Russell Hurlburt

Russell T. Hurlburt (born 1945) is a professor of psychology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He is the founder of the Descriptive Experience Sampling method, which aims to reveal the contents of consciousness over short spans of time.

Early life and education

Russell T. Hurlburt, the son of Richard G. Hurlburt and Ruth (née Sherrard) Hurlburt, married Roberta Rochkar in 1967. He earned his Bachelors of Science in engineering in aeronautical engineering from Princeton University. He received a M.S. in mechanical engineering in 1967 from the University of New Mexico.

Hurlburt took up the study of psychology while playing trumpet at military funerals during the Vietnam War. He was frustrated by the lack of attention psychology gave to everyday experiences and decided to pursue this. He earned a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, with an unpublished dissertation titled ''Self-observation and self-control,'' at the University of South Dakota.

Career

Hurlburt started developing Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES) in the 1970s. In 1973 he invented a beeper capable of delivering random beeps and patented it. Hurlburt's research started with the use of the beeper device in naturalistic settings. Originally he gave participants a questionnaire with a limited range of options. This facilitated quantitative comparison. Hurlburt reportedly grew frustrated at the limitations this placed on unveiling experience. He moved towards more in-depth qualitative interviewing.

DES recommendations for how first-person reports could be more accurately obtained include 1) interrupting a process at the moment it is occurring, 2) alerting subjects to pay careful attention to their cognitive process, and 3) coaching them in introspective procedures.

When refining the method, Hurlburt at first sampled himself extensively for around a year. He then concluded that it would be better not to use himself as a subject. Phenomena that he observed in himself he might more easily attribute to others. For approximately the next 25 years, he declined to participate in DES as a subject until the urgings of his students convinced him to try.

Hurlburt is a professor of psychology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Selected publications

Books

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Articles

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Patent

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References

Additional sources

*Douglas, Kate. (2023)
How are you thinking
''New Scientist''.
*Oakes, Kelly. (2019)
What the voice inside your head says about you
''BBC Future''.

External links

* (1:21:35 hours)
Interview with Russell T. Hurlburt, Pioneer of the Investigation of Inner Experience
by Dominique Musorrafiti, July 10, 2024.

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Living people
Princeton University School of Engineering and Applied Science alumni
University of New Mexico alumni
University of South Dakota alumni
University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty
21st-century American psychologists
Year of birth missing (living people)
1945 births