Experience Sampling Method: Measuring the Quality of Everyday Life

Joel M. Hektner is an Associate Professor in Human Development and Family Science at North Dakota State University. He holds a Ph.D. in Psychology: Human Development from the University of Chicago and an A.B. in psychology from Princeton University. Before arriving at NDSU, Hektner was a research scientist in child and adolescent psychiatry at the University of Minnesota. He has used ESM to study  the developmental implications of longitudinal changes in adolescent experiences of flow and has written chapters on ESM in several books. In collaboration with students, he has conducted ESM studies of college students, adolescents in residential treatment, and LGB emerging adults. His research interests primarily involve family and peer factors that promote optimal development and evaluations of preventive interventions for antisocial behavior. He is presently working on strategies to strengthen positive peer culture among elementary and middle school children, and to promote more positive parent-child relations.

Jennifer Schmidt is Assistant Professor of Educational Psychology at Northern Illinois University. She earned her Ph.D. in Psychology: Human Development from the University of Chicago. Her current research focuses on resilience, motivation, and adolescent engagement in daily challenges. She has been conducting research involving the Experience Sampling Method (ESM) for over 10 years. Dr. Schmidt is former Director of Research at the Alfred P. Sloan Center on Parents, Children, and Work at the University of Chicago, where she directed an ESM study involving parents and children from 500 families across the United States. Her work to date has involved samples of children, adolescents, and adults. She has conducted ESM research within the context of families, elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools. Dr. Schmidt has trained national and international teams of researchers in ESM study design, administration and analysis.

Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is the Director of the Quality of Life Research Center at the Claremont Graduate School (CGU). His research interests include creativity and innovation, flow and motivation, leadership, work satisfaction, happiness, ethics in business and professions and school-to-work transitions. Dr. Csikszentmihalyi came to the Drucker School at CGU after spending over twenty years at the University of Chicago where he was a Professor of Human Development. He co-founded the "Positive Psychology" movement in The American Psychological Association.

Professor Csikszentmihalyi has written numerous articles and his books include the best-selling Flow, Being Adolescent, The Evolving Self, and Creativity. He is a member of the American Academy of Education, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Leisure Sciences.