Measurement-Burst Designs for Social Health Research

Questions about variability and change in human behavior lie at the heart of much research in the behavioral sciences. This commentary examines the use of the measurement-burst design (Nesselroade, 1991) as an approach to study within-person processes that transpire over very different temporal intervals. Consisting of repeated bursts of intensive (i.e., daily or momentary) assessments, the burst design can augment the type of information obtained from conventional daily diary and prospective longitudinal designs. We describe how the measurement-burst approach can improve detection of long-term intraindividual change, and how it can be used to study intraindividual variability and change in fine-grained temporal relationships between daily experiences (e.g., hassles) and psychological states (e.g., mood). Some of the difficulties of implementing and analyzing data from measurement-burst designs are discussed.