Comparing Two Methods for Exploring Consciousness: Descriptive Experience Sampling and Micro-Phenomenological Interviews

Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems 22(1), 84-106, 2024 COMPARING TWO METHODS FOR EXPLORING CONSCIOUSNESS: DESCRIPTIVE EXPERIENCE SAMPLING AND MICRO-PHENOMENOLOGICAL INTERVIEWS Julian L. Bass-Krueger1, *, Elisa G. Wiedemann2 and Ema Demšar3 1 University of Vienna Vienna, Austria 2 2 Central European University Vienna, Austria 2 3 Monash University Melbourne, Australia 1 DOI: 10.7906/indecs.22.1.5 Regular article Received: 11 March 2023. Accepted: 21 February 2024. ABSTRACT Methods are arising in first-person research aimed for deeper understanding of lived experience. Here we compare two of the most frequently used methods – Descriptive Experience Sampling and the micro-phenomenological interview. Both look at short episodes of experience. Both have safeguards to limit biases and distortions from first-person reporting. But these methods are still different in terms of how they deal with memory, questioning, and analysis. We report on an exploratory study that used both methods in the context of a common task. Four participants were interviewed about their experience of a mental imagery task using both methods. Descriptive Experience Sampling results focused more on fine-grained details of visual experiences. micro-phenomenological interview results focused more on how experience extended over time, and how participants engaged with the task. These differences in results demonstrate how the applied methods differ in their focus and scope, and present a direction for future comparison, investigation and potential integration of first-person methods. KEY WORDS empirical phenomenology, descriptive experience sampling, micro-phenomenological interviews CLASSIFICATION APA: 2260 JEL: I12 *Corresponding author, : ; +43 6607666688; *Margaretenstraße 132/13, 1050 Vienna, Austria Comparing two methods for exploring consciousness: descriptive experience sampling and … INTRODUCTION It is possible that as you are reading this you feel an itch somewhere on your body. Or you start to form a sensory impression – say, of a white sandy beach, with clear blue water, the smell of salt, and the gentle chirping of birds in the background. Even if you have resisted these suggestions, chances are that you are still having some kind of conscious experience. To give a pragmatic definition, for a conscious person, there is something that it is like to be that person [1]. In recent decades, new methods have been developed that aim at providing scientifically admissible descriptions of subjective experience1 [2]. In this article, we will look at two of the most wide-spread: Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES) and the micro-phenomenological interview (MPI). DES was pioneered by Russell Hurlburt in the late 70s and refined over the course of subsequent decades [3]. It uses random beeps to direct participants towards specific, concrete episodes of experience. The micro-phenomenological interview (MPI) was adapted by Claire Petitmengin from Pierre Vermersch’s explicitation interview [4]. The MPI aims to guide participants to a state in which memory becomes immediate and lived [5], taking into account the biases and errors frequent in unguided recall of experience. Both methods seek detailed descriptions of lived experience. And both want to recentralize consciousness as a worthy topic of research. First-person research has had a rocky history [6, 7]. In the early 20th century, first-person research was a major pillar of psychology. But this was marred by a prolonged disagreement between two rival ‘introspectionist’ camps [4, 8]. One side argued for the possibility of thoughts without any imagery (visual, auditory, etc). The other side held this was impossible. Other disagreements compounded and eventually the domain of psychology moved on, leaving introspection behind. Throughout the 20th century, behavioural, neural, and computational approaches to studying the human mind rose in prominence. When consciousness was investigated, this was mostly done from the outside – through its traces on the world – rather than from within – how it was experienced. An influential paper by Nisbett and Wilson [9] further kicked first-person research when it was down. It solidified the notion that first-person data is flawed and distorted by heuristics, overgeneralizations, and memory problems. People simply do not know what is in their consciousness. You might expect us to lash back at Nisbett and Wilson but we actually do not disagree! Biases of memory and attention get in the way of accurately describing consciousness. In fact, the founding authors of both DES and MPI have directly addressed Nisbett and Wilson’s critiques. Hurlburt and Heavey [10] point out that the DES method actually complies with oft-overlooked prescriptions that Nisbett and Wilson give for how first-person research can be done right. These include: 1) interrupting a process at the moment it was occurring, 2) alerting subjects to pay careful attention to their cognitive process, and 3) coaching them in introspective procedures. Random beeps in participants’ everyday life are meant to attune them to the moment directly preceding the beep. As for the MPI, Petitmengin and colleagues [11] sought to replicate a study inspired by Nisbett and Wilson’s critiques. Participants were given a choice and then tricked to believe they made the opposite choice. In the original study [12], participants were largely unable to detect this manipulation. However, in the conceptual replication, with an MPI conducted immediately after the participant made the choice, participants’ ability to detect the manipulation significantly improved [11]. Both methods have guidelines to narrow in on specific moments of experience and to limit biases. They aim to guide participants away from generalisation and towards concrete lived 85 J. Bass-Krueger, E. Wiedemann and E. Demšar instances. Experience described in the abstract is an amalgamation of warped memory, self-perception, conceptual frames, and fleeting impressions. ‘This morning I had breakfast and felt sleepy’. However, specific experience manifests itself as a flow of vivid nows. ‘Now I’m watching the cream dissolve in my coffee. Now I’m picturing what would happen if gravity reversed overnight and I had to rearrange my furniture on the ceiling’. These nows, so vivid when lived, can dissolve in memory like cream in coffee, so that we might forget their original colour. Methods of first-person research and empirical phenomenology [13] aim for that colour. Despite similar intentions, there has been some contention between methods. Hurlburt and Akhter [14] have questioned the validity of the MPI. Petitmengin has argued about DES that “the beeper is not suitable for observing very brief or very fine subjective events” [5; p.253]. What is the nature of this disagreement? Does it imply that ‘empirical phenomenology’ doomed to the same fate as introspection, with unresolved differences once (...truncated)