Gordon Alan Marlatt (November 26, 1941 – March 14, 2011) was a leading American-Canadian

clinical psychologist Clinical psychology is an integration of social science, theory, and clinical knowledge for the purpose of understanding, preventing, and relieving psychologically based distress or dysfunction and to promote subjective well-being and persona ...

in the field of

addictive behavior An addictive behavior is a behavior, or a stimulus related to a behavior (e.g., sex or food), that is both rewarding and reinforcing, and is associated with the development of an addiction. Apart from the aforementioned addictive behaviors the mos ...

s from the 1980s through the 2000s. He conducted pioneering research in

harm reduction Harm reduction, or harm minimization, refers to a range of public health policies designed to lessen the negative social and/or physical consequences associated with various human behaviors, both legal and illegal. Harm reduction is used to de ...

brief intervention Brief intervention can often be referred to as screening and brief intervention (SBI) or, in England, identification and brief advice (IBA). Brief interventions are a technique used to initiate change for an unhealthy or risky behaviour such as smo ...

s, and

relapse prevention Relapse prevention (RP) is a cognitive-behavioral approach to relapse with the goal of identifying and preventing high-risk situations such as unhealthy substance use, obsessive-compulsive behavior, sexual offending, obesity, and depression.Witki ...

Biography

Marlatt was born in 1941 in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

, to Vera Whitehead and Sholto Marlatt (a

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; french: Aviation royale canadienne, ARC) is the air and space force of Canada. Its role is to "provide the Canadian Forces with relevant, responsive and effective airpower". The RCAF is one of three environm ...

flight officer The title flight officer was a military rank used by the United States Army Air Forces during World War II, and also an air force rank in several Commonwealth countries, where it was used for female officers and was equivalent to the rank of flig ...

who died in 1942). Marlatt received his bachelor's degree in psychology from the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public university, public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks a ...

in 1964, and his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

in clinical psychology from

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universit ...

in 1968.

Career

After serving on the faculties of the

(1968–1969) and the

University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an educational institution, institution of higher education, higher (or Tertiary education, tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. Universities ty ...

(1969–1972), he joined the University of Washington faculty in the fall of 1972. He eventually became a professor of psychology and director of the Addictive Behaviors Research Center at that institution. He conducted pioneering research in three areas: harm reduction, brief interventions, and relapse prevention. In 1996, Marlatt was appointed as a member of the National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse of the

National Institute on Drug Abuse The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is a United States federal government research institute whose mission is to "advance science on the causes and consequences of drug use and addiction and to apply that knowledge to improve individual a ...

(NIDA). He served as the president of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors from 1983 to 1984; president of the Section for the Development of Clinical Psychology as an Experimental-Behavioral Science of the Society of Clinical Psychology (Division 12 of the

American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States, with over 133,000 members, including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants, and students. It ha ...

), 1985–1986; and president of the Association for the Advancement of Behavior Therapy, 1991–1992. Marlatt's books include ''Alcoholism: New Directions in Behavioral Research and Treatment'' (1978), ''Relapse Prevention: Maintenance strategies in the treatment of addictive behaviors'' (1985, 2005), ''Assessment of Addictive Behaviors'' (1985; 2005), ''Addictive Behaviors Across the Lifespan'' (1993), ''Harm Reduction: Pragmatic Strategies for Managing High-Risk Behaviors'' (1998), ''Changing Addictive Behavior'' (co-authored with Dennis M. Donovan and Jalie Tucker) (1999), and ''Brief Alcohol Screening and Intervention for College Students (BASICS) Manual'' (1999), ''The Tao of Sobriety: Helping You to Recover from Alcohol and Drug Addiction'' (Forward) (2002), and ''Therapist's Guide to Evidence-Based Relapse Prevention'' (2007). In addition, he published over 200 book chapters and journal articles and served on the editorial boards of numerous professional journals, including the ''Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology'', ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology'', ''Addictive Behaviors'', and ''Journal of Studies on Alcohol''. Marlatt received continuous funding for his research from a variety of agencies including the

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), as part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, supports and conducts biomedical and behavioural research on the causes, consequences, treatment, and prevention of alcoholism and ...

, the

ABMRF/The Foundation for Alcohol Research ABMRF/The Foundation for Alcohol Research is a private, non-profit foundation supporting young investigators researching the effects of alcohol on health and behavior. The Foundation's mission is "To achieve a better understanding of the effect ...

, and the

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is an American philanthropic organization. It is the largest one focused solely on health. Based in Princeton, New Jersey, the foundation focuses on access to health care, public health, health equity, ...

. In 1990, Marlatt was awarded The Jellinek Memorial Award for outstanding contributions to knowledge in the field of alcohol studies from the International Society for Biomedical Research on Alcoholism. In 2001, he was given the Innovators in Combating Substance Abuse Award by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and in 2004 he received the Distinguished Researcher Award from the Research Society on Alcoholism. He received the Distinguished Psychologist award for Professional Contribution to Knowledge from the Washington State Psychological Association in 1990 and the Distinguished Scientist Award from the Society for a Science of Clinical Psychology in 2000.

Urge Surfing

Marlatt popularized the concept of "urge surfing" as a coping mechanism for addiction. The strategy involves picturing addictive urges as physical waves that rise in intensity, peak, and eventually crash and subside.

Personal life

Marlatt was married four times. He married his fourth wife, Kitty Moore, in Seattle on July 18, 2010. He had one son and three stepchildren. Marlatt died on March 11, 2011, of

kidney failure Kidney failure, also known as end-stage kidney disease, is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney failure is classified as eit ...

Warm Beach, Washington Warm Beach is a census-designated place (CDP) in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. The population was 2,437 at the 2010 census. Based on per capita income, one of the more reliable measures of affluence, Warm Beach ranks 66th of 522 ar ...

References

External links