Howard M. Bahr has been a professor of Sociology at Brigham Young University (BYU) since 1973 and was director of field research for the study in 1999. Bahr received his bachelor's degree in Sociology with a minor in Psychology from BYU in 1962. He then went to study at the University of Texas at Austin where he received an M.A. in 1964 and a Ph.D. in 1965. Both of these were in Sociology with minors in Geography.