Russell Branaghan is an associate professor in the human systems engineering program with the Polytechnic School at Arizona State University. Branaghan is cognitive psychologist who studies learning, memory and decision-making especially in the context of product design and human factors. He joined ASU after working in industry (Hewlett-Packard and IBM) and consulting for 15 years. In consulting, he served as senior vice president and partner at Fitch Worldwide and senior vice president and partner at Lextant Corporation.

His research focuses on cognitive human factors - identifying ways to make products and systems easy to learn, efficient to use, and easy to remember. Branaghan's favorite topics include:

• Medical devices such as programmers for pacemakers/defibrillators and external defibrillators.
• Product design for first responders (e.g. police, fire, EMT).
• Aviation human factors such as the design of cockpit displays and controls.
• Cognitve science of creativity and innovation
• Consumer psychology of branding and brand personality.

At present, the National Science Foundation, Motorola and the Veteran's Health Administration sponsor Branaghan's research and students. His consulting clients include the Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory. Previous clients include HP, Motorola, Microsoft, Nike, Disney, PepsiCo, Sprint, Qwest, Medtronic, Cardinal Health and others.