A01

• What is an idiographic approach?

  An approach to research which focuses on the individual case and emphasises on uniqueness in order to understand human behaviour
• Which type of data does an idiographic approach focus on?

  Qualitative and subjective data
• Which methods are used by the idiographic approach?

  Case studies, journals, unstructured interviews to capture subjective experiences
• Which approaches take an idiographic approach?

  Humanism and psychodynamic
• What is a nomothetic approach?

  An approach to research which seeks to formulate general laws of human behaviour based on the study of groups = goal of a scientific approach
• Which type of data does a nomothetic approach focus on?

  Quantitative and objective data
• Which methods are used by the nomothetic approach?

  Experiments and statistical testing
• Which approaches take a nomothetic approach?

  Behaviourism, cognitive, biological
• What is an interactionist approach in the context of the idiographic vs. nomothetic approach?

  Seeing the idiographic and nomothetic approach as complementary rather than contradictory and taking advantage of both to explain behaviour
• Explain why the cognitive approach can be seen as taking an interactionist approach

  They aim to create general laws (e.g. WMM), but use case studies to provide evidence for theories (e.g. patient KF)