Idiographic vs Nomothetic

• IDIOGRAPHIC: Focuses on the individuals and emphasises uniqueness. This favours qualitative methods in research.
• NOMOTHETIC: Seeks to formulate general laws of behaviour based on the study of groups and the use of statistical methods (quantitative). Attempting to summarise differences between people through generalisations.
• QUALITATIVE: Non-numerical data
• • Most idiographic research is qualitative
  • Participants would be interviewed in depth and the focus may be on a particular facet of human behaviour, such as how the participants coped with their experiences (using unstructured interviews)
  • Such data is analysed and emergent themes are identified
  • Conclusions may help with people going through similar experiences, or more widely, may help mental health professionals determine best practice
• Psychodynamic is Idiographic

  • Psychologists such as Freud used many case studies to try and get to the roots of human behaviour
  • His dream analysis on the Wolfman was specific and included many details only relevant to that individual. The conclusions drawn were of a personal basis for explaining his patient’s issues.
• Humanistic approach is idiographic

  • Focuses purely on the individual, and self actualisation
  • Since this is a hypothetical spectrum specific to different people, it uses qualitative information (descriptive details) to convey and justify its point.
• Allport 1961

  • For his research into the human personality (he divided it into three components: cardinal, central and secondary), he penned the ‘idiographic approach’
  • Claimed qualitative personality tests are more insightful than highly generalisable mathematical data
• Nomothetic research most closely fits traditional models of the scientific method in psychology

  • Hypotheses are formulated
  • Numerical data is produced and analysed for its statistical significance
  • Nomothetic approach seeks to quantify (count) human behaviour
• Behaviourist approach is nomothetic

  • We are programmed responders to our environment
  • Skinner used a very specific sample
• Biological approach is nomothetic

  • The biological approach uses quantitative data
  • Studies such as Nesdalt (finding concordance rates between mental health disorders) and Christiansen (finding concordance rates between twin criminality) all pin behaviour on complex, biological causes, such as genetics.
• Eysenck’s theory of personality is nomothetic

  • His use of scales to measure this collected quantitative data, which was then applied to all criminals, despite other studies disputing his theory (Farrington).
• Nomothetic = objective. Laws of behaviour are only possible if methods of assessment are delivered in a standardised way. Ensures true replication across samples and removes the contaminating influence of bias
• Idiographic tends not to believe that objectivity is possible. It is people’s individual experiences of their unique context that is important, rather than some underlying reality ‘out there’.
• Nomothetic approach has allowed psychology to represent itself as more of a scientific discipline. Experimental design, standardised variables and its use of statistical analysis are all contributors that have made data collected more reliable, valid and scientifically credible.
• Nomothetic approach has real life applicability - treatments for OCD, such as SSRIs, that prevent the reuptake and reabsorption of serotonin during synaptic transmission, are based on the nomothetic idea that the disorder is caused by neurochemical imbalance.
• However, drug treatments are not 100% successful for everyone. 40-60% of people see a reduction of symptoms, so some psychologists have employed more idiographic approaches to treating disorders, such as CBT, that explain them through the patient’s experiences and perspective.
• The nomothetic approach only provides a superficial understanding of human behaviour. Milgram found that 65% of people will obey an authority figure in his electric shock experiment, but due to the extent of quantitative data collection and statistical analysis, the findings do not venture an explanation for why such a behaviour was carried out. Some participants weren’t even debriefed afterwards.
• The idiographic approach is unable to provide an applicable definition towards mental health disorders or psychiatric illnesses. Due to the subjective and specific nature of its research, it fails to provide anything productive on a practical and wide-scale basis, hindering not only psychology’s placement as a scientific discipline, but its main goal of application.
• Idiographic approach is very time consuming - Freud’s case study Little Hans has 150 pages!