idiographic and monothetic

• Idiographic View


  -          views people to have unique personality structures

  -          some traits like the cardinal is more important in understanding the structure of some people than others

  -          emphasis to the unique psychological structure and that some traits are possessed by only one person

  -          this viewpoint also gives emphasis in variation of importance from person to person

  -          it uses methods such as case studies, bibliographical information, diaries, etc. for information gathering
• Nomothetic View

  -          indicates the people’s unique personality can be understood as having relatively greater or lesser amounts of traits that are consistent across people

  -          emphasizes comparability among individuals but sees people as unique in their combination of traits

  -          the belief is that people differ only in the amount of each trait

  -          it is this which constitutes their uniqueness

  -          this approach tends to use self report personality questions, factor analysis, etc.