Idiographic And Nomothetic Approaches Flashcards
What does idiographic mean?
- It comes from the Greek word ‘idios’ which means ‘own’ or ‘private’.
- Psychologists who take an idiographic approach focus on the individual, and emphasise the unique personal experience of human nature.
What does Nomothetic mean?
- Nomothetic comes from the Greek word ‘nomos’ which means ‘law’.
- Psychologists who take a nomothetic approach are concerned with establishing general laws, based on the study of large groups of people, and the use of statistical (quantitative) techniques to analyse data.
What types of methods do psychologists who take an idiographic approach prefer and why?
Give examples
They prefer qualitative methods of research such as case studies, thematic analysis, unstructured interviews as qualitative research provides greater detailed data giving them an increased insight into the individual behaviour.
Why are case studies important in psychology?
- They give a psychologist increased insight through really quality at in depth data into an individual or small group behaviour which can be used to evaluate a theory
- An individual case study can highlight flaws within a theory and significantly undermine other research.
Give me example of a case study that highlights flaws within a theory?
-Shallice and Warrington examined the case of Patient KF, who experienced a motorbike accident. KF’s short term forgetting of auditory information was greater than his forgetting of visual information, suggesting that short term memory (STM) consists of multiple components. Consequently patient KF undermines the multi-store model of memory suggesting that the STM is not one unitary component.
What statistical methods do psychologists who take a nomothetic approach use and are favoured?
-experiments, correlations and psychometric testing.
What is the main approach out of the used in scientifically orientated psychology and give examples why?
- Nomothetic approach is the main approach used within scientifically orientated psychology.
- Biological psychologists take a nomothetic approach when explaining psychological disorders such as Schizophrenia and OCD as being caused by specific innate biological factors such as neurotransmitters. They also develop treatments that are used on all patients.
- Cognitive psychologists such as Atkinson and Shriffin, developed general laws, such as the multi store model of memory which they believed could be generalised to everyone.
- Social psychologists take a nomothetic approach to creat general conclusions about human behaviour: Such as situational factors that could cause us to obey or conform and resist social influence.
AO3 for idiographic
- Case studies can evaluate theories and undermine research 😃
- unable to produce general laws, which contradicts the main aim of psychology ☹️
AO3 for Nomothetic approach
Scientific 😃
Looses sight of whole person ☹️
Outline case study being a strength of the idiographic approach
P:The idiographic approach using case studies as a method of research is praised as it allows for psychological theories to be evaluated.
E: Shallice and Warrington investigated the case of Patient KF who suffered from a motorcycle accident. His short term memory forgetting for auditory information was greater than short term memory forgetting for visual information.
E: This suggests the short term memory is made up of at least two components responsible for auditory and visual information.
L: This has highlighted the flaws of the multi store model suggesting it is not a unitary component as Atkinson and Shriffrin have pointed out to be. This shows us case studies prompt research into phenomenons in this case memory which increases our knowledge on human behaviour.
Outline how the idiographic approach is criticised for not taking a scientific approach.
P: The idiographic approach is criticised as it cannot produce general laws or predictions about human behaviour, and this severely limits the development of effective practical use to treat psychological disorders.
E: Psychology which is a study dedicated to provide application from its scientific understanding this is a devastating weakness from the idiographic approach.
E:This is all a result of the idiographic approach relying only on qualitative in depth techniques to gather data on behaviour which makes it difficult to arrive at any justifiable generalisations on behaviour.
L: This contradicts to the central purpose of mature science which is to explain the most variation in the fewest possible terms so that phenomena can be predicted and ultimately controlled. Therefore this criticises wether psychology is actually a science.
Strength for nomothetic being scientific
P: The nomothetic approach is praised for being scientific.
E:The use of quantitate, controlled experimental techniques have allowed psychologists to have the ability to predict behaviour.
E: controlled methods also allow for replication to examine reliability of findings which has helped psychology become a scientific discipline. The development of theories from using empirical testing is a big contributing factor to psychology being a science.
Weakness of nomothetic approach loosing sight of the whole person
P: Due to the reliance of the nomothetic approach relying on quantitative data and statistical analysis it looses sight of the whole person which criticise the approach.
E: It is argued that the nomothetic approach only provides a superficial understanding of human behaviour.
E: An example of this is milligrams research which used quantitative methods to investigate behaviour found that 65% of people would obey an unjust order and inflict 450 volts on an individual from an authority figure however it did not explain why.
L: Therefore the idiographic approach would have investigated obedience using qualitative methods which would give us an explanation to why they obeyed.
