PSYCHOLOGY

Psychology

Psychology

Idiographic-Nomothetic Psychology

Social scientists may choose to formulate either idiographic or nomothetic interpretations of phenomenona. These terms were coined by Wilhelm Windelbrand to describe the work of the natural sciences on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the cultural or human sciences, in which individual cases were studied. An essential conflict defines the two points of view. Scientific generalizations are assumed to be nomothetic or law-like. But for these predictions to be used, they must be applied to particular cases, and individual cases (idiographic analysis) may not conform to general laws.

Idiographic science involves the intensive analysis of single cases, with the attempt to formulate interpretive statements pertaining only to the case or to the class of phenomena that the case represents. Idiographic interpretations are based on the particularities of a given case. Their claim to validity rests on the power of the descriptions produced by the researcher. These descriptions attempt to capture the perspectives of those studied. It is assumed that different interpretations are likely to be meaningful in different realities. Any interpretation will be shaped by local particulars and interactions between the researcher and those studied.

Freud Theory

The very first personality studies of leaders applied qualitative analyses to single cases. Typically, these early investigations were conducted by psychoanalysts, and most of these inquiries are classed as psychobiographies. Sigmund Freud was among the first psychoanalysts to do so, publishing one of Moses and another on U.S. President Woodrow Wilson (posthumously with William C. Bullitt). Erik Erikson contributed psychobiographical studies of Martin Luther and Mahatma Gandhi; although neither is, properly speaking, a political leader, these inquiries provided a different model for carrying out such research. It is difficult to think of a famous or infamous head of state who has not been subjected to psychobiographical analyses. But among the vast collection, probably Adolf Hitler has attracted more attention than any other.

Needless to say, such investigations are not immune from criticism. The assessment of a leader's personality depends on being able to carry out a clinical evaluation from archival materials—speeches, correspondence, biographical records, and historical chronologies. This information may fall short compared to what is available from face-to-face interviews. Furthermore, too often the psychobiographer appears preoccupied with establishing that a given leader suffered from serious mental illness. That is why psychobiographies can sometimes be seen as “psychopathographies.” Finally, psychobiographers are seldom interested in discerning the general regularities relating personality and leadership.

Instead, the goal is almost invariably to explain some unique feature of a leader's personality, such as why Great Britain's King George III went mador why President Woodrow Wilson failed to secure passage of the treaty establishing the League of Nations. In brief, qualitative single case studies tend to have an idiographic rather than nomothetic orientation. That is, their aim is to explain distinctiveness rather than isolate broad laws of leader behavior. As a consequence, qualitative single case investigations are less equipped to provide answers to the seven questions posed earlier in the chapter. Those questions are clearly nomothetic in the sense that they concern empirical results that would apply to political leaders in ...