Biographical method in psychology

Literary studies, sociology and psychology use the biographical method of research, which allows studying the work of art, the features of social development, and the psychological development of the personality through a description of the biography of the writer, individual member of society, or a particular person.

In psychology, this method is presented in three versions. The first is the description and analysis of a person in retrospect, on the basis of already available documents and other sources. The second option is a long-term study, the collection of biographical data throughout life for subsequent analysis. The third way is by means of a causometry, i.e. The establishment of connections between the various events of life, indicated and estimated by the person in terms of their significance.

The traditional biographical method

As a rule, various documentary sources are used to describe and study the life of a person: letters, diaries, memoirs of contemporaries and their own, all that has survived in time. But such data, as a rule, are incomplete, certain periods of life simply turn into "black holes" of biographies, and it becomes impossible to learn anything about them. Another problem in the study of post factum is the inaccuracy of certain facts, the subjectivity of their assessment, the inconsistency in describing the same events by different people.

It is important for the researcher-psychologist not only to obtain reliable information about the biography, the external life of a person, the description of which he is engaged in, but, first of all, his emotional, emotional experiences associated with certain events, their significant evaluation. Unfortunately, documentary facts reflect a person's psychological state only partially, and sometimes they do not give such information at all.

Longitudinal biographical method in psychology

Another way to study a person's biography is based on long-term observations of his life's path. This is a psychological experiment that lasts a lifetime. Similar studies deal with the direction in science, called "ontogenetic psychology", which is widely developed in America and Europe.

Longitudinal observations in the perspective of the development of personality are certainly more complete and provide an opportunity to select different objects and objects for analysis. In addition, they allow us to use real measurements of various psychological parameters, rather than rely on documentary evidence. But the duration in time makes them blurred, and does not give a solid idea of the development of individuality. Another drawback of such studies is the proportionality of ongoing long-term observations with the personality of the experimenter, which gives a very subjective assessment of life events.

The causal biographical method

This method was founded by A. A. Kronik, who tried to model the life path of a person with the help of special techniques that trace the causal relationship of life events. The essence of the method is that a person selects the most significant events for him, which gives a certain positive or negative assessment, depending on their impact on life. Linking these values to the personality, character and temperament, as well as significant values, one can evaluate the past life and build the right perspectives in the future. This is the aim of the methods of causal analysis, which use different means for obtaining experimental material: interviews, projective techniques, simulation of game situations.

The data obtained are subjective, but this biographical method, unlike traditional, is more therapeutic and useful, since it allows a person to assess his own way of life, to structure it, which allows for a deeper analysis and evaluation.