Differences between the Idiographic and Nomothetic Approach

The idiographic approach maintains a more individual perspective on personality traits, while the nomothetic approach is focused on the group aspect. The idiographic approach has the advantage of producing a deeper understanding of specific subjects related to personality by focusing on individuals. The disadvantage of this approach can be that it is time-consuming and cannot be applied to a large group of people. The nomothetic approach has a perspective that focuses on the group, and the universally shared personality traits. This is an advantage to those who seek to determine patterns among people, and view personality traits through a reductionist perspective. The nomothetic approach is more atomistic than the idiographic approach because it focuses on the "whole", as it ties back all personality traits universally. The nomothetic approach is also more reductionist than the idiographic approach because since it focuses on the shared personality traits among people, it is used to to reduce all the patterns from the data collected from the groups to see the similarities we all have in relation to personality, despite the differences observed.