Psychobiography definition of philosophy
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Definition
Psychobiography, or psychological biography, is most accurately defined as “the intensive life-span study of an individual of historic significance in socio-cultural context using psychological and historiographic research methods and interpreted from established theories of psychology” (Ponterotto , p. ). Psychobiography is classified as a subdivision of psychohistory, which is concerned with the psychological study of significant groups or events throughout history. For example, the study of the origins, key characters, and development of psychoanalysis as a system of psychology at the turn of the twentieth century would constitute a psychohistory, whereas an intensive psychological profile of Sigmund Freud would be a psychobiography. Psychobiography focuses on the inner psychological drives and motivations that led to the historic subject’s thinking, feeling, and behavior during their lifetime.
Introduction
Psychobiography has been
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People
Published in Emmanuel Tsekleves, John Keady, Design for People Living with Dementia,
Emmanuel Tsekleves, John Keady
True to the philosophy of a person-centred approach, this social theory did not emerge from the consideration of data collected from a large numbers of individuals. It was, instead, built around a single case history, or psychobiography as it was originally named, undertaken by Kitwood himself (Kitwood, a). This psychobiography was conducted by Kitwood in the late s with a person called ‘Rose’ whose struggle to assert her personality through the mask of her confusion triggered Kitwood’s thoughts on the need to reconceptualise the experience of dementia. After attempting to agree a meaning to Rose’s actions and behaviours with colleagues at the Bradford Dementia Group (see: Kitwood, a for a fuller discussion), the team constructed a multi-dimensional theory that identified a range of social and subjective factors that they believed shaped Rose’s experien
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Psychobiography
The begrepp psychobiography in its broadest sense designates any approach to biography that emphasizes inner life and psychological development, but in the more specific sense, it means the use of a formalized psychological theory and concepts in writing biography, and it received its decisive impetus from psychoanalysis. Psychobiography in the broad sense goes back at least to Plutarch, but Freud's book on Leonardo's childhood () fryst vatten often seen as one of the first to apply a formalized metapsychology.
Although many biographies in the past had dealt with psychological development, the ankomst of psychoanalysis in the twentieth century has offered a comprehensive psychological theory of early human development that explains the shaping of the life course. Psychobiography generally focuses on the formative early years of life in an effort to uncover the relational dynamics, traumas, or complexes that might explain later behavior.
Psychobiography is a major instrument