The Distance from Psychological Research to Real Life

摘要

Considering our experiences in everyday life, the result of research basedon sample assumed to be derived from a "population" cannot afford individualpredictions. That is because the variabilities within individuals which play animportant role in actual psychological processes are erased from the data in samples-based studies. In this article, we begin the discussion with how the intra-individualvariance contributes to individual prediction. As case study works on the basis ofvariability within each individual, it explores the intrinsic mechanism of develop-ment and emphasize the connection between person and environment. The questionof how to generalize from case studies requires that the researcher to selectivelyconsider some of the variance and construction of a hypothetical model that showshow different features of oppositions (Yin and Yang) are integrated into an abstractwhole that is applicable to all individual cases.