Psychobiography: A Research Method in Search of a Home

Abstract

This paper explains the interdisciplinary narrative research method of psychobiography, using examples from the author's psychobiographical work about Dian Fossey. Dr Fossey was the primatologist and occupational therapist famous for saving the highland mountain gorillas from extinction. She is known worldwide from her popular book, Gorillas in the Mist, and from the 1987 film of the same name. She sustained her research centre in Rwanda successfully for 18 years before her murder in 1985. Prior to her primatology career, Fossey graduated from an occupational therapy programme in the United States and worked with children for 10 years. The paper details the steps to write a psychobiography, the strategies for analysis and the markers of a good psychobiography. It is suggested that psychobiography is a method that can find a home in occupational therapy and occupational science. The reasons that psychobiography can mesh with occupational therapy are discussed. A second paper, a psychobiographical study of Dian Fossey, is in press.