个体的民主赋权、失业年轻人的骚乱、企业管理中的深刻变化、教育体系和千千万万人的生命历程,都是加速变化中的个体化的各种变异形式。与此同时,数以亿计的世界公民由于极端贫困,被排除在当今的个体化成就之外。这些现象以及另外一些相关现象的社会及科学重要性迅速增加。相反,个体化研究的概念整合努力却十分稀缺。当前这一研究领域中,人们只是对局部可操作化、测量方法和经验性证据作出有限的尝试,而焦点清晰的有关个体化的纵向研究和比较研究几乎没有。在社会科学领域作出全面克服这些缺点的努力的时机已经成熟。本文从理论观点和实证研究发现入手,详述了一个有关个体化差异的分析性概念。随后,概述了让这一概念可操作化的策略。这种讨论,为有效预测并管理个体化这种全球性趋势背后的那些具有根本意义的社会过程,提供了方法论上具有一致性和累积性的研究前景。 The individual’s democratic empowerment, the unrest in the unemployed youth, the profound changes in business management, the education system and the life course of tens of thousands of people all are various forms of variation that accelerate the individualization of change. At the same time, hundreds of millions of world citizens are excluded from today’s individualized achievements due to extreme poverty. The social and scientific importance of these phenomena, as well as of other related phenomena, is rapidly increasing. Conversely, the conceptual integration efforts of individualized research are scarce. In the current field of research, there are limited attempts to localize operability, methods of measurement, and empirical evidence, while focus is clear on longitudinal and comparative studies of individuation. The time has come to make efforts in the social sciences to fully overcome these shortcomings. This article starts with the theoretical and empirical research, detailing an analytical concept about individual differences. Subsequently, an overview of strategies to make this concept operational is outlined. This discussion provides a methodologically consistent and cumulative research perspective for the effective prediction and management of the fundamental social processes underlying such global trends of individuation.