Case Studies

Question 1

What are the features of a case study?

Answer 1

1) study an individual, group, event or institution in detail
2) often involve unusual circumstances
3) usually qualitative data
4) longitudinal

Question 2

How can data be collected?

Answer 2

1) interviews
2) observations
3) questionnaires
4) experimental or psychological testing
5) gathering additional data from family, friends and the individual

Question 3

What are the strengths of case studies?

Answer 3

1) detailed data and important facts are collected which may e overlooked by other methods
2) allows insight into situations which can’t be ‘created’ by researchers and studies unusual behaviour
3) contributes to understanding of ‘typical’ functioning
4) can generate hypotheses for future study

Question 4

What are the limitations of case studies?

Answer 4

1) replication is difficult meaning it is hard to measure reliability of results
2) difficult to generalise to wider population as focus on one person
3) subjective
4) low in validity
5) personal accounts may be inaccurate