Case studies of brain damaged patients as an effective method for investigating human memory

Question 1

ao1 - what is a case study?

Answer 1

an in-depth qualitative investigation of a single person or small group of people who have suffered a brain injury

Question 2

ao1 - what does a case study look into?

Answer 2

a unique or singular event that would normally be unethical to research such as individuals suffering with brain damage

Question 3

ao1 - how are case studies carried out?

Answer 3

carried out over a long period of time using triangulation to gain quantitative and qualitative data on a particular situation whilst also observing the changes overtime in human memory of brain damaged patients

Question 4

ao1 - what types of methods do case studies use?

Answer 4

triangulation using methods such as writing diaries, structured and unstructured interviews and questionnaires

Question 5

ao3 - how can case studies of brain damaged patients be used?

Answer 5

help people with similar brain injuries by applying it to treatments for helping patients as it gives an insight into issues that can’t be researched in a lab

Question 6

ao3 - generalisability of case studies into brain damaged patients (positive and negative)

Answer 6

ungeneralisable as there is only one or very few participants and so won’t be representative of the entire population
can be generalised in some cases as everyone has the same brain functions so it gives a greater understanding of how the brain works

Question 7

ao3 - reliability of case studies

Answer 7

unreliable as the cannot be replicated because they deal with unique occurrences so it would be hard to find a similar case to replicate the study

Question 8

ao3 - validity of case studies

Answer 8

high in validity as the researcher can collect in-depth qualitative data which can give accurate data and is conducted in the patient’s natural environment so also has ecological validity

Question 9

ao3 - ethical issues of case studies of brain damaged patients (positive and negative)

Answer 9

may not have the capacity to give consent i.e. those with memory loss may forget that they gave consent
harm was not caused to patient by the researcher so no further harm is being caused to the participants

Question 10

issue and debate - psychology as a science

Answer 10

case studies are usually not scientific

in cognitive psychology brain scans and other scientific methods are used which shows psychology being scientific