In this research methods in psychology video we will cover the use of case studies.
We will discuss what is included in the definition of a case study and describe a few examples
of famous case studies.
The strengths and weaknesses of using a case study in psychological research will also
be covered.
INTRO In a case study a researcher gathers a range
of information on an individual, a group or an organisation.
Interviews are often the main source of data collected.
But the researcher can include observations of behaviour and experimental findings from
psychological tests, and even include content analysis on records like diary's, what makes
case studies special is the level of detail that is collected about the individual or
group.
Case studies tend to be investigations of psychologically unusual individuals, but you
can do case studies of events, such as looking at the reasons for football violence by reviewing
footage and interviewing criminals and police, or you could do case studies on organisations,
such as the hiring policies of google, or the teaching at outstanding schools.
You may even do a case study on a group of typical members of a demographic, like a group
of 15 year old working class boys.
The type of data collected is usually qualitative because of the use of interviews, but when
researchers include experimental techniques, quantitative data can be used to back up qualitative
findings.
The duration of a case study can be a couple of hours, a few days or years to decades.
A short case study is called a snapshot and a long case study is called a longitudinal
study.
Longitudinal studies are particularly interesting because you can observe changes over time,
but as you can imagine, it's expensive to keep longitudinal studies funded over many
years.
Case studies have been used significantly in clinical psychology, brain-damaged patients
often have unusual symptoms and this gives insight on the functioning of the brain.
For example Paul Broca researched a patient referred to as tan, this patient could only
say Tan, work while Tan was alive was combined with a post mortem dissection of his brain
after death.
This work led to the identification of Broca's area, a part of the brain responsible for
speech production.
Freud used a number of case studies to develop psychodynamics, the most famous being little
Hans.
This young boy had a phobia of horses that Freud identified as being symbolic of a fear
of his father.
Freud conducted this case study by sending a series of letters to his father, and used
this case study to support his theory of childhood development
Case studies of children with abnormal upbringings can be used to test ideas of childhood development.
One example is the case of a child called Genie who was severely deprived of care from
infancy until 13.
Even with the help of trained psychologists she was unable to develop beyond simple communication
and struggled to behave appropriately.
Genie demonstrated the importance of the early years and critical periods of childhood in
learning language and social skills.
Evaluation of case studies We can positively evaluate case studies easily,
there just isn't another method that collects as much in-depth and rich information about
individuals.
This leads to a high level of realism that can be argued to be highly valid.
Psychologists call this approach holistic, understanding a behaviour or individual not
from one just one perspective, but from a range.
It's the preferred approach of a group of psychologists called humanists.
Case studies often look at the behaviour of very rare individuals, this behaviour and
the participants' situations can't be replicated in the lab, genie's situation for example
could never be ethically replicated.
This means case studies are often the only way to study certain behaviours.
Another strength is just one unusual case study can show a pre-existing psychological
theory is incorrect or not yet complete.
But there are critical evaluations of case studies.
Most of these critical evaluations question the scientific nature of case studies.
For example case studies are often completed long after events and depend on memory, recalled
in interviews which is often inaccurate.
And you also have the problems of interviews like social desirability bias.
Being studies often of one unique individual, the findings from case studies can't be generalised
to wider populations.
It may be a range of factors of that individual, that caused a certain behaviour, rarther than
for example damage to a particular part of the brain.
Linked to this point, the exact replication of case studies is impossible.
The amount of data collected is large, however a problem with this is more data is collected
than can be used, the researcher ultimately decides what to include in their report, and
may only include data that supports their ideas.
This is one example of researcher bias, another way case studies suffer from researcher bias
is as researchers work so closely with a case, often over many years, they may lose objectivity
when interpreting behaviour.
While case studies shouldn't be generalised, and lack the scientific credibility of experimental
methods, they can generate hypotheses than can be tested experimentally and then ultimately
accepted, well over 100 years after Paul Broca's and Tans death, we can now use FMRI brain
scans to confirm the existence of the region of the brain associated with speech production.
So that was case studies,I have 6 tutorial videos covering the 2017,18 and 19 AS and
A-level research methods sections, these videos have worked examples to every question and
are full of exam tips.
Patrons at the neuron level and above can access these, and many, many more hours of
exam tutorial videos, as well as over a hundred printable resources from across the A-level
over on psych boost .com I do want to thank all the students and teachers
who have supported psych boost over on patreon during the development of the research methods
unit.
It's their support that allows me to teach part time so I can make psych boost on youtube
for everyone.
So thanks to them, and I will see you all in the next research methods video, aims and
hypothesis.