Case Studies (AQA GCSE Psychology): Revision Note

What is a case study?

• A case study is an in-depth, detailed and highly idiosyncratic account of a single participant, or a small group of participants, or an institution (e.g. a school)

• Case studies tend to amass mainly qualitative data, e.g:

  • Interviews with the participant and, possibly people connected to them e.g. family, friends, colleagues

  • Naturalistic observations of the participant either alone or interacting with others

  • Diary/journal entries written by the participant

• Case studies may also collect quantitative and/or scientific data, for example:

  • Psychometric tests e.g. IQ, personality and mental health measures

  • Scores achieved on, e.g memory tests

  • Clinical data such as MRI scans or blood tests 

• Most case studies are longitudinal i.e. tracking a participant's experience or progress over time, for example:

  • HM, a case study of an individual with anterograde amnesia following brain surgery, studied for 55 years

  • The 'Eve White/Eve Black' case, a study of dissociative identity disorder lasting several years

The ‘Eve White/Black’ case study was turned into a film, ‘The Three Faces of Eve’.

Evaluation of case studies

Strengths

• Case studies allow researchers to investigate rare or extreme conditions (e.g. severe brain damage, dissociative identity disorder) that it would be unethical to create deliberately. Because the condition already exists, studying it in depth raises no additional ethical concerns

• Case studies amass a wealth of rich, detailed, in-depth information, giving them high validity

• Researchers conducting a case study often don't start with a fixed hypothesis or narrow aim, so they are more open-minded and can pick up unexpected findings, rather than being limited by what they expected to find

Weaknesses

• Generalising from case studies is very difficult, as they tend to feature only one participant (or a small group), so the findings may not apply to anyone else

• Case studies rely heavily on qualitative data, which the researcher must interpret. This interpretation can be influenced by the researcher's own views or expectations, making case studies subjective and challenging the validity of the conclusions drawn

• The researcher may become closely involved with the participant over months or years, which can introduce bias and reduce their objectivity