A
The case of Phineas Gage
In 1848 Phineas Gage was working on the construction of a railway
track in the USA. One day, following a mistake, a tamping iron
exploded and went straight through his skull. It went in under his left
cheek bone and completely out through the top of his head. Not only
did he survive but he was able to speak and function fairly normally,
despite massive bleeding and loss of brain tissue. However the
accident did have a significant effect on his personality; before the
accident he was hardworking, responsible and popular whereas
afterwards he became restless and indecisive and swore alot. After a
few weeks in hospital he went back to work and lived for a further 12
years. His skull is now on display at Harvard University.
This case study was important in the development of brain surgery as
it showed that parts of the brain could be removed without having a
fatal effect. Therefore surgeons started to remove brain tumours, no
longer fearful that this would cause a patient’s death. Phineas’ injury
also suggested that damage to the frontal lobe leads to personality
changes which may have influenced the development of frontal
lobotomies (a form of psychosurgery to disconnect the frontal lobes
from the rest of the brain).
B
The case of HM
On his 16th birthday, HM experienced his first epileptic fit. For the
new few years these fits became progressively worse and
uncontrollable by medication. Scoville and Milner (1957) believed
that HM’s epilepsy might be cured by removing the parts of his brain
thought to be causing the fits. Therefore HM had an operation to
remove the hippocampus from both sides of his brain to reduce his
severe epilepsy. Following the operation, the effect on HM’s epilepsy
was not clear, although there was a slight improvement. However,
although HM’s personality and intellect remained intact, HM could
not form new long-term memories. For many years after the
operation he reported that he was 27 and the year was 1953. He
couldn’t memorise lists of words or recall faces of people that he had
met.
The case study of HM has led to memory research into the different
types of memory (procedural and episodic) as well as the brain areas
involved in memory.
C
The case of KF
KF (Shallice and Warrington, 1970) suffered brain damage from a
motorcycle accident that damaged his short-term memory yet his
long-term memory was left intact. He has a digit span of 1 item (i.e.
when given a string of 20 numbers to recall in sequence he usually
can only remember one of them). This suggests that KF has almost no
short-term memory recall and can be used to support the idea that
short-term memory and long-term memory are separate memory
systems. Therefore if one is damaged it doesn’t necessarily mean
that the other is too.
D
The case of Clive Wearing
Baddeley (1990) reported the case of Clive Wearing who contracted
a viral infection which attacked his brain, damaging the hippocampus
and associated brain areas. Clive lost all of his ability to transfer
memories from his short-term memory to his long-term memory. He
remembers some aspects of his life before the infection but not
others (e.g. he knows that he has children from an earlier marriage
but cannot remember their names and he remembers his second
wife, Deborah, and greets her joyously every time they meet,
believing he has not seen her in years even though she may have just
left the room briefly).
E
The case of Genie
Genie had virtually no human contact from birth and was locked
away in an empty room by her father until she was 13 ½ (because he
thought she was mentally retarded). She was deprived of any
stimulation, fed baby-food, slept in a cot, and strapped to a ‘pottychair.’ When she was ‘found’ in November 1970 she could not stand
up straight and could not speak. Over time, Genie showed a slight
improvement in some areas of development but never fully
recovered socially; she apparently showed a disinterest in other
people. Researchers have suggested that her lack of recovery may be
due to her extreme early privation as she had not been able to form
an attachment (Curtiss, 1977).
F
The case of the Czech Twins
Koluchova (1976) reported the case study of the Czech twins, Andrei
and Vanya, who spent the first 7 years of their lives locked up by
their stepmother (their own mother died when they were infants).
When they were first ‘discovered’ they couldn’t talk. They were then
fostered and cared for by two loving sisters. By the age of 14 they
had near normal intellectual and social functioning. By the age of 20,
they were above average intelligence and had excellent relationships
with the members of their foster family. It has been suggested that
they recovered from early childhood privation as they were found at
a young enough age to still form attachments.