KMF 1023 Cognitive Psychology

Case study (20%) 3 students in a group

Please read the following 2 case studies. In each case study, you have to relate material
that you have learned in class (any aspect of cognition e.g. concept or finding or
principle) to explain the experienced.
Each case study is worth up to 10 marks and should contain the following:

Your explanation on how the case study relate to a theory or principle in

Cognitive Psychology that you have learned throughout the course (e.g. theory of
attention, perception, memory, etc). You could explain the case study (e.g. why it
happened, or how it could happen) and how to solve the experience using the
theory/ principle (if it had been problematic).
Feel free to explain based on your readings.
Be creative

When you submit your case study assignment, please include a cover page that mentions
the following details:
- Name (you and your group members)
- Lecturers name
- Students Matric Number
To hand in the case study, firmly staple your paper. Hand in the case study to instructors
office (Level 2), before 4.30pm on the 6th November 2015 (Friday)
No late assignments will be accepted. No exceptions!

KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

Cases from Psychology Today.com

Instructions
Read through the following cases and write your report on
both cases, answering the questions that follow

Case 1
HM, the Man with No Memory
Henry Molaison (HM) taught us about memory by
losing his
Henry Molaison, known by thousands of psychology students as "HM,"
lost his memory on an operating table in a hospital in Hartford, in
August 1953. He was 27 years old and had suffered from epileptic
seizures for many years.

HM, aged 60: Copyright J, Ogden, "Trouble In Mind" 2012, p.173, OUP,
New York
Source: Photo credit: Jenni Ogden, author's own photo
William Beecher Scoville, a Hartford neurosurgeon, stood above an
awake Henry and skilfully suctioned out the seahorse-shaped brain
structure called the hippocampus that lay within each temporal lobe.
KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

Henry would have been drowsy and probably didn't notice his memory
vanishing as the operation proceeded. The operation was successful in
that it significantly reduced Henry's seizures, but it left him with a
dense memory loss. When Scoville realized his patient had become
amnesic, he referred him to the eminent neurosurgeon, Dr. Wilder
Penfield and neuropsychologist Dr. Brenda Milner of Montreal
Neurological Institute (MNI) who assessed him in detail. Up until then it
had not been known that the hippocampus was essential for making
memories, and that if we lose both of them we will suffer a global
amnesia. Once this was realized, the findings were widely publicized so
that this operation to remove both hippocampi would never be done
again.
Penfield and Milner had already been conducting memory experiments
on other patients and they quickly realized that Henry's dense
amnesia, his intact intelligence, and the precise neurosurgical lesions
made him the perfect experimental subject. For 55 years Henry
participated in numerous experiments, primarily at Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT) where Professor Suzanne Corkin and her
team of neuropsychologists assessed him. Access to Henry was
carefully restricted to less than 100 researchers (I was honored to be
one of them), but the MNI and MIT studies on HM taught us much of
what we know about memory. Of course many other patients with
memory impairments have since been studied, including a small
number with amnesias almost as dense as Henry's, but it is to him we
owe the greatest debt. His name (or initials!) has been mentioned in
almost 12,000 journal articles, making him the most studied case in
medical or psychological history. Henry died on December 2nd, 2008,
at the age of 82. Until then, he was known to the world only as "HM"
but on his death his name was revealed. A man with no memory is
vulnerable, and his initials had been used while he lived in order to
protect his identity.
Henry's memory loss was far from simple. Not only could he make no
new conscious memories after his operation, he also suffered a
retrograde memory loss (a loss of memories prior to brain damage)
for an eleven year period before his surgery. It is not clear why this is
so, although it is thought this is not because of his loss of the
hippocampi on both sides of his brain. More likely it is a combination of
his being on large doses of antiepileptic drugs and his frequent
seizures prior to his surgery. His global amnesia for new material was
the result of the loss of both hippocampi, and meant that he could not
learn new words, songs or faces after his surgery, forgot who he was
talking to as soon as he turned away, didn't know how old he was or if
his parents were alive or dead, and never again clearly remembered an
event, such as his birthday party, or who the current president of the
United States was. In contrast, he did retain the ability to learn some
new motor skills such as becoming faster at drawing a path through a
KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

picture of a maze, or learning to use a walking frame when he sprained

his ankle, but this learning was at a subconscious level. He had no
conscious memory that he had ever seen or done the maze test
before, or used the walking frame previously.
We measure time by our memories, and thus for Henry, it was as if
time stopped when he was 16 years old, eleven years before his
surgery. Because his intelligence in other non-memory areas remained
normal he was an excellent experimental participant. He was also a
very happy and friendly person and always a delight to be with and to
assess. He never seemed to get tired of doing what most people would
think of as tedious memory tests, because they were always new to
him! When he was at MIT, between test sessions he would often sit
doing crossword puzzles, and he could do the same ones again and
again if the words were erased, as to him it was new each time.
Henry gave science the ultimate gift; his memory. Thousands of people
who have suffered brain damage, whether through accident, disease or
a genetic quirk, have given similar gifts to science by agreeing to
participate in psychological, neuropsychological, psychiatric and
medical studies and experiments, and in some cases by gifting their
brains to science after their deaths. Our knowledge of brain disease
and how the normal mind works would be greatly diminished if it were
not for the generosity of these people and their families (who are
frequently also involved in interviews, as well as transporting the
"patient" back and forth to the psychology laboratory). After Henry's
death his brain was dissected into 2000 slices and digitized as a threedimensional brain map that could be searched by zooming in from the
whole brain to individual neurons. Thus his tragically unique brain has
been preserved for posterity.
Question
What are the lessons about memory, that you have learnt from the
above case of Henrys?
Explain and elaborate your points in a report and submit it to your
Instructor

KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

Case 2
Einstein's Genius Linked to Well-Connected Brain
Hemispheres
The right and left hemispheres of Einstein's brain were
uniquely well-connected
The debate over right brain-left brain lateralization has raged on for
decades. A study (link is external) released on October 4, 2013 found
Albert Einstein's brilliance may be linked to the fact that his brain
hemispheres were extremely well-connected. The ability to use right
brain creativity and left brain logic simultaneously may have been
what made Einstein a genius.
The part of the brain that connects the two hemispheres of the brain is
called the corpus callosum. It contains a bundle of neuronal fibers
found in humans and other higher order mammals that allow the two
hemispheres to talk to one another.
The new study, "The Corpus Callosum of Albert Einstein's Brain:
Another Clue to His High Intelligence," was published in the
journal Brain. The research was led by Dean Falk who is an
evolutionary anthropologist at Florida State University. Falk and her
colleagues found that Albert Einstein had more extensive connections
between certain parts of his cerebral hemispheres compared to both
younger and older control groups.
The study was led by Weiwei Men of East China Normal University. Men
has created a revolutionary technique allowing researchers to explore
the internal connectivity of Einsteins brain via the corpus callosum,
KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

for the first time. "This technique should be of interest to other

researchers who study the brain's all-important internal connectivity,"
Falk said.
According to Falk, "This study, more than any other to date, really gets
at the 'inside' of Einstein's brain," Falk said. "It provides new
information that helps make sense of what is known about the surface
of Einstein's brain." Using their new method, the team was able to
determine the relative thickness of various subdivisions throughout full
length of the corpus callosum.

The researchers found differences in thickness which were then colorcoded to provide the research group with an approximation for the
number of neurons stretching between the left and right hemispheres.
A thicker corpus callosum suggests that there are a greater number of
neurons. Interestingly, different regions of the corpus callosum are
implicated in a variety of special functions. For example, neurons
situated at the front of the corpus callosum are involved in movement
of hands, while neurons running along its back side are thought to be
implicated in mental arithmetic.
Its no coincidence that Einstein was a genius physicist and a master
violinist. After having been inspired by Mozart music at age 13, he
began to practice the violin religiously. More and more studies are
beginning to link musical training and improved cognitive
function. Practicing an instrument engages all four hemispheres of
your brain and makes them more well-connected.
I thought of it while riding my bicycle.

KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

Albert Einstein loved to take long walks and ride his bicycle around
Princeton. He once said of E=mc2, I thought of it while riding my
bicycle. If you look at the daily routines of creative greats there is a
strong link between some type of bi-pedal aerobic motion that engages
all four brain hemispheres that leads to Eureka moments and creative
breakthroughs. This is a topic I will be exploring in my next book titled,
Superfluidity.
Falk and her colleagues reported (link is external) on uncommon
features of Albert Einsteins brain when images were first release in
2012. By analyzing autopsy photographs, the team was able to visibly
identify features of Einsteins brain that could be fundamental to the
mans intellect. They found greater intricacy and deep grooves across
certain regions of his brain, particularly the prefrontal cortex, the visual
cortex and the parietal lobes.
The prefrontal cortex is thought to be the seat of both critical and
abstract thinking, decision-making and expression of personality traits.
The parietal lobe is involved in sense and motor function. Interestingly,
Falks group found that the somatosensory cortex, which receives
sensory input information, was also increased in magnitude in an area
that corresponded to Albert Einsteins left hand.
In a Psychology Today blog title, Are Lefties More Likely to Become
Champions and Leaders? I discuss the role that handedness plays in
linking up the left brain-right brain. The conclusion is that ideally you
want to create symmetry and become as close to ambidextrous by
KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

fortifying the link between the right brain-left brain of both the
cerebrum and the cerebellum.
Conclusion: Left Brain-Right Brain Is Only Half the Story

Over the past few years, I have had my antennae up for scientific
research exploring the interconnection between all four brain
hemispheres. I was excited this morning to wake up and see this new
study on the link between Albert Einsteins genius and his wellconnected brain hemispheres.
My father, Richard Bergland, was a neuroscientist and neurosurgeon
who wrote a book called The Fabric of Mind (Viking). He believed that
the vermis which is the link between the two hemispheres of the
cerebellum is hugely important in the communication of the
cerebellar hemispheres. He also believed that the midbrain which
connects the cerebrum (up brain) to the cerebellum (down brain) is
the gateway for keeping a line of communication simultaneously
flowing between all four brain hemispheres.
These are very exciting time for neuroscientific research on the
interconnection between brain hemispheres. At this point in time,
much of this research is still theory and conjecture. Therefore, it is
important to look at the daily habits of people who have maximized
brainpower so that you can emulate their lifestyle choices and make
your brain hemispheres more well-connected, too

KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016

Question
What are the findings on the role of left-right brain factor and
intelligence, that you have learnt from the above case of Einsteins?
Explain and elaborate your points in a report and submit it to your
Instructor

KMF1023 Sem. 1, 2015/2016