Clive Wearing Case Study Essay

This essay is about the case study of Clive Wearing, a musician who developed encephalitis which attacked his central nervous system. I will look at the effect it had on his memory, and what we can learn about memory from this.
Wearing developed Herpes viral encephalitis, from the herpes simplex. This is a virus which doesn’t show any side effects until the damage has been done. The virus caused him to lose all his memories before the event in 1985, as he developed anterograde and retrograde amnesia. Anterograde amnesia is a type of amnesia which prevents the creation of new memories. This means that Wearing can’t remember recent events. Retrograde amnesia causes a loss of memory access. Wearing can’t recall any memories and information that has been learnt. His memory now only lasts for 7-30 seconds, meaning that by
A case study, in this case, is a process or record of research in which detailed consideration is given to the development of a person over time. In this case a patient has been used who already has brain damage which has had an impact on the patient’s memory. This means that the injuries can’t be controlled, and it is more difficult to determine which injured part of the brain is causing the problems. However in other circumstances certain areas of the patient’s brains can be damaged in a controlled environment to see what effect that would have on the patient. Although this method can give a clearer understanding of the brains impact on memory, it is also deemed unethical. Using the controlled method on humans causes long term damage to the patient’s brain, even though it will teach you exactly what part of the brain controls which parts of memory. The experiments are also used on animals, which is very unethical as well. These animals aren’t able to agree to the testing, and animal brains may not work in the same as a human’s does. This means that anything learnt from the testing may not work for humans