Case Study Example: Henry Molaison
One of the most notable case studies in psychology is Henry Molaison (or HM).While on a surgery table in a Hartford hospital in August 1953, HM lost his memory. In research from Lichterman (2009), “Henry Molaison was born near Hartford, Connecticut, the son of an electrician. Three first cousins on his father’s side had epilepsy. It remains unclear whether a minor head trauma at the age of 7 years had any role in the development of Henry’s petit mal seizures from the age of 10.” Henry really attempted to live a regular life. The frequency of this kind of fits quickly grew to almost ten every day, which is extremely significant. In research from Dieguez (2014), “ Despite taking large doses of anticonvulsant drugs, Henry's ability to work and live independently as an adult was significantly hampered by his seizures. Neurosurgeon William Beecher Scoville performed an experimental brain operation on Henry, then 27, to remove sections of his medial temporal lobes, including a major portion of the hippocampus, which may have been the source of his seizures, in order to ease his seizures.” In the removal hippocampus changed his cognitive map, which caused his memory to be disrupted. Later in 1992, a MIR showed Scoville misjudged the length of transient projection resection.
Henry Molaison’s semantic memory was intact (he recalled historical facts, recognized relatives, and had a large vocabulary), and his procedural memory was likewise intact. As a result of the surgery, Henry Molaison suffered from retrograde amnesia (the ability to recall just his life before the age of 16) and anterograde amnesia (the ability to recall only his life after the age of 16). The ablation of his medial temporal lobes caused Henry Molaison to forget all his new experiences within 30 seconds. If he met someone and then left the room, he had no recall of the individual or their encounter after a few minutes. The lack of glutamate in Henry was a reason for the lack of memory. Glutamate is essential for mental health, learning and memory , just as different capacities all through the body.
Through rehearsal, Henry was able to hold material in his mind, but he was unable to keep it in long-term memory (Dieguez, 2014). H.M. beginning to be able to recognize some famous people and to draw a floor plan of his house, which is linked to spatial memory outside of the medial temporal lobe. He could also play the piano but would quickly forget his talent because of the amnesia. Neither Clinical staff nor Molaison's family noticed any adjustment of his personality or mental ability. In research from Shah (2014), His IQ was above average. His language, reasoning, and perceptual capacities were normal (exceptions were impaired olfactory function, caused by the operation, and cerebellar symptoms, a side effect of Phenytoin) (Shah, 2014).
His condition was an immediate consequence of him reaching out to scientists at 'McGill College' in Montreal, where two comparative cases had been accounted for. A clinician from 'McGill College,' named Brenda Mill operator, visited Hartford to notice Henry face to face. She concentrated on his condition, his recollections, and his mind capacities. What made Henry an ideal subject for additional exploration was the way that despite the fact that his amnesia was serious, he was totally sound in any case. Henry was likewise able to go through additional investigations. In spite of the fact that his testing started in 1953, which was before long the medical procedure, the principal official paper on his condition was distributed in 1957. It was named 'Patient HM.' Brenda utilized the nom de plume to ensure Henry's personality. The paper, distributed by Brenda, became one of the most referred to papers in the area of neuroscience.
Throughout the long term, neuroscientists have learned by means of H.M. how these mind districts assist with framing recollections. Researchers used longitudinal and triangulation with the case to study data. Molaison's examination made the way for more investigation into the cerebrum networks that encode cognizant and oblivious recollections .Neuroscientists keep on studying him even after his passing in 2008 at 82 years old. For the first time, Henry's name was made public, and with the conservator's permission, Henry's brain was donated to Mass. General and MIT (Shah, 2014). The methodology he made "gives a degree of goal and detail to smaller people what even the most powerful X-ray scanners can create." While Henry Molaison's extraordinary type of amnesia kept him from at any point totally understanding his commitments. He inspired many reseachers such as Silva. In research from Mascarelli (2019), “Silva's group has discovered that infusing mice with specific medications eliminates the brake on mind signal transmissions. That brake is really a courier synthetic called GABA. A few medications can slow or stop the cerebrum's arrival of GABA. So rather than getting a red light, treated nerve cells presently get a green one. Mice getting this GABA blocker can abruptly adapt ordinarily.” Another researcher named Jacopo Annese was also inspired and wanted to study him .When Henry Molaison died, in 2008, his brain was whisked away to be dissected and immortalized in digital form by the neuroanatomist Jacopo Annese, at the University of California, San Diego (Schwartz, 2016). As a result of the case, many people were inspired and it helped psychologists understand memory. It is also one of the most famous case studies in neuroscience.
