PL 5202 Research Methods

Lecture 7
Case Study Research
Longitudinal vs cross sectional
studies
• Correlational research study that involves
repeated observations of same items over long
periods of time – often many decades
– Track the same people
• A type of observational study: without
manipulating it
– Less power to detect causal relationship
– Exclude time invariant unobserved individual
differences; or temporal order of events
 Longitudinal studies in social science

• Distinguish short from long term phenomena

such as poverty
 Types:
• Cohort studies
– Sample a cohort: defined as a group experiencing some event
in a selected time period, studying them at intervals through
time
• Panel studies (time series cross sectional / TSCS)
– Combine time series and cross sectional, looks at the multiple
subjects and how they change over the course of time.
– Sample a cross section and survey it at usually regular intervals
• Retrospective studies: a longitudinal study that looks
back in time
 Cross Sectional Study
• Involve observation of some subsets of a
population of items all at the same time, in
which, groups can be compared at different
ages with respect of independent variables
such as IQs and memory.
• Used in most branches of science
• Takes place in a single point in time
• A snapshot, freezes a specific moment in time
– Relationship between different variables at a point
in time. Ex: the relationship between income and
travel to markets
• A Rolling cross section:
– Presence of an individual in the sample and the
time at which the individual is included in the
sample are determined randomly.