The use of case study in psychotherapy research

This article reviews the current state of the use of Case Studies (CS) in psychotherapy research. This technique has been used since the beginnings of the discipline and is still a widely used form of research. However, it has been often criticized because of its lack of rigor and the difficulties to extract generalizable knowledge from individual cases. There is a certain level of vagueness in the way "case study" is used the term in the literature. In this paper, first we define a CS as an in depth investigation of a case in its context, seeking to see their particularities and boundaries. Secondly we list various types of CS used in psychotherapy and the guidelines that several authors have suggested to guarantee reliability in CS. We summarize the benefits and weakness of the CS research. We conclude the importance of systematizing the way CS should be done. This type of research is an essential tool for understanding the therapeutic process and for testing the plausibility of hypotheses and theoretical propositions.