Section A

My research question will be as follows: How does the presence of high cortisol levels in

the brain before the age of ten due to stress caused by domestic violence between parents affect

one's chances of developing symptoms of dementia after the age of 65? This study would be

based off of the hypothesis that exposure to traumatic stress during childhood releases a

dangerous amount of cortisol in the brain. This, in turn, is correlated with hippocampal atrophy

as shown in a study by Carrion and colleagues. (Carrion, Weems, & Reiss, 2007). Elderly

individuals showing signs of hippocampal atrophy were more likely to display more issues with

long and short-term memory retention as shown in a study conducted by Lupien and colleagues

(Lupien et al., 1998). The study conducted by Carrion and colleagues was conducted on children

and early adolescents between the ages of nine and fourteen who showed symptoms of Post-

Traumatic Stress Disorder. These children were tested for high levels of cortisol (Carrion et al.,

1998). The study conducted by Lupien and colleagues, however, were conducted on elderly

adults to search for a correlation between their current levels of cortisol and the state of their

hippocampus (Lupien et al., 1998). These studies both concluded that there was a possible

correlation between high levels of cortisol and degenerative effects to the brain over time.

Therefore, it is not unreasonable to hypothesize that exposure to stress-inducing situations during

childhood while the brain is still developing may result in long-term cognitive damage.

Section B

The study will be correlational because while it will include comparison between two

groups, the sample groups will be not randomly assigned and none of the variables will be

manipulated over time. Instead, it will be comparing the relationship between two variables and

how they differ based on differences that will already be established at the beginning of the
study. The study will also be longitudinal rather than cross sectional because it will take place

over the course of five years to study whether or not these two variables may share a possible

correlation. These will be the study’s characteristic’s due to the nature of the research question. It

would be nearly impossible to conduct a true longitudinal experiment. To do so would be

unethical, because it would require children to be purposefully placed in dangerous environments

that would result in trauma, and because a longitudinal study spanning over the course of seventy

years would be astronomically expensive and likely have high attrition rates. Therefore, a

correlational longitudinal study would be a realistic compromise to possibly answering the

research question.

Section C

The sample of interest would include elderly adults aged sixty-five or older who report

having experienced high levels of stress or unhappiness during childhood as the direct result of

domestic abuse or violence within their family system. Of this sample category, 10 males and 10

female participants will take part in this study. Of these tested individuals, a “control” group of

10 males and 10 females will be assigned including elderly individuals aged sixty-five or older

who instead report a happy or stable childhood. An initial sample of healthy elderly adults within

both categories will be recruited through recommendation by personal physician. In order to

determine which category the participant would fit into, they would undergo a set of interview

questions regarding their childhood.

Section D

The two main variables in this experiment will be level of family-induced stress

experienced during childhood and level of cognitive decline. To operationalize the level of

trauma, the participant will undergo a series of interview questions related to experiences in
childhood. Depending on the nature of the answers, the participant’s level of severity will be

placed upon a specific point on a sliding scale ranging from 1 to 5 with 1 being insignificant and

5 being very severe. Cognitive decline will be operationalized in a few ways. One will be simple

MRI scanning of the brain in order to track the state of the subject’s hippocampus to keep track

of possible deterioration. Another way will be through a series of memory-based exercises which

will measure both short and long-term memory. The last way will be through a psychological

evaluation to determine the current emotional and mental well-being of the patient. Together,

these three data points will be combined to create a sliding scale similar to the first to determine

the patient’s level of cognitive decline, which 1 once again being insignificant and 5 being

severe.

The study itself will take place over the course of five years, with data collection

occurring bi-yearly. During the first session, both variables will be measured to establish a

baseline for future sessions. At the end of each session the data points for each participant will be

recorded onto a scatter plot in order to determine whether or not a correlation exists.

An example of a question that would be asked while the participants are undergoing the

process of being split into the two groups is as follows: Do you think that the trauma that you

experienced as a child was caused by marital violence between your parents? During the MRI

scanning, the main focus would be the mass and location of the subject’s hippocampus. During

the long-term memory tests, items such as ability to remember names, places, and specific

objects would be the focus. The short-term memory testing would involve the patient’s ability to

complete simple instructions that require use of their working memory. The psychological

screening during each session would measure level of distress or agitation that the subject
feelings during their daily routine. Other key elements that we would watch for would be general

feelings of uneasiness, listlessness, confusion, and inability to maintain relationships.

Section E

This experiment would use paired T-testing in order to compare the two different groups

of participants. This is because they are related through comparison and procedure, and the only

different between the two would be the presence of the trauma variable.

Section F

One limitation to the test includes the inability to quantify the variables with absolute

precision. This is because while there will be an extensive interviewing process to answer the

questions in the study, there are still a wide range of possible answers and attempting to

compartmentalize them may be difficult. Another limitation would be the inability to make the

study too large due to the thorough and time-consuming nature of each participant’s session and

the amount of money and resources it would use.

The small size would also be a threat to external validity because it makes the study less

applicable to the general population. Any conclusions drawn from this experiment could only

apply to adults that are similar to the participants in the study. A lack of diversity may also be a

threat to external validity. While the study will attempt to find a diverse set of participants,

because the study is small and the requirements to join are very specific, there might only be a

limited amount of possible participants. One threat to internal validity may be the issue of

temporal precedence. While the study establishes a baseline for each participant at the beginning

of the study, there may be hidden symptoms or asymptomatic signs of dementia before the study

begins, which may not account for rare early-onset dementia. Another threat to internal validity

would be the inability to easily rule out and account for a third variable. The experiment could
attempt to alleviate this issue by excluding anybody with a significant family history of dementia

from the study to rule out genetics for the purpose of this study alone. However, one of the

strengths of the study includes its flexibility in allowing participants to answer interview

questions in order to more accurately operationalize the variable. And though it harms the

study’s external validity, the small size can help strengthen its internal validity to establish

whether or not any possible correlation could be caused by the variables measured, which in this

study may actually be more important than generalizability.

References

Carrion, V. G., Weems, C. F., & Reiss, A. L. (2007). Stress predicts brain changes in children: a

pilot longitudinal study on youth stress, posttraumatic stress disorder, and the

hippocampus. Pediatrics, 119(3), 509-516.

Lupien, S. J., de Leon, M., De Santi, S., Convit, A., Tarshish, C., Nair, N. P. V., ... & Meaney,

M. J. (1998). Cortisol levels during human aging predict hippocampal atrophy and

memory deficits. Nature neuroscience, 1(1).