A case study is a type of paper that focuses on a specific problem affecting a population, place, or organization. Examples of subjects in a case study include a person, a group, city, company, department, or event.
The typical structure of a case study includes:
1) Introduction: provides background information about what is being studied. Introduce the topic and describe the problem. Consider the following questions when writing your introduction:
- Who or what is being studied?
- What specific problem you will be focusing on?
- Why is the investigation important in the field?
2) Literature review: provides context for the problem being studied.
- How is the problem or the subject you are investigating described in the literature?
- What is the relationship to other cases?
- What interpretations, gaps, conflicts are identified in the literature?
- How do the ideas of other authors relate to the problem you are investigating?
3) Method: provides details about how the problem is being investigated.
- Provide details about the subject (person, population, organization, etc.) that will be the focus of your study.
- Explain why and how the subject and problem were selected.
- Explain how you collected data to investigate the problem. Examples of possible data collection methods: structure or semi-structured interviews, focus groups, observation, surveys, etc.
4) Discussion: describe your findings.
- Reiterate the research problem and describe the main findings of your research.
- Interpret your findings and how they relate to other studies.
- Provide explanations for the findings, identify gaps and limitations, and suggest future areas of research
5) Conclusion: summarize your findings
- Synthesize the findings and how they are connected to the research problem.
- Emphasize the importance of the study and how they contribute to clarify the research problem.
- Provide recommendations based on your findings; if not done so already, clarify gaps, limitations, alternative explanations, and suggest areas for future research.
This section was based on recommendations provided by:
USC Libraries. (2020, November 1). Organizing your social sciences research paper. https://libguides.usc.edu/writingguide
Further reading:
Yin, R. K. (2003). Case study research: Design and methods (3rd ed.). Sage Publications. Call number: H62 .Y56 2003
Cengage Learning. (n.d.). Business resources for students: Case studies. https://college.cengage.com/business/resources/casestudies/students/index.html
