A03

• Point: A strength of fMRI is that it is non-invasive and doesn’t rely on radiation.

  Explain: This means fMRI can safely produce a clear and detailed picture (high spatial resolution) of the brain without any risk to the participant.

  Point: A limitation of fMRI is that it is very expensive and has poor temporal resolution

  Explain: This means fMRI can not accurately represent brain activity instantly as there is roughly a 5 second delay between the neural activity and the image on the screen.
• Point: A strength of EEG is it has real world applications like diagnosis

  Explain: For example, its high temporal resolution allows an EEG to detect arrhythmic brain patterns, such as epilepsy.

  Point: A limitation of an EEG is that the signal shows a generalised representation of many thousands of neurons.

  Explain: This means it is not good at pinpointing the exact source of neural activity, meaning it has poor spatial resolution.
• Point: A strength of ERP is that it allows the specific measure of neural processes far better than an EEG alone.

  Explain: This means it can be used to measure cognitive functions or deficits with very high temporal resolution.

  Point: A limitation of ERP is that background ‘noise’ or extraneous material cannot always completely be eliminated.

  Explain: This means you are not always able to get an isolated reading of neural activity following an event.
• A strength of PME is that has provided key information to our early understanding of functioning in the brain

  e.g, Broca and Wernicke both relied on PME to discover the language centres of the brain as well as HM’s PME which gave us useful insight into how memory works in the brian.

  A limitation of PME is that it is hard to draw causal conclusions as researchers don’t know what the brain was like before any damage occurred.

  This means it is hard to establish whether a particular mental deficit was due to the observed damage or some unrelated trauma or decay in another area.