Controversey: Sexism Flashcards
Define sexism.
Sexism is defined as discrimination, prejudice, or stereotyping on the basis of sex.
It tends to be against women and has been a problem in society and the field of psychology for a long time.
What is heterosexism?
Heterosexism is the assumption that a ‘natural relationship’ is one formed between a male and female.
This opposes homosexuality which is between 2 people of the same gender.
What is psychologies problem with heterosexism?
Psychology tends to focus on heterosexual relationships as opposed to homosexual relationships and this is a form sexism, specifically heterosexism.
Who challenged heterosexism in psychology?
Wood and Duck challenged this in their book entitled ‘Understudied Relationships’. They argued that psychology only focused on heterosexual relationships and neglected to study other forms of relationship such as homosexual, online, and long-distance relationships.
What is a ‘justification for heterosexism’?
However, it still may not be appropriate to study these kinds of relationships, not for sexist reasons, but rather to protect these kinds of relationships from stereotypes derived from alpha bias.
This kind of research `is classified as socially sensitive research.
Identifying that there may be a difference between heterosexual relationships and other relationships and that they require separate research, it may provoke stereotypes. This is an alpha bias.
What is the counter to the counter for heterosexism?
However, ignoring understudied relationship types completely is a beta bias, and this should also be avoided.
What is the first point providing explanation for traditional sexism?
A beta bias may be an explanation for traditional sexism.
This is where differences, in this case between men and women are ignored or minimised.
Questions about women may be ignored or studies that were conducted only on men may have been applied to women assuming that they apply equally.
This is an androcentric bias, where a study is conducted by males therefore is bias, favoring males.
What is an example of beta bias in psychology?
An example of this is Kohlberg’s study on moral development. The questions are based on male orientated moral principle, yet the results were still generalised to woman.
Gilligan claimed women’s justice is based on a ‘tend and befriend’ attitude.
Therefore, it is unfair that woman are assumed to follow the same theory.
This is demonstration of the female perspective being devalued.
What is a common reason that women are not used in studies?
However, a common reason that research tends to be male based is because it is claimed that female hormones will interfere with the research.
This may seem to justify female exclusion from studies however it may lead to key female differences being left uncovered.
What discovery was made about women behaving differently to men.
For example, Taylor et al made a big discovery that females stress response was different to males.
For a number of years, it was assumed that the ‘fight or flight’ stress response was universal across both genders.
However, Taylor claimed that females had a ‘tend and befriend’ response rather than the ‘fight or flight’ response. For many years, women were wrongly assumed to have the same stress response of males.
Therefore, it is important that research on women is not ignored.
What is the fourth point?
It should be noted that social and historical context contribute to sexism.
Lloyds and Smith’s research had mothers playing with children. The research showed that mothers chose ‘gender appropriate’ toys such as trucks for boys and dolls for girls.
This shows that adults are reinforcing gender stereotypes and passing them on through their children. Young children are also subject to stereotypes through the media. This is vicarious reinforcement.
Therefore, parents must be careful not to directly expose their children to gender sterotypes.
What is the 5th point?
The field of psychology tends to be very male orientated. Despite the majority of psychology undergraduates being female, the field remains male orientated.
The American Psychology Association published the top 100 most influential psychologist of the 20th century and only 6 were female.
This shows an unjustified bias in male dominancy in psychology.
However, Murphy et al suggests that women’s own implicit stereotypes about gender also contribute to this problem and that the solution is that we must all be more aware of our biases.
What is the conclusion?
In conclusion, there is still a great deal of sexism in psychology at the expense of women. While there are clear biological and social differences between men and women, studies conducted on men are applied to women until there is evidence suggesting otherwise separate to the original study. Furthermore, there is also clearly a male dominancy within the field of psychology despite a female majority in terms of numbers within the field. Additionally, it could be argued that the beta bias in the understudied relationships as appose to heterosexual relationships is an issue that needs to be adressed. Although, psychologists need to be careful in their approach so that alpha bias can be avoided to prevent stereotypes on these relationships. Issues like these need to be addressed and although the situation has improved over time, the issue of sexism in psychology is clearly still present today.
