Culture Bias - Evaluations

Question 1

What real-world effects can culturally biased research have?

Answer 1

Culturally biased research can have significant real-world effects by amplifying and validating damaging stereotypes. For example, the US Army’s culturally biased IQ test before WWI reinforced stereotypes and negatively influenced attitudes toward African-Americans.

Question 2

How did Smith and Bond’s survey (1998) highlight the issue of cultural bias in psychological research?

Answer 2

Smith and Bond’s 1998 survey of European textbooks on social psychology revealed that 66% of the studies were American, 32% European, and only 2% from the rest of the world. This suggests that much psychological research is severely unrepresentative, and addressing this bias involves selecting different cultural groups to study.

Question 3

How has the increased awareness of cultural diversity in psychology been reflected in the development of theories?

Answer 3

It has led to the development of ‘indigenous psychologies,’ which are theories explicitly drawing on the experiences of people in different cultural contexts. One example is Afrocentrism, emphasizing the African context of behaviors and attitudes and adopting an emic approach.

Question 4

What progress has been made in diagnosing mental disorders regarding cultural considerations?

Answer 4

Progress in diagnosing mental disorders includes acknowledging the inadequacy of early approaches, such as the DSM system virtually ignoring disorders in non-American cultures. DSM-IV (1994) included a short appendix on culture-bound syndromes, but criticisms by Kleinman and Cohen (1997) highlighted the need for further improvement.