Debates & Issues : Gender Bias Flashcards
What is Universality?
> Universality means something is shared between everyone despite their culture, gender and time.
Explain Gender Bias : alpha bias and beta bias.
> Gender Bias occurs when researchers make distorted claims about men and women. The nature of these distorted claims have implications as to whether or not a characteristic is viewed as universal.
Alpha Bias = present when researchers hers make distorted claims that exaggerate the differences between men and women. Typically this distortions favour men. A consequence of alpha bias is that researchers may incorrectly claim to have uncovered differences between men and women, meaning they have failed to identify genuine universal ways in which men and women think, feel or behave.
Beta Bias = present when researchers make distorted claims that minimise or ignore genuine differences between men and women. A consequence is that researchers may incorrectly claim to have uncovered a universal psychological characteristic.
Give an example of Alpha Bias.
Freuds Theory that boys go through the Oedipus complex and girls through the Elektra complex. Most researchers now
believe Freud’s claim about differences between boys and girl’s development is
distorted. This exaggeration obscures the genuine universal aspects of their development.
Give an example of Beta Bias.
Research into the fight or flight mechanism. Older research into fight or flight was conducted on male animal subjects only, as the researchers believed fluctuating female hormones would create an extraneous variable. e. Nonetheless, these researchers claimed fight-or-flight was a universal
response to threat. Later researchers challenged this claim, by identifying a distinctively female response to threats called ‘tend-and-befriend’ which stressed
females direct their attention to the care of offspring and forming defensive networks with other females.
Explain Androcentrism.
> This is a major cause of gender bias in psychological research.
It is a male centred perspective that views male experiences and behaviours as the norm, and female experiences and behaviour as a deviation from this norm.
Androcentrisms effect on research can cause beta bias. This occurs when researchers fail to include female participants in their sample. Meaning generalising from male to female behaviour is problematic as they have in fact only uncovered male characteristics.
Androcentrism can also cause alpha bias. This can occur if the male—centred perspective of a researcher leads them to design as study that disadvantages women. Resulting in distorted behaviour differences between men and women.
Explain why the primary issue with the presence of gender bias in psychological research has the potential for social consequences that harm women.
The potential of harm from alpha bias is most obvious. If researchers depict women as
different in a way that devalues them relative to men, this can encourage sexist social
attitudes that stigmatize women. Beta bias also has the potential to harm women. For example, beta bias in autism research may have contributed to a failure to acknowledge the existence of autism symptoms that are characteristically female. This could have resulted in girls and women being undiagnosed with autism, causing inadequate support, increased mental health issues, and social
challenges for women.
Ultimately, the reason gender bias is socially harmful is that it leads to false knowledge. It’s
not unreasonable to assume that men and women are the same in some respects and
different in others. It is only through accurate knowledge of these similarities and
differences that effective social reforms can be implemented. Gender bias is therefore
harmful to women as the false knowledge it produces can inhibit social progress
Why might some gender bias’ cause social harm to men?
For example, Chodorow (1978) viewed women as more relational and caring than men. This could result in social harm, such as men being denied access to caring professions, like nursing, or a reluctance in society to pursue social policies that
enable men to take on caring roles for children (e.g., not mandating men have access to paid
paternity leave).
What is one way to challenge the Androcentrism and gender bias?
The feminist psychology approach. A central assumption of feminist psychology is that biology plays a minimal role in determining differences between the genders. These differences are explained better by social factors such as stereotypes. This challenges the Androcentric assumptions as if feminist psychologists argue male and female behaviour is socially constructed, then male behaviour cannot be considered the ‘norm’ as its every bit as constructed as female behaviour. However, a challenge to feminist psychology’s response to androcentrism and
gender bias is that its approach lacks objectivity. Some have argued that feminist psychology, which
is committed to using psychology to promote social change that will benefit women, is unduly political and therefore cannot remain objective. From a feminist psychological approach, this
argument is naïve as it overlooks how all research is influenced by social and cultural contexts. Since
researchers within traditional psychological approaches are not immune to the androcentric attitudes that pervade our culture, they cannot be assumed to be more objective than feminist
psychologists.
