issue and debates

Question 1

alpha bias

Answer 1

exaggerate differences between men and women. the consequence is that theories devalue one gender in comparison to the other

Question 2

beta bias

Answer 2

ignore or minimise differences between men and women.

Question 3

androcentrism

Answer 3

centred or focused on men, often to the neglect or exclusion of women

Question 4

gender bias

Answer 4

the differential treatment or representation of men and women based on stereotypes rather than real differences

Question 5

universality

Answer 5

develop theories that apply to all people, which may include real differences

Question 6

cultural bias

Answer 6

judge all people in terms of your own cultural assumptions.

Question 7

cultural relativism

Answer 7

behaviour cannot be judged properly unless it is viewed in the context of the culture in which it originates

Question 8

culture

Answer 8

the rules, custom, morals, childrearing practices that bind a group of people together and define how they are likely to behave

Question 9

ethnocentrism

Answer 9

seeing things from the point of view of ourselves and our social group. evaluating other groups of people using the standards and customs of one’s own culture

Question 10

determinism

Answer 10

behaviour is controlled by external or internal factors acting upon the individual

Question 11

free will

Answer 11

individuals have the power to make choices about their behaviour

Question 12

hard determinism

Answer 12

all behaviour can be predicted and there is no free will. the two are incompatible

Question 13

soft determinism

Answer 13

allows for some element of free will

Question 14

emic

Answer 14

investigation of a culture from within the culture itself

Question 15

etic

Answer 15

study of a culture from the perspective of another culture

Question 16

psychic determinism

Answer 16

Freud’s psychoanalytic theory suggests that personality is determined by innate drives and early experience

Question 17

biological determinism

Answer 17

human genome research suggests that some of our behaviours are genetically determined. genes also influence brain structure and neurotransmitters implicated in behaviour

Question 18

environmental determinism

Answer 18

behaviourists believe that most behaviour is learned and unlearned via classical and operant conditioning

Question 19

humanistic approach

Answer 19

free will is necessary in order to take responsibility for and change behaviour, without self determinism e.g. self growth cannot occur

Question 20

moral responsibilty

Answer 20

individuals exercise free will over their actions. ‘normal’ adult behaviour is viewed as self-determined

Question 21

environment

Answer 21

everything that is outside our body, which includes people, events and the physical world

Question 22

heredity

Answer 22

traits are passed from parents to their offspring, usually referring to genetic inheritance

Question 23

interactionist approach

Answer 23

the view that the processes of nature and nurture work together rather than in opposition

Question 24

nature

Answer 24

behaviour is seen as a product of innate factors

Question 25

nature-nurture debate

Answer 25

the argument as to whether a person’s development is mainly due to their genes or to environmental influences

Question 26

nurture

Answer 26

behaviour is a product of environmental influences

Question 27

holism

Answer 27

focuses on the whole system rather than its constituent pars and suggests that the system is more than the sum of its individual components

Question 28

reductionist

Answer 28

breaks complex phenomena into simpler components, implying that complex phenomena are best understood in terms of the simplest, yet complete, level of explanation

Question 29

idiographic approach

Answer 29

focuses on individuals and emphasises uniqueness; favours qualitative methods in research

Question 30

nomothetic approach

Answer 30

seeks to formulate general laws of behaviour based on the study of groups and the use of statistical techniques. it attempts to summarise the similarities between people through generalisations

Question 31

socially sensitive research

Answer 31

any research that might have direct social consequences for the participant in the research or the group that they represent