Issues and debates

Question 1

Define gender bias

Answer 1

The tendency to treat one individual group in a different way to others based on gender.

Question 2

What does bias cause issues with?

Answer 2

Universality

Question 3

Define universality

Answer 3

Any underlying characteristic of human beings that is capable of being applied to all, even despite differences of experience and upbringing

Question 4

What re the two forms of gender bias?

Answer 4

• Alpha bias
• Beta bias

Question 5

What is alpha bias?

Answer 5

Research that focuses on and exaggerates differences between male and females

Question 6

What is beta bias?

Answer 6

Research that ignores or underestimates differences between male and females

Question 7

Give an example of alpha bias and elaborate

Answer 7

FREUD PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGES.

• In the Phallic stage, boys and girls were proposed to both develop a desire for their opposite gender parent. In a boy, this manifests as strong castration anxiety which is resolved when he identifies with his father.
  In a girl, her identification is weaker which means her superego is weaker (as it develops as a result of taking on the same-genders moral perspective). This has created the impression that females are morally inferior to men.
• Oppositely, alpha bias can favor women in the psychodynamic approach. It was proposed that daughters and mothers have a greater connectedness than sons and mothers due to biological similarities. As a result of the child’s closeness, women develop better abilities to bond with others and empathies.

Question 8

Give an example of beta bias and elaborate

Answer 8

FIGHT OR FLIGHT RESPONSE

• Biological research tends to favour male over female animals on the basis that they experience less hormonal fluctuations and ignores any potential differences in the fight or flight response.
• Against the assumption that women and men react the same to a threat, Taylor et al. proposed an alternate “tend and befriend” response. Oxytocin, the “love hormone” is more plentiful in women and studies suggest women produce oxytocin in response to stressors. This shows how research that minimises/disregards differences between gender may result in a misinterpretation of women’s behaviour.

Question 9

What are beta bias and alpha bias a consequence of?

Answer 9

Androcentrism

Question 10

Define androcentrism

Answer 10

• Means male-centred
• When ‘normal behaviour’ is judged according to a male standard
  (This creates the consequence of female behaviour being judged to be abnormal or inferior in comparison)