Issues and debates Flashcards
Define gender bias
The tendency to treat one individual group in a different way to others based on gender.
What does bias cause issues with?
Universality
Define universality
Any underlying characteristic of human beings that is capable of being applied to all, even despite differences of experience and upbringing
What are the two forms of gender bias?
- Alpha bias
- Beta bias
What is alpha bias?
Research that focuses on and exaggerates differences between male and females
What is beta bias?
Research that ignores or underestimates differences between male and females
Give an example of alpha bias and elaborate
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.
Give an example of beta bias and elaborate
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.
What are beta bias and alpha bias a consequence of?
Androcentrism
Define androcentrism
- 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)
Define universality
Universality is any underlying characteristic of human beings that is able to be applied to all despite differences in upbringing and experience
How does gender and culture bias affect universality?
Gender and culture bias threaten the universality of findings
Evaluate gender bias
- Essentialist perspective
A limitation of gender biased research is that it may have essentialist perspective origins - this is as it suggests that proposed differences between sexes are fixed and inevitable. An example of this was “scientific” research in 1930 claiming that intellectual activity, such as attending university would cause infertility in women. Essentialist theories and research are often politically motivated arguments made to be facts. This suggests that double standards can be generated through gender biased research that views behavior differently regarding someone’s sex. - Positive reflexivity
A strength of identifying gender bias is that increased awareness has made researchers more aware of their own value and preconceptions influence on research.
It is becoming common to embrace the effects of their values on their research, rather than dismiss it as a problem or threat to objectivity.
Example: study on lack of executive position women in accountancy firms. They outlined how their own experiences as women had influenced their interpretation of events. This is reflexivity - becoming important in psychology which leads to awareness of personal biases in shaping research. - Serious implications
A limitation of gender bias is that research that includes gender bias can lead to serious negative implications.
If a theory is biased, it will fail to challenge negative stereotypes and can lead to the allowance of discrimination.
Research may attempt to justify unfair treatment of females such as denying workplace opportunities. If androcentrism is accepted and behavior of males is viewed as the norm then it becomes normal for women to feel abnormal.
This can be damaging, contributing to pathologizing conditions such as PMD and leading to 2x diagnosis of depression. - Institutional sexism
A further limitation of gender bias is that there may be inequalities between males and females within the research process due to multiple factors.
Women are less likely to be appointed as senior researchers, creating a bias concerning what is being researched.
Research from males is more likely to be published and research guilty of alpha bias tends to be more prevalent in journals.
Even in the design of experiments there are disadvantages to women as participants may feel intimidated by a male researcher who has the potential to judge them as abnormal. This results in the field potentially supporting institutional sexism alongside biased theories.
What is meant by culture bias?
The tendency to interpret all phenomena through the perspective of one’s own culture, ignoring the effect that cultural differences has on behaviour
What acronym describes people most likely to be studied and what does it stand for.
- WEIRD
- Westernised
- Educated
- Industrialised
- Rich
- Democracies
What is a form of culture bias?
Ethnocentrism
Who created the WEIRD acronym to describe the culturally biased group usually studied
Heinrich et al
Define ethnocentrism
Judging other cultures by the standards and values of one’s own culture
This contributes to perceived superiority one’s own culture
Give an example of ethnocentrism in research and elaborate
- Ainsworths strange situation
It is criticised for reflecting only the norms of Western culture.
They conducted research on attachment type, suggesting an ‘ideal’ attachment type where babies show moderate distress upon separation
This led to misinterpretation of cross cultural child rearing practises that deviated from the American standards.
For example, Japanese infants were more likely to be classified as insecurely attached due to showing high distress upon separation. This creates the belief that other cultures have a less ‘desirable’ attachment due to Western ethnocentrism
Define cultural relativism
The idea that norms and values, as well as ethics can only be meaningful and understood within specific social and cultural contexts
Differentiate between ‘emic’ and ‘etic’
- Etic: studying behavior outside a given culture and attempting to describe these behaviors as universal
- Emic: studying behaviors from within a culture, identifying behavior SPECIFIC to that culture.
( PROPOSED BY BERRY )
How was Ainsworth’s research guilty of imposed etic (cultural relativism)
The research studied behavior inside of one culture (American) and then assumed that their perceived ideal attachment type (and methodology) could be applied universally.
Apart from Ainsworth’s research, what is another example of imposed etic?
In psychopathology, defining abnormality is an example of imposed etic.
This can be seen in ‘deviation from ideal mental health’ where independence from other people is on Jahoda’s criteria for ideal mental health.
Different countries approach the notion of independence differently, such as between collectivist and individualist cultures.
Evaluate culture bias
- Ethnic stereotyping
A limitation of culture bias is that it can result in prejudice against groups of people. Gould explained how the first IQ tests piloted during WW1 on soldiers led to eugenic social policies in the US.
Army recruits were subject to an IQ test that had many ethnocentric items on it, such as assuming that every group would know the names of presidents. In the results, African-American and Balkan recruits scored the lowest. Rather than interpreted as weaknesses in the test design, this was used to inform racial discourse about genetic inferiority, deeming minorities ‘feeble-minded’.
This illustrates how cultural bias can be used to justify prejudice. - Classical studies.
A limitation of cultural bias is that many of the most influential studies are culturally biased.
Cultural bias is present in multiple defining studies in social influence such as Milgram’s obedience study and Asch’s conformity study that only conducted experiments on US participants with white and middle class backgrounds.
Replications of Asch’s experiment in collectivist cultures found significantly higher rates of conformity than the individualist US. This suggests that understanding of topics such as social influence cannot be generalized, and should only be applied to the culture conducted in. - Globalization
A further limitation of cultural bias is that in an age of increased media globalization, one can argue that distinguishing between individualist and collectivist culture is less significant or no longer applies.
The traditional argument that individualist cultures value individualism/independence whilst collectivist cultures value society and community. Despite this, a Japanese study found that 14/15 studies comparing the US and Japan found no evidence of individualism or collectivism - making the definition seem too simplistic. This suggests that cultural bias in research may be less of an issue in the modern day. - Cultural psychology.
A strength of cultural bias is that it has led to the emergence of cultural psychology.
Cultural psychology is the study of how people shape and are shaped by their cultural experience, being an emerging field which incorporates sociology, anthropology and political science. Cultural psychologists avoid ethnocentric assumptions through embracing an emic approach. They conduct studies within their cultural context, using local researchers and culturally based techniques. This suggests modern psychologists are now mindful of the dangers of cultural bias and actively strive to avoid it.
What is the free will and determinism debate?
It contemplates whether we have free will (the ability to make choices without constraint) or if we are the product of internal or external influences that determine behavior.
What approaches are on the free will or determinism side?
- Biological approach: suggests causes for behavior are internal (determinism)
- Behaviorist approach: suggests causes for behavior are external (determinism)
- Humanistic approach: suggests we have free will.
What is free will?
The notion that humans can make choices and their behavior/thoughts are not determined by internal or external forces.
In this, we are self-determining despite the action of these forces and we can reject them.
What is determinism?
An approach which suggests that we are governed by external or internal forces and free-will is non-existent.
(There are hard and soft versions of determinism)
What is hard determinism? (fatalism)
The idea that all human behavior has a cause and, in principle, it is possible to identify and describe these causes.
It ALWAYS assumes that everything we think and do is dictated by internal or external forces out of our control.
What is soft determinism?
Seen in the cognitive approach,
An idea that suggests that, whilst it is objective to explain what determines behavior, this does not detract from the freedom to make rational conscious choices (William James - Philosopher)
What are the 2 subtypes of determinism?
- Hard determinism
- Soft determinism
What are the types of determinism in relation to approaches?
- Biological determinism
The biological approach emphasizes the role of biological determinism for behavior, such as the influence of the autonomic nervous system on the stress response or genetics in developing mental disorders.
Modern biological psychologists, however, recognize mediating influences from the environment. - Environmental determinism
In the behavioral approach, BF Skinner described free will as an ‘illusion’, according to this, all behavior is a result of conditioning.
This implies that although we believe we are acting independently, our experience of ‘choice’ is merely a result of reinforcement contingencies that have acted upon us. - Psychic determinism.
Seen in the psychodynamic approach, Freud also believed free will is an illusion and emphasized the influence of biological drives and instincts.
He believed human behavior is determined by unconscious conflict repressed in childhood. In this, there is no such thing as an accident and even a slip of the tongue (parapraxes) can be explained by the unconscious.
What is the scientific emphasis on casual explanations (free will vs determinism)
The basic principle in science that every event in the universe has a cause, and causes are explained using general laws (hard determinism)
Knowledge of causes and forming laws are important as it allows scientists to predict and control future events.
In psychology, lab experiments are used as it enables researchers to demonstrate casual relationships where all variables are controlled.
Evaluate free will vs determinism
- PRO-FREE WILL: practical value of free will
A strength of free will is its practical value.
The common sense view is that humans exercise free will on a daily basis, yet even if this is false, thinking we do exercise choice can improve mental health.
This was seen in a study into adolescents who had a strong belief in fatalism - that their lives were ‘decided’ by events out of their control. The study found that these adolescents were at a much higher risk of developing depression. This links to social influence in the fact that people who exhibit an external locus of control tend to be less optimistic.
This suggests that, even if we don’t have free will, the fact we believe we do may have a positive impact on mind and behavior. - ANTI-FREE WILL: Neurological counter evidence
A limitation of free will is that brain scan evidence does not support the idea of free will, instead supporting more determinist processes.
Libet et al. instructed participants to choose a random moment to flick their hand whilst he measured activity (readiness potential) in their brain.
Participants had to state when they felt the conscious will to move.
The findings showed that the unconscious brain activity leading up to the movement came around half a second before the participants stated their will to move. This could be interpreted as our basic experiences of free will are actually determined by our brain before we are aware of them. - ANTI-DETERMINISM: The law
A limitation of determinism is how it operates in the legal system around responsibility.
The hard determinist stance is that individual choice is not the cause of behavior. This is an extreme stance when considering law. This is not consistent in how the legal system works. In a court of law, offenders are held responsible for their actions. The main principle is that the offender exercised free will in committing the crime, hence being prosecuted. This implies that determinist arguments may not work in real world situations.
