Issues And Debates Flashcards
What is ethnocentrism
A type of cultural bias that invoives judging other cultures by the standaras and values of ones own culture. The strange situation was criticised for being ethnocentric. It was designed for western cultures but was incorrectly applied to eastern cultures.
What is the Etic approach?
This looks at universal behaviour from outside of a given culture and attempts to describe and explain behaviour that are universal. For example the strange situation.
What is the emic approach?
This looks at behaviour from within a given cultures and identifies behaviour specific to that culture.
What is cultural relativism ?
The idea that human behaviour can only be meaningful and understood within specific social and cultural contexts.
What is universality ?
An underlying characteristic of human beings that is capable of being applied to all, despite differences of experience and upbringing.
What is bias?
The tendency to treat one individual or group in a different way to others, typically based on stereotypes and prejudice.
What is gender bias?
Psychological research or theory that offers a view that does nor justifiably represent the experience and behaviour of men or women ( but usually not women). It may be the representation of one gender only.
What is alpha bias?
The attempt to exaggerate or overestimate the differences between the genders.
What is beta bias?
The attempt to downplay or underestimate the differences between the genders.
What is androcentrism?
When men’s behaviour is the standard to which women’s behaviour is compared. Female behaviour is often judged to be ‘abnormal’ ,‘deficient’ or ’inferior’ by comparison.
Alpha bias
In Freud’s psychoanalytic approach he argued that because girls do not suffer the same Oedipus complex, they don’t identify with their mothers as strongly as boys do with their fathers. He said because of this women develop weaker superegos.
Studies that show gender bias
-Milgram
-Asch
-Zimbardo
=all use male pps
=beta bias
Define Ethical implications
The impact that psychological research may have in terms of the rights of people especially participants.
Define socially sensitive
Studies in which there are potential consequences or implications for the participants or the group of people the participants represent.
Define Free will
The notion that humans can make their own choices and their behaviour and thoughts are not determined by external forces.
Define determinism
The view that an individual’s behaviour is controlled by internal or external forces, and not by the individuals will.
Define Hard determinism
The view that’s all behaviour is caused by some forces, so free will is an illusion.
Define soft determinism
The view that’s behaviours may be predictable but there is also room for personal choice. A ‘restricted’ free will.
What are the three types of hard determinism?
-Biological
-Environmental
-Psychic
Define environmental determinism
The belief that behaviour is caused by features of the environment that cannot be controlled.
Define biological determinsm
The belief that behaviour is caused by biological influences that cannot be controlled. (Genetic or evolutionary)
Define psychic determinism
The belief that behaviour is caused by unconscious psychodynamic conflicts that cannot be controlled.
What is the scientific emphasis on causal explanations
Science aims to find the cause of things, based on the principle that every event has a cause. Psychology wants to be a science so it employs that scientific method; hypothesis testing and lab experiments
Define Nature
The view that behaviour is the product of innate biological or genetic factors. This is known as the nativist position; the assumption that the individual differences between humans are a result of each persons genetic code:
Define nurture
The view that behaviour is the product of environmental influences. Also known as empiricists, they believe the mind is a blank slate at birth and human characteristics are learnt.
What is the relative importance of heredity and environment?
Both heredity and environment are involved in the development of behaviour as there has never been a concordance rate that is 100%. It makes little sense to try and seperate the two, so psychologists take an interactionist approach.
Define the interactionist approach
It is a way of explaining the development of behaviour in terms of a range of factors. It is the view that both nature and nurture work together to shape human behaviour.
Define holism
A theory which suggests psychologists should only study an indivisible system, rather than break it down into its parts.
Define Reductionism
The belief that human behaviour is best explained by breaking it down into its smaller parts and studying them individually.
Define biological reductionism
A form of reductionism that attempts to explain social and pathological phenomena at a lower biological level.
Define environmental reductionism
A form of reductionism that attempts to explain phenomena based on stimulus-response bonds and learned associations.
Define levels of explanation
Different ways of viewing the same phenomena. Some ways are more reductionist than other
Levels of explanation
Define Idiographic approach
This approach to research focuses more on the individual case as means of understanding behaviour.
