Issues and Debates

Question 1

Hare-Mustin and Marecek (1988)

Answer 1

Alpha bias: assuming there are differences between men and women.
Beta bias: assuming that there are no difference between men and women.
+
Arguing for gender equality ignores the needs of women in society.

Question 2

Josselson (1988)

Answer 2

In the Freudian psychodynamic approach, women are wrongly viewed as being morally inferior.

Question 3

Taylor et al. (2000)

Answer 3

Men and women respond differently to stress. Traditionally, it was thought to be the same (a beta bias).

Question 4

Eagly (1978)

Answer 4

Women are less effective leaders, this means that specific training programs may be required.

Question 5

Rosenthal (1966)

Answer 5

Male researchers are biased in how they interact with female participants.

Question 6

Eagly and Johnson (1990)

Answer 6

Women and men (in real life situations) have equal leadership skill.

Question 7

Cornwell et al. (2013)

Answer 7

Women are better at learning because they are more attentive, flexible and organised.

Question 8

Vernimmen (2015)

Answer 8

Women do often compete for males. Darwin’s theory of sexual selection was influenced by Victorian ideas of women.

Question 9

Takano and Osaka (1999)

Answer 9

Meta analysis showed that people from collectivist cultures are not more conformist that those from individualist cultures.

Question 10

Wober (1974)

Answer 10

Collectivist cultures see intelligence as the group’s shared knowledge.

Question 11

Smith and Bond (1998)

Answer 11

98% of studies in a European psychology textbook were American or European.

Question 12

Sears (1986)

Answer 12

A large majority of studies use undergraduates.

Question 13

Henrich et al. (2000)

Answer 13

2/3 of participants in studies are American psychology students. A randomly selected American student was 4000 times more likely to be a participant for a study than a non-Westerner.

Question 14

Gould (1981)

Answer 14

Original IQ tests created false and enduring stereotypes surrounding intelligence of blacks and Eastern Europeans.

Question 15

Hill et al. (1999)

Answer 15

People with high intelligence have the IGF2R gene.

Question 16

Rogers (1959)

Answer 16

If people do not take responsibility for their actions they cannot be self-actualised and healthy.

Question 17

Dennett (2003)

Answer 17

Total determinism is impossible. Chaos theory: causal explanations are probabilistic not deterministic.

Question 18

Libet et al. (1983)

Answer 18

There is neural activity in motor regions of the brain before the conscious decision to move.

Question 19

Soon et al. (2008)

Answer 19

Neural activity in the prefrontal cortex 10 seconds before awareness of a decision to act.

Question 20

Trevena and Miller (2009)

Answer 20

Brain activity was just the readiness to act, not the intention to act.

Question 21

Hebb

Answer 21

It is meaningless to ask which is more important, nature or nurture, because they both contribute to everything.

Question 22

Plomin et al. (1977)

Answer 22

Reactive interaction: children have to react to an environment which is affected by their genetic predispositions.
Passive interaction: children react to an environment that is influenced by their parents/carers genetic predispositions.

Question 23

Scarr and McCartney (1983)

Answer 23

Niche picking: people have biological predispositions and then search for groups that match their views.

Question 24

Blakemore and Cooper (1970)

Answer 24

‘Innate’ visual systems in kittens could be overridden during early development.

Question 25

Wolpe (1973)

Answer 25

SD didn’t work for woman with fear of insects (reductionist approach) as her husband, called “insect”, was the problem instead (holistic approach).

Question 26

Martin et al. (2001)

Answer 26

Psychotherapy is just as effective for increasing serotonin in depression-sufferers as drugs were.

Question 27

Kandel (1979)

Answer 27

Because learning creates new neuron connections, it is logical that nurture can affect our physiology.

Question 28

Allport (1961)

Answer 28

Idiographic approach teaches us more about personality than personality tests.

Question 29

Hall and Lindzey (1970)

Answer 29

If idiographic approaches try to make predictions then they are basically nomothetic.

Question 30

Holt (1967)

Answer 30

The difference between idiographic and nomothetic is meaningless as generalisations are inevitably made. There is no such thing as a unique individual.

Question 31

Millon and Davies (1996)

Answer 31

Research should start with the nomothetic approach and then, once the psychological principles have been devised, an idiographic approach should be used.

Question 32

Sieber and Stanley (1988)

Answer 32

Research should be socially sensitive (It’s a whole page so just go read it—pg 54).

Question 33

Herrnstein and Murray (1994)

Answer 33

The Bell Curve: it is a waste of time to try and educate unintelligent groups as they are genetically destined to under-achieve.

Question 34

Heather (1976)

Answer 34

Behaviour is predictable but not inevitable: people are free to make a decisions but from a limited repertoire.

Question 35

James (1890)

Answer 35

Physical behaviour is determined but mental behaviour is not.

Question 36

Valentine (1992)

Answer 36

Behaviour is always determined but does not always look that way depending on the situation.

Question 37

Gilligan (1982)

Answer 37

Kohlberg’s (1969) research into morality was only carried out with male participants but men have an ethic of justice whereas women have an ethic of care.

Question 38

Westcott (1982)

Answer 38

People feel more free in situations when there are few responsibilities or factors that prevent certain behaviours.