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Psychology > Issues & Debates > Flashcards

Issues & Debates Flashcards

1
Q

(Gender bias)

Alpha bias - Sociobiological relationship theory

  • Men aim to impregnate as many women as possible - ‘survival efficiency’
  • Women aim to ensure the healthy survival of offspring
  • For men, promiscuity is biologically determined
A

Wilson

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2
Q

(Gender bias)

Beta bias - Fight or flight response

  • Female biology has evolved to inhibit the response
  • Women turn to tending to offspring and befriending other females to form a defensive network
A

Taylor

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3
Q

(Gender bias A03)

‘Institutional sexism’

  • Women have little influence over questions research as few are appointed as senior level
  • Lab experiments - females placed in working relationships with male partner

However, some feminists conduct their own research into the motivations and meanings of women using qualitative research methods (feminist standpoint epistemology)

A

Denmark

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4
Q

(Gender bias A03)

Criteria for non-biased research

  1. Field experiments > lab experiments
  2. Participation > observation
  3. Diversity between women > differences between sexes
  4. Qualitative data > quantitative data
A

Warrell

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5
Q

(Cultural bias)

Cultural relativism - Imposed etic and emic

Etic - looks at behaviour outside of a culture but concludes it to be universal

Emic - looks at behaviour within a culture and identifies behaviours that are specific to it

A

Berry

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6
Q

(Cultural bias)

DIagnosis of mental illness

Afro-Caribbeans 7 times more likely to be diagnosed with mental illness

DSM
- DSM-4 included 25 culture-bound syndromes (CBS)
- Have treatments elsewhere but are not recognised in the west
E.g. Brain fog (West Africa), Koro (China)

A

Cochrane and Sashidharan

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7
Q

(Cultural bias A03)

Individualism and collectivism

  • 14 out of 15 studies comparing US to Japan found no evidence of distinction between individualism and collectivism
  • Cultural bias may have become less of an issue due to cultural globalisation
A

Takano and Osaka

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8
Q

(Cultural bias A03)

Some findings are universal

  • Basic human/ animal facial expressions are universal
A

Ekman

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9
Q

(Cultural bias A03)

‘Scientific racism’

  • Issued IQ tests to immigrants and concluded that they were ‘feeble-minded’ in comparison to US citizens
  • Test required knowledge of English language
A

Goddard

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10
Q

(Free will vs determinism)

Soft determinism

  • First to advocate the idea
  • Scientists can explain the forces that act upon us but we have the ability to make rational choices
A

James

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11
Q

(Free will vs determinism A03)

Against free will

  • Brain activity relating to decision-making seems to predate our knowledge of having made a decision
    E.g. activity regarding pressing a button with our right or left hand occurs up to 10 seconds before being consciously decided
A

Soan

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12
Q

(Free will vs determinism A03)

We are influenced by our environment but have free will to decide what we pay attention to (ARRM mediating processes)

A

Bandura

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13
Q

(Nature vs nurture)

Nativism

  • Human characteristics are innate; the result of inheritance
  • Hereditability coefficient - assessment of hereditarity
    0 - 1.0 (0.5 for IQ)
    Intelligence must be influenced by genetics and environment
A

Rene Descartes

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14
Q

(Nature vs nurture)

Empiricist

  • ‘Tabula rasa’
A

John Locke

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15
Q

(Nature vs nurture)

Interactionism

  • Finnish adoptees study
  • Most likely to develop schizophrenia if they had a family history of it and ‘dysfunctional’ relationships with adoptive parents
A

Tienari

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16
Q

(Nature vs nurture)

Epigenetics - mice and acetophenone

  • Smell of acetophenone - electric shock
  • Mice developed fear response
  • Children and grandchildren also born with fear response

Epigenetic ‘mark’ left on DNA like an ON switch to switch on phobic reaction to stimulus

A

Dias and Ressler

17
Q

(Nature vs nurture A03)

Shared and unshared environments in family studies

  • Individual differences can mean siblings experience same environment differently
  • Include age, temperament
  • May be different consequences for same events
    E.g. parental divorce
A

Dunn and Plomin

18
Q

(Nature vs nurture)

Constructivism - ‘niche-building’

  • People seek out an environment that personally suits them
    E.g. naturally aggressive people will seek out aggressive friends
A

Plomin

19
Q

(Nature vs nurture A03)

Genotype-environment interaction

  1. Passive interaction - Parent’s genes influence treatment of child
  2. Evocative interaction - Child’s genes influence environment (natural talent)
  3. Active interaction - Child creates own environment by selecting people and experiences
A

Scarr and McCartney

20
Q

(Holism vs reductionism)

Environmental reductionism - though it ‘sub-vocal speech’

  • Process of thought is just ‘sub-vocal speech’
  • It is a physical process
  • We do not control cognition, it is influenced by our environment
A

Watson

21
Q

(Holism vs reductionism A03)

Against environmental determinism

  • Ingested poison to cause physical paralysis
  • Could still recall and solve cognitive puzzles
  • Preventing speech movements would make thought impossible if we didn’t have independent control over cognition (Watson)
A

Dr. Scott Smith

22
Q

(Idiographic vs nomothetic approach)

3 types of general law

  1. Classification - DSM
  2. Principles of behaviour - conformity studies
  3. Dimensions for comparison - IQ
A

Radford and Kirby

23
Q

(Ethical implications)

Research indirectly led to it becoming the norm for women to achieve custody of children in divorce courts

A

Bowlby

24
Q

(Ethical implications)

Social policy - The 11+ exam

  • Showed that there was a hereditability coefficient of 0.77 for twins in IQ
  • Intelligence believed to be genetically influenced
  • Led to 11+ exams to seperate ‘naturally intelligent’ from others

Research based largely on fabricated findings
Led to social inequalities - more resources given to grammar schools

A

Cyril Burt

25
Q

(Socially sensitive research)

Researcher should be mindful of 3 things

  1. Implications - giving ‘scientific credibility’ to stereotypes
  2. Uses - public policy
  3. Validity - is it really value-free?

Cross-cultural research

  • Cross-cultural research can be ethnocentric, based on western standards
  • Researchers need to operate with preconceptions
A

Sieber and Stanley

26
Q

(Socially sensitive research)

Can be beneficial

Can give insight into marginalised, under-studied groups and promote greater understanding and sensitivity for others

A

Scarr

Psychology (8 decks)

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