A01 Cultural Bias

• Sample of psychologists

  Psychology is mainly the study of white American males. Despite haviung their enquiries restricted, many psychologists claim to have discocrered 'facts' about human behaviour.
• Universality and bias

  Although psychologys claims to make unearthed findings that say something people all over the world, they actually only apply to certain particular groups of people who were studied.
• Culture

  An imporant influence on human behaviour that's ignored. Studies from individualist cultures have made the assumption that they apply all over the world. E.g: Asch,Milgram. If the norm of one particular behaviour is judged from the standpoint of one particular culture, then any cultural differences will be classified as abnormal.
• Ethnocentrism

  Belief in the superiority of one's nation or ethnic group. In psychological research this may be communicated through a view that any behaviours which do not conform to the model are somehow deficient, unsophisticated and underdeveloped.
• Cultural relativism


  the practice of judging a society by its own standards. E.g: Ainsworth's strange situation has imopsed etic in psychology. In assuming that the US-based model of classifying attachment was the norm, Ainsworth imposed her own cultural understanding upon the rest of the world.
• Etic and Emic


  Berry drawn a distinction between etic and emic. Etic looks at behaviour from outside of a given culture and attempts to describe those behaviours as universal. Emic functions from within/inside certain cultures and identifies behaviours that are scientific to that culture. Berry argues psychology has often been guilty of imposed etic apprach. Therefore, psychologists must be more mindful of cultural relativism.