Gender Bias

• Gender Bias:
• Universality: Means that all research applies equally to both genders.
• Gender Bias: The differential treatment and representation of males and females, based on stereotypes and not on real differences.
• Alpha Bias: When the differences between men and women are shown and may be exaggerated, often to devalue females to their male counterparts.
• Beta Bias: The attempt to downplay or minimise the differences between the genders.
• Androcentrism: The stance that the behaviour of men is taken as the norm and women's behaviour is seen as atypical.
• Gynocentrism


  Theories which are centred on females.
• Institutional Sexism: Men are predominant at senior researcher levels, leading to research agendas that follow male concerns.
• Standardised Procedures in Research: Women and men might respond differently to research situations and might be treated differently by researchers.
• Dissemination of Research Results: Male researchers are more likely to have their work published.
• Fight or Flight Response: Documented as being universal, even though the research was only carried out on male samples (rats).
• Tend and Befriend: Research indicated that women tend to respond to stress by nurturing and seeking social support.
• Womb Envy: The term coined by Horney (1926) indicating that males were envious of females' ability to have children.
• Freud's Theory of Psychosexual Development: He believed that femininity was failed masculinity and that the two sexes could never be equal in position or worth.
• PMS (Pre-Menstrual Syndrome): Criticized by feminists as a stereotype that trivializes the female experience and medicalizes female emotions.
• Misleading Assumptions: The implications of gender bias in research may create misleading assumptions about female behaviour.
• Scientific Justification: Gender bias may provide a justification to deny women opportunities within the workplace.
• Critics of PMS: Claim that PMS is a social construct which explains female emotions, especially anger, in hormonal terms.
• Male Anger: Often seen as a rational response to external pressure.
• Consequences of Gender Bias: May have damaging effects on the lives and prospects of real women.
• Lack of Female Representation: The lack of women appointed at a senior level leads to male researchers being more likely to have their work published.
• Gender Bias Evaluation:

  • It may create misleading assumptions about female behaviour. • It may provide a scientific justification to deny women opportunities within the workplace.
  • • For example, feminists have objected to the diagnostic category pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS) because it stereotypes and trivialises the female experience.
  • Critics claim that PMS is a social construct which medicalises female emotions, especially anger, by explaining these in hormonal terms.
  • • However male anger is often seen as a rational response to external pressure.
  • • Thus, gender bias in research may have damaging consequences which affect the lives and prospects of real women.
• Gender Bias Evaluation:

  • May be prevalent within research is the idea that female concerns may not be reflected in the questions proposed.
  • This is because there is a lack of women appointed at a senior level, which leads to the idea that male researchers are more likely to have their work published.
  • For example, Nicolson (1995), believes that lab experiments may further disadvantage women. This is because female participants are placed in an inequitable or unjust relationship.
  • Therefore, psychology may be guilty of supporting a form of institutional sexism that creates biased theories and research.
  • However, Feminists Worrell and Remer (1992) put forward several criteria that should be adhered to avoid the gender bias within research.
• Gender Bias: Evaluation:

  • Issues of gender bias go unchallenged.
  • For example, Darwin’s theory of sexual selection suggests women are selective and phrases like ‘picky’ are often used in society, when choosing a mate.
  • These views have recently been challenged by DNA evidence suggesting that women are equally as competitive as men when the need arises.
  • This highlights the importance of continually challenged earlier research and reducing gender bias to ensure that a valid picture of women is portrayed in studies and society.
  • However, many of the gender differences reported by psychologists over the years are based on the idea that they are ‘fixed’.
  • In the 1930’s, ‘scientific research’ revealed how intellectual activity would shrivel a woman’s ovaries and harm her chances of giving birth, creates a double standard.