Gender bias

• What is gender bias?

  • When psychological research or theory offers views that do not justifiably represent the experience and behaviour of men or women, usually women
• What is universality?

  • Any underlying characteristic of human being that is capable of being applied to all, despite differences of experience and upbringing
  • Gender and culture bias threaten the universality of findings in psychology
• What is alpha bias?

  • When the differences between men and women are exaggerated and often devalue women in relation to men
  • Freud's theory of psychosexual stages is an example of this, suggesting that during the phallic stage boys identify with their fathers but a girl's identification is weaker, making her Superego morally inferior to that of boys
• What is beta bias?

  • When the differences between men and women are underestimated or ignored, often occurring when findings are applied to men and women although women were excluded from the research process
  • Fight or flight response is an example of this, as research tends to use male subjects as female behaviour is affected by regular hormonal changes due to ovulation, ignoring these differences
  • Taylor et al. (2002) found women have the 'tend and befriend' response, as the 'love' hormone oxytocin is more plentiful in women and is increased as a response to stress - reduces fight or flight -> women have an evolved response to look after others
  • Illustrates how research that minimises gender differenced may result in a misrepresentation of women's behaviour
• What is androcentrism?

  • When 'normal behaviour' is judged according to a male standard, meaning female behaviour is judged to be abnormal or deficient by comparison
  • At worst women's behaviour is pathologised (taken as a sign of illness) e.g. the diagnostic category called premenstrual syndrome medicalises women's emotions like anger by explaining these in hormonal terms, which feminists have objected to
  • Men's anger in contrast is seen as a rational response to external pressures, illustrating the consequences of androcentrism and alpha bias in blatantly misrepresenting women
• What is an implication of gender bias?

  • Biological vs. social explanations: gender differences are often presented as fixed and during when they are not
  • Maccoby and Jacklin (1974) concluded that girls have better verbal ability and boys have better spatial abilities, and that these differences are 'hard-wired' into the brain before birth
  • Joel et al. (2015) used brain scanning and found no such differences in brain structures and processes, suggesting that the earlier data was widely accepted due to pre-existing stereotypes of girls as 'speakers' and boys as 'doers'
  • Suggests we should be wary of accepting research findings as biological facts when they may be better explained as social stereotypes
• What is another implication of gender bias?

  • Sexism in research: women remain underrepresented in university departments
  • Murphy et al. (2014) suggests although psychology's undergrad intake is mainly women, lecturers are most likely to be men - means research is likely to be conducted by men which could possibly disadvantage female participants
  • Nicolson (1995) said male researchers may have expectations of women to be irrational and unable to complete complex tasks, meaning they underperform in research studies
  • Suggests institutional structures and methods of psychology may produce gender-biased findings
• What is another implication of gender bias?

  • Gender differences can be useful: Ingalhalikar et al. (2014) suggests that the popular stereotype of women being better multitaskers may have some biological truth
  • Found that women's brains have far better connections between the left and right sides, while men's brains have more intense activity within the brain's individual hemispheres
  • Concluded that a woman's brain is hardwired to cope better with several tasks at once
  • Suggests biological differences exist but we should be wary of exaggerating the effect they may have on behaviour
• What is another implication of gender bias?

  • Research challenging gender bias may not be published: Formanowicz et al. (2018) analysed over 1000 articles about gender bias over 8 years
  • Found research on this is funded less and published by less prestigious journals, meaning fewer scholars become aware of it or apply it to their own work
  • Suggests gender bias in psychological research is not taken as seriously as other forms of bias