Gender Bias

• Universality


  •Universality is the idea that any conclusions drawn about an underlying characteristic of human beings can be applied to all people, anywhere, regardless of time or culture i.e. despite differences of experience and upbringing.
• Psychologists are people and therefore have values and beliefs that are influenced by the social and historical context they live in. Consequently, bias may be an inevitable part of the research process.
• Simone de Beauvoir


  The representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of man; they describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with the truth
• •Gender bias = a type of bias where psychological research or theory may offer a view that does not justifiably represent the experience of men or women (usually women). It is the differential treatment or representation of men and women based on stereotypes rather than real differences.
• Alpha Bias


  •Psychological theories/research that over exaggerate or overestimate differences between the sexes. Such differences are typically presented as real and enduring, fixed and inevitable. They may enhance or undervalue members of either sex, but typically undervalue females.
• Beta Bias


  •Psychological theories/research that ignore, minimise or underestimate differences between the sexes. This often occurs when females are not a part of the research process and then it is assumed that research findings apply equally to both sexes.
• Zimbardo

  •Beta bias. It ignores that there may be a difference in men and women and whether they show de-individuation in the same way, which would create problems with generalising results from women to men. This could therefore lead to inaccurate beliefs about male behaviour and gender bias.
• Milgram

  Beta/Alpha bias. Ignores a possible difference between the behaviour of males and females. It assumes that females will obey authority figures in the same way. Women may not show such a strong level of obedience to authority, which makes the research gender biased. Later research by Milgram did however exaggerate differences between the interaction of male/female participants to the experimenter.
• At best, this leads to female behaviour being misunderstood and misrepresented (either overestimating/exaggerating or underestimating/minimising gender differences), and at worse pathologised (i.e. seen as a sign of psychological instability or disorder). Therefore, it becomes normal for women to feel abnormal.
• Such research may create misleading assumptions about female behaviour, fail to challenge negative stereotypes and validate discriminatory practices.
• It may provide scientific 'justification' to deny women opportunities within the workplace or wider society e.g. the diagnostic category of PMS has been criticised as it medicalises female emotions, explaining them in hormonal terms. In contrast, male anger is seen as a rational response to external pressures. This could lead to an increase in diagnosis of mental illness.
• Consequently, gender bias in research is not just a methodological problem – it can have damaging consequences which affect the lives and prospects of women in society.