Culture Bias

• Culture bias


  • Culture bias is when research from one culture is applied to all cultures
• Emic research


  researching a culture from within to understand that culture specifically
• Etic research


  Conducting research from an outside perspective to understand universal truths about human psychology
• Ethnocentrism


  A perspective where the behaviours of a certain ethnicity or culture are seen as the default and normal. As such, any behaviour that deviates from the norms of that culture may be seen as abnormal
• Examples of ethnocentrism

  Ainsworth's studies only looked at American infants and concluded that secure attachment styles are best. From this perspective, child-rearing practices in other countries may be seen as psychologically abnormal
• AO3

  • Given that all humans in all cultures have very similar biology, there are likely to be many universal psychological truths, so etic research is not automatically bad. But if researchers assume their culture is the default, that's where the bias comes in. Psychological research can avoid cultural bias by being conscious of cultural relativism.