Issues and Debates Paper 3

• Universality


  The assumption that research can be applied to everyone everywhere, regardless of time and culture
• Bias


  A distortion in representation of a group/data,etc. A view is biased if it leans toward a subjective opinion, rather than objective reality
• Types of gender bias

  • Alpha Bias
  • Beta Bias
• Alpha Bias


  Research that exaggerates differences between men and women
• Alpha Bias


  • Freud claimed that identification processes are weaker for females than males as girls do not experience castration anxiety. As a result, Freud claimed that females are morally inferior to males.
• Beta Bias


  Research that ignores, minimises or underestimates differences between men and women
• Beta Bias


  • Levels of conformity in men represents conformity in all people (Asch). Early research into fight or flight response was conducted exclusively on male animals as it was thought female hormones fluctuate too greatly.
• Androcentrism


  Research that is centred on men. 'Normal' behaviour is judged according to a male standard, meaning that female behaviour is often judged to be 'abnormal' or 'deficient' by comparison
• Androcentrism


  • Male anger is often seen as a rational response to external pressures e.g. sexual jealousy and infidelity. Female anger however is less 'accepted'. Instead, concepts such as premenstrual syndrome emerged and are seen by many critics as a social construction which medicalises female emotions, especially anger.
• Biological Versus Social Explanations: Gender differences are often presented as fixed and enduring (i.e. alpha bias) when they are not
• Recent brain scans have found no sex differences in brain structure and processing, suggesting the data from Maccoby and Jacklin was popularised as it fitted social stereotypes of the time
• Ingalhalikar et al (2014) found there are more connections between the two hemispheres in women's brains than men's brains, suggesting the stereotype of women being better at multitasking may have some biological truth
• Male researchers are more likely to have their work published and studies that find evidence of gender differences are more likely to be published than those that do not, perpetuating the prevailing view of gender difference
• Gender bias may create misleading assumptions about female behaviour, fail to challenge negative stereotypes and validate discriminatory practices
• Ways to avoid gender bias in research

  • Promoting universality
  • Studying women within meaningful real-life contexts and having them genuinely participate in research
  • Examining diversity within groups of women rather than comparisons between women and men
  • Greater emphasis on collaborative research methods that collect qualitative as opposed to numerical data
  • Greater focus on research into women dominated areas
• Culture Bias


  The tendency to judge all people in terms of your own cultural assumptions, ignoring the effects that cultural differences might have on behaviour
• Ethnocentrism


  Judging others by the value and standards of one's own culture, including beliefs about the superiority of one's own cultural group
• Ethnocentrism


  • Ainsworth's Strange Situation is considered ethnocentric as it reflects the norms and values of Western society. When applied in Japan, babies were more likely to be considered insecurely attached, because they were so distressed during separation, when they had rarely experienced separation from their mothers.
• Cultural Relativism


  The idea that behaviour can only be properly meaningful and understood in the context of the norms and values of the society or culture in which it occurs
• Etic approach


  Researchers look at behaviour from outside of a culture and attempt to describe those behaviours as universal
• Emic approach


  Researchers study a single culture to understand that culture
• Many classic studies in psychology are culturally biased, as they were conducted with US participants. Replications in different countries produced different results.
• Takano and Osaka found that 14 out of 15 studies comparing the USA and Japan found no evidence of the traditional distinction between individualism and collectivism, suggesting cultural bias in research is less of an issue than it once was.
• The first IQ tests in the 1930's were culturally biased, leading to prejudice against groups of people and racist discourse about the genetic inferiority of particular cultural and ethnic groups.
• Ekman (1989) suggests that basic facial expressions for emotions are the same all over the human and animal world, suggesting some universal behaviour.
• Cultural psychology studies how people shape and are shaped by their cultural experience, aiming to avoid ethnocentric assumptions.
• Ways to avoid culture bias in research

  • Do not attempt to extrapolate findings/theories to cultures not represented in the research sample
  • Use researchers who are native to/familiar with/immersed in the culture being investigated
  • Carry out cross-cultural research rather than research with a sole culture
  • Do not assume universal norms/standards across different cultures
  • Be sensitive to cultural norms/standards when designing research/reporting findings
  • Taking a reflexive approach ie constantly reflecting on own biases when carrying out research
• Free Will


  People have the power to make choices about and control their own behaviour/thoughts. These are not determined by biological or external factors.
• Determinism


  Behaviour is controlled by either internal or external forces acting upon the individual, rather than an individuals will to do something.
• Hard Determinism


  All human behaviour has an internal or external cause and in principle it should be possible to identify and describe these causes. Such causes are completely outside a person's control.
• Soft Determinism


  Behaviour/actions/traits are to an extent governed/dictated by internal/external forces, but we still have some element of control over/some free will to control our behaviour/actions/traits etc.
• Biological Determinism


  Behaviour is determined by biological factors outside of our control e.g. the influence of the ANS on the stress response or the influence of genes, neurotransmitters and brain structure on mental health.
• Environmental Determinism


  Behaviour is determined by environmental factors (the consequences) outside of our control e.g reinforcements and punishments for behaviour.
• Psychic Determinism


  Behaviour is determined by unconscious conflicts, repressed in childhood, that are outside of our control e.g. between the id and superego.
• Determinism focuses on the causes of behaviour. A causal explanation is based on the scientific notion that behaviour is caused/determined by internal/external factors – there is a cause and effect relationship.
• Laboratory experiments are controlled so the only thing that changes is the IV, all other extraneous variables are controlled allowing a researcher to establish if there is a significant effect on the DV.
• Determinism is consistent with the aims of science. There is no point studying something if it ultimately tells us nothing about what caused it.
• Determinism


  Focuses on the causes of behaviour. A causal explanation is based on the scientific notion that behaviour is caused/determined by internal/external factors – there is a cause and effect relationship.
• Laboratory experiments


  Controlled so the only thing that changes is the IV, all other extraneous variables are controlled allowing a researcher to establish if there is a significant effect on the DV.
• The determinism-free will debate involves two competing approaches and as a result what is a strength for one, will be a weakness for the other and vice-versa.