Issues and debates in psychology
• Issue: a source of conflict that if ignored, could undermine the value of our theories and researc
• Gender bias, cultural bias, idiographic and nomothetic approaches to psychological investiga
and ethical implications of research and theories
• Debate: an academic argument that lasts many years and often appears to have no resolution,
enables us to gain a better understanding of any other factors.
• Many psychologists prefer to take an interactionist approach to explain an aspect of behavio
rather than remaining on one side of a debate.
• Nature vs nurture, reductionism vs holism, free will vs determinism
Gender and culture in psychology- universality and bias
• Beliefs, values, opinions: developed through parents, family, friends, life experiences and soc
media
• Bias: within research due to the difficulty of acting entirely free from any influence from beliefs,
values and opinions.
• Scientific approach: attempts to make it objective and ‘value free’, this is very hard
• Universal truths: psychology claims to be discovering universal truths about people throughou
world
• Universal truth: Van Ijzendoorn- secure attachment is the dominant attachment style
• Differences: case studies- Clive Wearing etc.
, Gender and culture in psychology- Cultural bias, includ
ethnocentrism and cultural relativism
• Cultural group: research studies tend to focus on one group as it is practically
impossible to study all ‘types’
• Cultural bias: the tendency to perceive the world from your own cultural group
• Ethnocentrism: judging other cultures by the standards and values of your own
culture
• Consequences: explanations only work for certain cultural groups, we have to
question the findings of studies that attempt to generalise the findings to everyone
(Ainsworth, Asch, Milgram, Zimbardo)
• Cultural relativism: the idea that norms, values, ethics, moral standards can be
understood and meaningful within specific cultural contexts
• Imposed etic: when a theory/ methodology is developed in one culture and used t
study the behaviour of people in a different culture with different norms, values and
experiences.
Gender bias, including androcentrism and alpha and be
bias
• Gender bias: when a piece of research/ theory is based on only one gender
• Androcentric: focuses only on explaining male behaviour
• Gynocentric: focuses only on explaining female behaviour
• Alpha bias: assuming that there is a real and enduring difference between male an
• Issue: a source of conflict that if ignored, could undermine the value of our theories and researc
• Gender bias, cultural bias, idiographic and nomothetic approaches to psychological investiga
and ethical implications of research and theories
• Debate: an academic argument that lasts many years and often appears to have no resolution,
enables us to gain a better understanding of any other factors.
• Many psychologists prefer to take an interactionist approach to explain an aspect of behavio
rather than remaining on one side of a debate.
• Nature vs nurture, reductionism vs holism, free will vs determinism
Gender and culture in psychology- universality and bias
• Beliefs, values, opinions: developed through parents, family, friends, life experiences and soc
media
• Bias: within research due to the difficulty of acting entirely free from any influence from beliefs,
values and opinions.
• Scientific approach: attempts to make it objective and ‘value free’, this is very hard
• Universal truths: psychology claims to be discovering universal truths about people throughou
world
• Universal truth: Van Ijzendoorn- secure attachment is the dominant attachment style
• Differences: case studies- Clive Wearing etc.
, Gender and culture in psychology- Cultural bias, includ
ethnocentrism and cultural relativism
• Cultural group: research studies tend to focus on one group as it is practically
impossible to study all ‘types’
• Cultural bias: the tendency to perceive the world from your own cultural group
• Ethnocentrism: judging other cultures by the standards and values of your own
culture
• Consequences: explanations only work for certain cultural groups, we have to
question the findings of studies that attempt to generalise the findings to everyone
(Ainsworth, Asch, Milgram, Zimbardo)
• Cultural relativism: the idea that norms, values, ethics, moral standards can be
understood and meaningful within specific cultural contexts
• Imposed etic: when a theory/ methodology is developed in one culture and used t
study the behaviour of people in a different culture with different norms, values and
experiences.
Gender bias, including androcentrism and alpha and be
bias
• Gender bias: when a piece of research/ theory is based on only one gender
• Androcentric: focuses only on explaining male behaviour
• Gynocentric: focuses only on explaining female behaviour
• Alpha bias: assuming that there is a real and enduring difference between male an
