Cultural Bias

Question 1

Key points in the knowledge of cultural bias

Answer 1

• Americans and students overrepresented in research
• WEIRD people set standard
• Ethnocentrism
• Example of ethnocentrism
• Cultural relativism
• Universality

Question 2

Talk about people in research and WEIRD people setting the standard

Answer 2

A review found that 68% of research participants came from the US and 96% from industrialised nations. Another review found that 80% of research participants were undergraduates studying psychology.

We know human behaviour has a strong cultural bias. Henrich et al coined the term WRIRD to describe the group of people most likely to be studied by psychologists - Westernised. Educated people from industrialised, rich democracies.

If the norm or standard for a particular behaviour is set by WEIRD people, then the behaviour of people from non-Western, less educated, agricultural and poorer cultures is inevitably seen as ‘abnormal’/ or ‘inferior’ or ‘unusual’.

Question 3

Talk about ethnocentrism and what does this mean

Give an example of this

Answer 3

Ethnocentrism - a form of cultural bias. Superiority of own culture.

In psychology, research this may be communicated through view that any behaviour that does not conform to a European /American standard is somehow deficient of underdeveloped.

Question 4

Talk about cultural relativism

Answer 4

Helps us to avoid cultural bias

The ‘facts’ that psychologists discover may only make sense from the perspective of the culture within which the were discovered. Being able to recognise this is one way of avoiding culture bias in research.

Question 5

Talk about universality

Answer 5

Berry (1969) argues that:
- an etic approach looks at behaviour from outside a given culture and identified behaviours that are universal
- an emic approach functions from inside a culture and identifies behaviours that are specific to that culture

Question 6

Evaluations for this section

Answer 6

Strength: the emergence of cultural psychology

Limitation: ethnic stereotyping / counterpoint

Many classic studies are culturally biased

Relativism vs universality

Question 7

Strength about emergence of cultural psychology / counterpoint

Answer 7

Cultural psychology is the study of how people shape and are shaped by their cultural experience. it is an emerging field that takes an emic approach.

Research is conducted from inside a culture, often alongside local researchers is on culturally based techniques. Fewer cities are considered when comparing differences (usually just two).

This suggests that modern psychologists are mindful of the dangers of cultural bias and are taking steps to avoid it.

Counterpoint: individualism vs collectivism distinction may no longer apply die to increasing global media. Takano and Osaka (1999) found that 14/15 studies comparing the US and Japan found no evidence on individualistic vs collectivist differences.

This suggests that cultural bias in research may be less of an issue in more recent psychological research.

Question 8

Limitation of studies are culturally biased

Answer 8

Many classic studies are culturally biased. Both Asch’s and Milgram’s original studies were conducrted with white iddle-class US partiaptns. Replications of these studies in different countries provided rather different results.

Asch-type experiments in collectivist cultures found significantly higher rates o conformity than the original students in the US, an individualist culture.

This suggests our understanding of topic such as social influence should only be applied in individualist cultures.

Question 9

Limitation of ethnic stereotyping

Answer 9

Gould (1981) explained how the first intelligence tests led to eugenic social policies in America. During WW1 psychologists gave IQ tests to 1.75 million army recruits.

Many test items were ethnocentric (ie named US presidents) so recruits from south-eastern Europe and African-Americans scored lowest and were deemed genetically inferior.

This illustrates how cultural bias can be used to justify prejudice and discrimination towards ethnic and cultural groups.

Question 10

Relativism vs universality

Answer 10

Cross-cultural research can challenge dominant individualistic way of thinking wand viewing the world. This may provide is with a better understanding of huma nature.

However, research (eg Ekman 21989) suggests that facial expressions for emotions (such as disgust) are the same all over the world. so some behaviours are universal.

This suggests a full understanding of human behaviour requires both, but for too long the universal view dominated.