Gender bias in psychology

Tutors, examiners, researchers and textbook writers all tell us how important it is to be active in our learning. Here, Paul Humphreys gives some useful activities that will consolidate and enhance the article you have just read

Let’s begin by addressing one of the most common errors made by students in their exam answers: confusing ‘gender differences’ and ‘gender bias’. There are many well-documented differences between males and females in terms of physical factors (sex differences) and psychological factors (gender differences). Maccoby and Jacklin’s The Psychology of Sex Differences (1974) is a classic book which collates these differences. Findings such as recorded differences in altruistic behaviour and (dare I say it) performance at GCSE and A-level are factual, not the product of gender bias in the research.

As the article you have just read shows, psychology is ‘shot through’ with examples of gender bias. But this is not to denigrate or attack the discipline of psychology; more often than not these biases are reflective of biases in societies at large, as the article also shows in relation to the UK.