Recently, debate has intensified over the “problem” of selective samples in psyc
ID: 3443351 • Letter: R
Question
Recently, debate has intensified over the “problem” of selective samples in psychological research. Scientists have coined the term WEIRD to describe the vast majority of participants in psychological studies:
Western
Educated
Industrialized
Rich
Democratic
What are some potential threats to the internal and external validity of a study that employs WEIRD subjects? What kinds of studies are at particular risk? How might we fix these problems systematically, in our research endeavors?
Bring in at least one outside source when answering the question(s).
Explanation / Answer
Recruitment of WEIRD subjects for studies is a form of sampling bias that has been discussed in recent literature. Most of the studies are based on these subjects eg american college student who are easy to get but are WEIRD(western,educated,industralized,rich,democratic).
While almost 80% of psychological studies are based on such subjects they actually represent only 16% of the world population. Their environment and upbringing may be very different from other people living in different cultures around the world and sharing different perspectives.
This leads to a problem of external validity in such studies. Result may be valid in western countries but not valid in eastern countries or other parts of the world which are uneducated, un democratic and unindustralized.
A common example could be efficacy of CBT in depression which is applicable to western countries but there is literature suggesting that same CBT cannot be applied to Indian population as people are not literate enough to be psychologically minded and hence its efficacy is questionable in such populations.
Many studies investigating behaviour, motivations and even intervention in Psychology are at risk of this sampling bias.
To fix these problems
1 encourage studies to recruit non-WEIRD subjects
2 replicate the study in different population to validate the finding
3 studying the cross cultural variations in development of brain and mind
Related Questions
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.