I recently listened to a podcast where psychology's WEIRD issue was dismissed as an "outdated concern". If you've followed me for a while, you can imagine the select profanities that rolled off my tongue! Back in the world of facts, 10 years after the landmark paper not much has changed: a recent analysis in a leading psych journal found that research was still mostly WEIRD, with little mention of socioeconomic status.
Psychology is also mostly WHITE: researchers who are quick to extrapolate from predominantly white samples are often less likely to do so when the sample is more diverse and studies end up in specialty journals focused on minority groups. “If you’re not studying black people, there’s no reason why you'd want to cite a paper looking at black participant outcomes.”
"There is still an unspoken assumption that the most legitimate studies — the ones that best point to universal truths — are those that used white, English-speaking subjects"
This is a problem for behavioural science - and if you think it isn't, try a thought experiment: what if 90% of the literature was based on samples from Nigeria, China, or lower SES non-white? Would you consider it generalisable? If not, you have your answer, to more than one question.
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