In this article, we provide evidence for the cultural (mis)attribution bias in developmental psychology in the United States: the tendency to see minorities as members of a group whose development is shaped primarily by culture, and to perceive Whites as independent individuals whose development is largely influenced by psychological processes. In two studies, we investigated this bias with a decade of peer reviewed developmental research conducted in the US (N = 640 articles), and an experiment and a survey with developmental psychologists in the US (N = 432 participants). In both studies we found that developmental psychologists in the US favor cultural over psychological explanations when considering the development of minorities, while the opposite pattern emerged in reference to Whites. This bias is exacerbated by the endorsement of the idea that minorities are more collectivistic and Whites more individualistic. We discuss the implications of this bias for diversity and inclusion initiatives in applied developmental sciences.

Introduction

The importance of diversity and inclusion has gained recognition in developmental sciences. The Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) has stated that one of the goals of its strategic plan is to pursue diversity in all aspects of its organization, activities, and membership. Diversity and inclusion are addressed in the plan as: (1) “…the principle that a full understanding of development requires inclusion of cultural, racial, ethnic, national, or other contexts as influences on individuals and the families and communities in which they live”, and the need to (2) “…provide a venue for scientists who represent a range of cultural and ethnic backgrounds…(and) increasing the number of developmental scientists from underrepresented ethnic and racial groups (SRCD, 2005, p. 2)”. Both goals are well justified. First, supporting diversity by encouraging the consideration of the role of culture is imperative, given its crucial and multifaceted role in shaping human development (Causadias, 2013; García Coll et al., 1996; Quintana et al., 2006; Rogoff, 2003; Super & Harkness, 1986). Second, promoting diversity through the inclusion of underrepresented groups is of paramount importance to the field, and the scientific enterprise, more generally. For decades, scholars have documented pervasive bias in the representation of minorities in published research, which constrains our scientific understanding of human development (García Coll, Akerman, & Cicchetti, 2000; MacPhee, Kreutzer, & Fritz, 1994; McLoyd & Randolph, 1985; Nielsen, Haun, Kärtner, & Legare, 2017). However, commitment to the goals of diversity and inclusion is often articulated in a way that emphasizes the importance of culture in the development racial/ethnic minorities, but not necessarily how culture shapes the development of Whites (see Quintana et al., 2006; Spencer, 2006). By developmental psychology in the United States we refer to the collective enterprise of developmental psychologists working in universities in the US -regardless of their race/ethnicity and nationality- conducting developmental research with samples mostly located in the U.S., and usually publishing research in developmental journals based in the U.S. We employ the term minorities to signify membership into any non-White cultural, ethnic, or racial groups in the U.S., including, but not limited to, African Americans or Blacks, Asian Americans, Hispanic or Latinos, Native Americans, and Pacific Islanders. We use the term Whites to indicate identification with any racial/ ethnic group of European ancestry in the US, including, but not limited to, European Americans, Euro-Americans, Anglo-Americans, and/or Caucasians. In this article, we provide evidence of a cultural (mis)attribution bias: the tendency to see minorities as members of a group whose development is shaped primarily by social-level cultural processes, and to perceive Whites as autonomous and independent actors whose development is instead largely influenced by individual-level psychological processes. In two studies, we investigated the presence of this bias in developmental research in the US using archival, experimental, and correlational methods. Considering this bias is central in the pursuit of diversity and inclusion because overemphasizing cultural differences is another way of reinforcing deficit perspectives: a deficit by difference approach.