Could anyone please explain the meaning of ethnocentric attitude?
It refers to instances when people are culturally biased. E.g. i.e. believe that their cultural behaviour, norms and values should be the same everywhere or that their culture is better than others. E.g. An ex South African Colleague kept going on about how much better the education system, climate etc was better in South Africa. Another example might be if you explained the behaviour of people in other cultures in terms of your own. E.g. A Developmental Psychology researcher called Takaheshi found that Japanese toddlers become upset when left by their mothers alone in a room (for a few minutes) and angry when they returned. Western developmental psychology researchers, such as Ainsworth therefore concluded that Japanese babies are less securely attached than UK and American babies. However, Takaheshi pointed out that Japanese babies are rarely out of their mother’s sight until they’re 2 years old. Thus, for this culture, the behaviour was ‘normal’. This is an example of an ethnocentri
