Psychology Today Apologizes for 'Black Women Less Attractive' Post

[malaise]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/atlantic/20110528/tc_atlantic/psychologytodayapologizesblackwomenlessattractivearticle38261
<snip>
Earlier this month, the popular magazine Psychology Today published an article by evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa titled “Why Are Black Women Less Physically Attractive Than Other Women?" that was met, expectedly, with mass outrage. The article used data based on another study to make several claims such as "black women are objectively less physically attractive than other women" yet "subjectively consider themselves to be far more physically attractive than others."

After some attempted editing of the title, the magazine retracted the post from its website in its entirety. Kanazawa in turn is facing an investigation by the London School of Economics, where he is a professor, after a unanimous vote for his dismissal by the student union.

Contributing writers to Psychology Today moved quickly to do some damage control. Dr. Kaufman, in his blog for the magazine "Beautiful Minds," wrote a post re-analyzing Kanazawa's data.

We retrieved the data from Add Health on which Satoshi Kanazawa based his conclusions to see whether his results hold up to scrutiny... Kanazawa mentions several times that his data on attractiveness are scored "objectively"... the low convergence of ratings finding suggests that in this very large and representative dataset, beauty is mostly in the eye of the beholder. Because raters differ strongly in terms of how they rate... this source of variation needs to be taken into account when testing for average race differences in ratings of attractiveness. Kanazawa does not indicate that he did so.

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Fuck you Kanazawa! I hope they fire your incompetent ass.

[seabeyond]

1. evolutionary psychologist are a cult like group promoting patriachal dominance. nt

[CTyankee]

2. where does the premise of this article fit into "patriarchal dominance"?

Not contesting what you are saying, but wondering what the relationship between the two might be...I'm interested in finding this out!

[seabeyond]

7. why would this man work on establishing what women are attractive and what women are not

for male pleasure?

it is all about the all empowered male sexuality forefront at all times in this "scientific" world of guesses.

every study is reinforced to establish male sexuality as all that. when any goal has an agenda to always create one side, it should automatically be suspect.

[JDPriestly]

47. Precisely, seabeyond.

By his measure, we older women would be the ugliest of all. Yet, I will say that I feel much more loved by my significant other (husband) now than I did when I was young and, at least more attractive than I am today.

What difference does it make.

The beauty of the soul, the love that a person gives others, is what makes us loved and truly beautiful.

[aikoaiko]

5. Yeah, that evolution stuff is just wacky.

Sure, there are some who use any scientific theory or framework (or any nonscientific framework for that matter) to enforce status quo thinking, but to dismiss the legitimate idea that some of our current behavioral, cognitive and affective patterns may be explainable by hundreds of thousands of years of evolutionary processes is silly.

[seabeyond]

6. the only studies i have seen coming out of evolutionary behavior last decade is the cult like, male

oriented.... knuckle dragging, patriarchal enforced, dominant rule.

when they start treating it like a science, i will start taking it seriously, instead of another means for male to dominate female.

[aikoaiko]

12. I think you're making a common mistake. Trying to explain what some would call

...patriarchal patterns is not the same as trying to enforce those patterns.

Other evolutionary psychologists are actively criticizing and confronting Kanazawa (see Scott Kaufman for example: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-barry-kaufman/satos...

To condemn the whole field of evolutionary psychology for a few is no different than those who called feminists feminazis because they've read some radsepfem literature.

[Pacifist Patriot]

15. I agree.

Robert Wright's 1994 book, "The Moral Animal" addresses this. Steven Pinker's work is also easily accessible to non-scientists.

I think a lot of people have objections to evolutionary psychology because they have read the criticisms of it without actually looking at what it has explored. It reminds me of people boycotting movies and books they haven't seen or read.

[seabeyond]

17. i have read the studies adn came up with my own criticism. not needing to listen to others

voice criticism to the agenda in much of this. it has been since challenging these studies after studies, that i have been told scientists dismiss this agenda driven cult like part of evolutionary science.

[Pacifist Patriot]

19. I'm not saying it isn't controversial.

However, the hypothesis that the human mind and our behavior evolved as well as our physical bodies is something worth exploring in my opinion. I think it's a shame this particular pursuit of knowledge has been so tainted.

[seabeyond]

21. shame this particular pursuit of knowledge has been so tainted.

i can agree with your point. my point was "this particular pursuit of knowledge has been so tainted."

[Name removed]

44. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TrogL]

25. A great deal of evolutionary psychology suffers from logical fallacies

...the most glaring being "undivided middle".

[aikoaiko]

32. Yes, but that's true of all hypoetheticodeductive reasoning studies which is most science these days

Pose an alternative hypothesis to the null hypothesis, collect data, if data allow one to reject null then accept alternative.

[aikoaiko]

wrong spot.

[BOG PERSON]

8. agreed

evolutionary psychology is totally ahistorical and, moreover, very popular with vicious little nerds like the guy in the article.

[Pacifist Patriot]

16. vicious little nerds who apparently don't understand it in the slightest

[Pacifist Patriot]

14. Evolutionary psychology, like pretty much anything else...

has areas open to interpretation.

I have found it very enlightening, but then the evolutionary psychologists I follow are very clear about two important things.

1) their work does not in any way support a deterministic view of either human behavior or gender relations
2) their findings do not suggest either gender is inherently better or superior to the other, just differentiated.

[Pithlet]

43. I think evolutionary psychology is bunk.

I've never been impressed by it at all.

[WatsonT]

60. Do you acknowledge that human behavior has anything to do with our evolutionary history?

[Schema Thing]

3. good. they were assholes for publishing it in the first place.

[JBoy]

4. He also wrote "Are All Women Essentially Prostitutes?"

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-scientific-fundamentalist/201103/are-all-women-essentially-prostitutes

A hack and a misogynist.

[Cronus Protagonist]

9. He self-identifies as an archaofeminist.

A lover of women, not a hater.

[yardwork]

11. Yeah, right. And Westboro Baptist Church is a ministry of love.

[Blue_Tires]

55. Wow...Just wow...

Unclassy, attention-grabbing headline aside, I'm much more shocked at how over-reaching, flimsy and intellectually bankrupt his analyses are...Where is his research and sourcing?

So essentially ONE former high-priced call girl opines that men who take women out on expensive dates (where they might get lucky) as opposed to buying an escort are suckers...And our esteemed psychologist not only accepts it as given fact with no alternate or opposing viewpoints, and completely ignoring relevant socio-economic/societal/ethical factors, HE STRETCHES THAT PREMISE TO COVER TWO MILLION YEARS OF MALE-FEMALE HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS(!)

[yardwork]

10. Disgraceful. Pure racism, and old-fashioned racism at that.

Sad to know that racist quacks can still hold academic positions.

[dawg]

13. Race is a sensitive issue.

Based on my limited layperson's knowledge of anthropology, races do not actually exist. There is only one race, with minor genetic variations - very minor variations compared to other species. Apparently, the human race went through a population bottleneck not all that long ago, and we are all the descendants of a handfull of survivors.

The notion that black women are somehow less attractive than other women is preposterous. Skin color is only one variable. There are many others. There really are no such thing as races. They are social constructs.

[Igel]

49. Yes and no.

You can very nicely do cladistic analyses that turn out to be very much like what popular opinion says about races.

On the other hand, if you look at genetic differences at the extremes of what races are, you can easily show that there's more variation within a race (especially "black") than between races.

Let's look at echinofossulocactus. There are no racial categories there, no advocacy groups, no history of oppression of echinofossulocactus species by another. They're a genus of cacti that lives in Mexico, for the most part. Their taxonomy is atrocious. They basically form more of a continuum that humans do: If you start at one edge of their area of natural occurrence and move to the other, there's no good cut-off. You never say, "Aha! A new species." Yet if you pick a 100 miles and compare the species at either end, you'd say, "Ah, well, these are definitely different species." Go to the extremes, and you have sharply reduced viability of hybrids. They form different species--yet if you look at the examples from near the borders, you have far more genetic diversity within a species than between species. If this is true, then all you're saying is that the species' lines are misdrawn or could be drawn elsewhere. Where to draw the line really is a problem--where the lines fall and how many species you have has traditionally depended crucially on your starting position. Genetic analysis helps--but only in the sense of showing phylogenetic differentiation. When the differences pile up sufficiently to entail a new species is still a question, and such analysis works mostly to reshuffle species, to making obvious lumpings and splittings.

Now back to humans. The phylogenetic work shows nicely that humans have differentiated, and that specific groups of humans are more closely related to some other groups than to some others. When to put them into different "races" is largely a social question--but that there are differences isn't really at issue. That the edges of the groups are blurred because humans can freely hybridize also isn't at issue (notice nobody says we're not one species--"race" is below "subspecies" and is a purely informal term). I think of them in terms of prototypes, because it's the prototypes that most people (racist or otherwise) return to, and it's the prototypes that tend to match cladistic analysis: I know what a chair is and what a table is, but there are modernist things that deconstruct the terms rather neatly and would lead to the simple conclusion that "chair" and "table" are meaningless social constructs, without any important structural differences. (I leave it to the deconstructionists to serve dinner on a recliner or use a conference table to support their rumps when watching a movie in a theatre, since there's no actual difference except what we perceive.)

[FLAprogressive]

18. While I don't agree with his views whatsoever......academic freedom, anyone?

[Pacifist Patriot]

20. I agree.

I have no problem with academic freedom or freedom of the pulpit. I think anyone should be able to make a right ass of himself or herself. And I say that as someone who has done so from time to time. :-)

I think there is an inherent responsibility with academic freedom. It must be tempered with academic integrity. Also, anyone who publishes must be prepared for a negative response. There are always consequences, good, bad or indifferent.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

27. i think consequences of academic freedom, should not including being fired

for an unpopular opinion. i say this, as someone who thinks his conclusions were completely unmerited. however, he has a right to publish it, especially if it was peer reviewed to pass scientific criterion

[aikoaiko]

36. this job was to blog for a magazine and it isn't an academic position.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

39. he published similar works in journal of intelligence

Intelligence and physical attractiveness • Article
Intelligence, Volume 39, Issue 1, 1 January 2011, Pages 7-14
Kanazawa, S.

Why beautiful people are more intelligent • Article
Intelligence, Volume 32, Issue 3, 1 May 2004, Pages 227-243
Kanazawa, S.; Kovar, J.L.


if op-eds are covered, blogging should be covered.

there is no reason to fire a researcher because you dont like his conclusions. its much more effective to retort with the same data and re-interpret it

[Pacifist Patriot]

40. I agree.

I was referring to the consequences of being blasted as a racist and sloppy scientist.

I think he should be fired if he fudged data or fabricated results, but if he just came to an unpopular conclusion that's quite different.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

42. agreed

[Blue_Tires]

57. Conclusions aside, I have no doubt he could get nailed for methodologies

even a freshman would find lazy at best and unprofessional at worst...

Like the prostitution blog post, it's like he already has his conclusion pre-determined and he's just creating confirmation of his bias...

[Pacifist Patriot]

58. Can't disagree with you on that one.

[seabeyond]

22. sure. why dont we put creationism in our schools, too. same garbage, other end of the

spectrum

[La Lioness Priyanka]

24. its not the same thing. academic freedom gives him the right

to study and publish controversial works.

not start a curriculum in a high school.

[seabeyond]

26. exactly the same. nt

[La Lioness Priyanka]

28. no it's not. high school dont have academic freedom for a reason,

researchers do for a reason, you should look it up, instead of conflating arguments.

[Pacifist Patriot]

46. not remotely

[La Lioness Priyanka]

23. i know. i am really disturbed by his conclusions, and would prefer someone deconstruct them

but academic freedom is a huge deal, and just like the first amendment, it is worth protecting.

[BOG PERSON]

29. the guy in the article works at the london school of economics though

and i don't believe britain has anything resembling the first amendment.

[FLAprogressive]

30. Academic freedom is a general, international concept.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

31. i was making a more philosophical point. free speech and academic freedom

are worth protecting and institutionalizing. i would really be against this guy getting fired, just like i would be against the pro-palestinian prof. in cuny getting fired.


academic freedom, is just like the first amendment, things will be said that one may personally find abhorrent, but the right is worth protecting.

[aikoaiko]

33. .

[aikoaiko]

35. This is a blog and not even an article in the magazine let alone an academic position.

As a professor I wouldn't think that academic freedom protects your job blogging poorly expressed ideas.

Psychology Today is not an academic journal although it usually tries to be better about what it publishes.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

37. he published the same/similar article in journal of intelligence too.

the blog version is a version of the one in the journal of intelligence

Intelligence and physical attractiveness • Article
Intelligence, Volume 39, Issue 1, 1 January 2011, Pages 7-14
Kanazawa, S.

Why beautiful people are more intelligent • Article
Intelligence, Volume 32, Issue 3, 1 May 2004, Pages 227-243
Kanazawa, S.; Kovar, J.L.

[aikoaiko]

38. I think those articles covered different topics with different data, but nevertheless

What he wrote was for a blog for a magazine and academic freedom doesn't really apply in my opinion. He still has his academic position and is not in jeopardy as far as I know.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

41. i think it should cover him, since op-eds are traditionally covered

i think what would be more effective is to use data, to deconstruct his argument

i think calling for his firing, is the lazy and unintellectual approach

[aikoaiko]

45. Sure, academic freedom covers the academic position (faculty) when someone write an op-ed

but if a faculty had a gig to write a column for newspaper that blew up like it did for Kanazawa then I could see how one might be fired from the newspaper.

I would agree that he shouldn't be fired from his academic position for the blog, but Psych Today can kick him to the curb if they wish.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

48. right. i am ok with psych today firing him but the firing is coming from students

about his academic position.

[Iggo]

34. And nowhere along the line did anyone say oh my god this is wrong?

[malaise]

50. Of course not

Overrated egos never think about consequences.

[Odin2005]

51. Evolutionary Psychology is a pseudoscience.

[BOG PERSON]

52. agreed

in another generation or two, people will look at it the same way we look at phrenology now.

[Pacifist Patriot]

53. I hope not.

How the human mind evolved is an intriguing line of inquiry. Why should it be any less scientific than behavioral psychology, clinical psychology, developmental psychology, etc.?

[BOG PERSON]

59. there's a difference between evopsych's post-hoc speculation

and other branches of psychology whose empirical standards may be a little more rigorous than "hot people are smart because hot girls want to get with smart guys"

[Pacifist Patriot]

61. I wouldn't exactly call your quote an empirical standard.

It's really pathetic an entire field in pursuit of answers to valid questions is riddled with controversy.

[Pithlet]

56. Yep. n/t

[ismnotwasm]

54. Good

I read that and it was pure bullshit that should never had made in a major publication. And he should be fired.