Ideological Bias: A Data Quality Control Factor for Cross-Cultural Research

Abstract

Raoul Naroll (1962, 1970) has advanced various control variables to help determine the accuracy of ethnographic reports for cross-cultural analysis. Some of these are: 1) length of stay in the field, 2) familiarity with the native language, and 3) completeness and length of ethnographic report. Here I examine ideological bias as another control factor, one associated with the effects of social, political, economic or moral ideology on data quality. From a worldwide sample of twenty societies I show that ideological bias appears to be a significant data quality control factor, and I present five indexes of ideological bias.