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Sunday, January 28, 2024
Lesson 1: Our Brains are Malleable
In this process of understanding what implicit bias is and getting to learn about our own biases, it is normal to start to feel like they are too deeply ingrained in our thoughts and actions to be able to combat their effects. However, as more research comes to light, we are able to find more and more ways to either lessen the effects of bias, or change the biases themselves. Although the latter is certainly a larger undertaking, it is very possible to do so. In the same way that our implicit biases were learned over time, we can disrupt this process with intention, attention and time.
This is because the neural connections between our associations get stronger as we take in more information that confirms our stereotypes or biases. By paying better attention to what we are exposed to and making the intentional choice to seek out experiences that go against our biases, we are able to disrupt this automatic chain of events, and those physical connection in our mind can be weakened. Two interventions we will be talking about later—mindfulness and intergroup contact, have shown the ability to not only stop the manifestation of these biases, but alter the implicit biases we possess.
study
Thank you for participating!
The sorting test you just took is called the Evaluative Priming Task.
We used that task to measure your automatic evaluation of eight of the photos.
Here are the eight photos, ordered by your automatic evaluation of
them, from the one you liked the most, to the one liked the least:
What Is An Automatic Evaluation?
An automatic evaluation is a person's very first quick judgment of objects, people, and social groups. An automatic evaluation can be activated very quickly, effortlessly, and unintentionally. Sometimes, the automatic evaluation is different than the evaluation that the person consciously and explicitly endorses. For instance, a person might endorse an equal evaluation of two objects (words, people, social groups), but still show a more positive automatic evaluation of one of these objects than the other. Some researchers argue that the automatic evaluation might influence people's behavior, especially when the behavior is done under conditions that reduce people's ability to control their behavior.
Disclaimer:
These results are not a definitive assessment of your automatic preferences. The results may be influenced by variables that not related to your automatic evaluation (e.g., momentary variations in how focused you were during the task). The results are provided for educational purposes only. You completed this study in Project Implicit's research section, in which we test new measures, tools and open questions in social psychology. This study is not supposed to test whether you have any implicit bias, or prejudice.
What was this study about?
In this study, we are testing people's automatic evaluation of different photos. We showed you photos that we created especially for this, and tested, using the evaluative priming task, your automatic evaluation of each of those photos. We will examine how people's automatic evaluations of photos differ. Do people tend to show a similar automatic evaluation of the same photos, or do their automatic evaluations vary widely?I Still Have Questions About The Study.
If you have questions about the IAT, please check out our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ). If you have any questions or comments about the study, please email the lead investigator Noga Segal Gordon (nogasegal1@mail.tau.ac.il) .
Your Participation And Financial Support Are Important!
Thank you again for participating in this research! We have learned so much from people like you taking the time to be part of our work. If you have time, please consider taking another test by clicking the button below.
As a non-profit organization, we would also appreciate your financial support. Since establishment in 2005, we have educated more than a million visitors each year about implicit biases concerning race, gender, sexual orientation, and other topics. Your donation supports Project Implicit's educational, scientific, and public service missions.
You have completed the study.
ebriefing
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You have completed the study.
Thank you for participating! The sorting test you just took is called a Brief-IAT, a variant of the Implicit Association Test. During the test, you categorized images of Black men and White men as well as images of weapons or harmless objects.
Your results are reported below, as well as more information on how this IAT works.During the Implicit Association Test (IAT) you just completed:
Your data suggest slight preference of Black Men over White Men.
Disclaimer: These IAT results are provided for educational purposes only. The results may fluctuate and should not be used to make important decisions. The results are influenced by variables related to the test (e.g., the words or images used to represent categories) and the person (e.g., being tired, what you were thinking about before the IAT).
What was the purpose of this study?
In this study, you first performed a First Person Shooter Task (FPST), and then an IAT. We were interested in how people evaluate others based on their gender (measured by the IAT), and whether people behave in biased ways to some groups rather than others (measured by the FPST). For example, participants might, on average, implictly associate Black men with danger more strongly than White men, and "shoot" Black men more quickly than White men when they are both holding a weapon or harmless object.
How does the FPST work?
You made a number of "Shoot" or "Do not Shoot" decisions towards Black or White men. Some were holding guns and some were holding harmless objects like soda cans. We are interested in whether the race of the person influenced your responses. On average, participants are typically more likely to decide to "Shoot" a Black man versus a White man, both when they are holding guns and even when they are holding harmless items like phones or wallets.
How does the IAT work?
The IAT measures associations between concepts (e.g., Black or White) and evaluations (e.g., safety or danger). People are quicker to respond when items that are more closely related in their mind share the same button. For example, when you are faster to sort weapons with Black men than White men, you could be implictly associating Black men with danger more strongly than White men when they are sharing a button.
Studies that summarize data across many people find that the IAT predicts discrimination in hiring, education, healthcare, and law enforcement. However, taking an IAT once (like you just did) is not likely to predict your future behavior well.
Does the order in which I took the IAT or FPST matter?
Yes, the order in which you see each pair has a small effect. For example, say that you see a face of a woman before a face of a man. Your score might differ if you had seen the latter face first. To minimize this effect, we randomly assign participants to different possible orderings. We also randomly assign the order of the IAT so that some people get one order and other people get the reverse order.
I still have questions about the IAT or FPST.
If you have questions about the IAT or FPST, please consult the links at the top of the page, where you will find answers to frequently asked questions, links to related research, and additional information about implicit associations. You may also email jeffrey.to@mail.mcgill.ca with questions or comments.
Please answer the following question(s) about your results:
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1. What brought you to this website?
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Click "Submit" to submit your answers.
The sorting test you just took is called the Implicit Association Test (IAT). You categorized Asian American and European American faces with words and photos relating to the categories “American” and “Foreign”, and the categories “Good” and “Bad.”
What was this study about?Past research has shown that Americans typically associate 'American' more with European Americans over Asian Americans. This study explores whether this stereotype is driven by the positivity and negativity associated with the terms 'American' and 'Foreign.'
Here is your result:Your data suggest no automatic association between Asian American with Good or Bad.
Your data suggest no automatic association between Asian American with American or Foreign.
American/Foreign IAT
If you were faster responding when European American and American were assigned to the same response key than when European American and Foreign were assigned to the same key, then this suggests you implicitly associate European Americans with the category “American” more than you associate Asian Americans with the category “American.” If you were faster responding when Asian American and American were assigned to the same response key than when Asian American and Foreign were assigned to the same key, then your score reflects the opposite implicit association.
Good/Bad IAT
If you were faster responding when European American and Good were assigned to the same response key than when Asian American and Good were assigned to the same key, then this suggests you have an implicit preference for European American over Asian American. If you were faster responding when Asian American and Good were assigned to the same response key than when European American and Good were assigned to the same key, then this suggests you have an implicit preference for Asian American over European American.
General information about your results
Your automatic association may be described as "slight", "moderate", "strong", or "no preference". This indicates the strength of your automatic association.
Was your result: "There were not enough trials to determine a result"? The IAT requires a certain number of correct responses in order to get results. You may have made too many errors while completing the test or went too quickly. Accordingly, there were too many errors to determine a result.
Note that your IAT result is based only on the categorization task and not on the questions that you answered.
More InformationDisclaimer
These results are not a definitive assessment of your implicit preference. The results may be influenced by variables related to the test (e.g., the category labels or particular items used to represent the categories on the IAT) or the person (e.g., how tired you are). The results are provided for educational purposes only.
How Does The IAT Work?The IAT measures the strength of associations between concepts (e.g., Asian American, European American) and attributes (e.g., American, Foreign). The main idea is that making a response is easier when closely related items share the same response key. We would say that one has an implicit preference for Asian American relative to European American if they are faster to categorize words/pictures when Asian American and American share a response key relative to when European American and American share a response key.
Any single IAT is unlikely to predict behavior well for a specific individual. In the aggregate, the IAT can predict behavior such as discrimination in hiring and promotion, medical treatment, and decisions related to criminal justice.
Does The Order In Which I Took The IAT Matter?Yes, the order in which you take the IAT can influence your overall results. But, the effect is very small. So if you first pair Asian American + American / European American + Foreign and then pair Asian American + Foreign / European American + American, your results might be a just a tiny bit different than they would be if you had done the reverse pairing first. To minimize the order effect, we give more practice trials before the second pairing than we did before the first pairing. We also randomly assign participants to one of the two possible orderings, so half of the test-takers complete Asian American + American / European American + Foreign and then Asian American + Foreign / European American + American, and the other half get the opposite order.
I Still Have Questions About The Study. If you have questions about the IAT, please check out our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ). If you have any questions or comments about the study, please email the lead investigator Mahzarin Banaji (mahzarin_banaji@harvard.edu). Your Participation And Financial Support Are Important!Thank you again for participating in this research! We have learned so much from people like you taking the time to be part of our work. If you have time, please consider taking another test by clicking the button below.
As a non-profit organization, we would also appreciate your financial support. Since our establishment in 2005, we have educated more than a million visitors each year about implicit biases concerning race, gender, sexual orientation, and other topics. Your donation supports Project Implicit's educational, scientific, and public service missions.
module 2
Below is a summary of your responses Download PDF
We thank you for your time spent taking this survey.
Your response has been recorded.
Consider the following scenario:Consider the following scenario:
Mr. J is an English literature teacher. He explicitly expresses the idea that all of his students can succeed and
does his best to view his students equally. Moreover, he recognizes the importance of diversity, and
consistently infuses his curriculum with multicultural literature. However, Mr. J also knows that he holds
negative implicit biases toward identities that some of his students possess. In his attempt to reduce the
effects of bias in his work, Mr. J reaches out to you in order to help him identify ways that his implicit biases
may influence his class.
Of the following areas, identify instances where Mr. J's implicit biases may disrupt his intention to ensure hisOf the following areas, identify instances where Mr. J's implicit biases may disrupt his intention to ensure his
students' academic success; check all that apply.students' academic success; check all that apply.
His ability to evaluate the quality of his students' work equitably
Correct!
His ability to evaluate the quality of his students' work equitably
Because Mr. J is already practicing other ways to improve equity in his classroom, the impact of
his implicit biases are not large enough to negatively affect his students' academic outcomes.
His perceptions of students' experiences and skills
What perspectives and backgrounds Mr. J chooses to highlight in his curriculum
Research shows that seemingly objective ratings of someone's work can be skewed based on
aspects of that person's identity, such as race or gender. As such, by removing students'
names from homework and test submissions, teachers can greatly reduce the possibility that
their biases influenced their grading.
Because Mr. J is already practicing other ways to improve equity in his classroom, the impact of
his implicit biases are not large enough to negatively affect his students' academic outcomes.
Not quite!
No matter how subtle the differences can seem, the impact of implicit bias is always
important to consider, as it can have a long-lasting impact on student outcomes.
His perceptions of students' experiences and skills
Correct!
Our implicit biases can cause us to unfairly associate certain skills and abilities with different
social groups, such as girls being better at language arts and boys being better at hard
sciences.
You missed this one! What perspectives and backgrounds Mr. J chooses to highlight in his
curriculum"
Mr. J is already including a diverse range of backgrounds into his teaching material. Yet, it is
impossible to highlight every perspective equally. Thus, Mr. J could survey his students to see
what cultural perspectives are most interesting to them as a way to supplement his current
practices.
Teachers' implicit biases have been shown to impact which of the following:
Who they determine needs discipline
Racial patterns in school discipline practices
Who they determine is a "problem child"
All of the above
Correct!
A teacher's implicit biases inform how he/she/they views and treats each student. Implicit
associations inform who a teacher views as problematic and who needs to be disciplined. The
negative implicit associations most people have about students with marginalized identities
can affect perceptions of the frequency and severity of the punishment needed to address a
student's behavior. These implicitly biased perceptions have been shown to create unequal
discipline outcomes between Black and White students, even if their behaviors are identical.
Although implicit bias can affect a wide range of discipline decisions, which of the
following instances is most likely to reflect a biased decision?
Disciplining a student for being disruptive, such as talking too loudly or being insubordinate
Correct!
Implicit biases can impact perceptions of student behavior, especially when we are making
decisions based on subjective or ambiguous information. Our personal biases and
experiences are much more likely to manifest in our determinations of what is deemed
acceptable behavior rather than a concrete deliverable or policy such as homework being
incomplete or violating a specific policy against fighting.
Which of the following is an example of the ways that implicit bias affects systemic
inequities beyond the classroom?
Disciplining a student for harming another student, such as punching or hitting
Disciplining a student for being disruptive, such as talking too loudly or being insubordinate
Discipling a student for being tardy to class more than 3 times
Disciplining a student for not completing a homework assignment
Implicit bias can interrupt pipelines to higher education.
Implicit bias can lead to inequitable evaluations of work samples or job qualifications.
Correct!
The implicit biases of teachers and authority figures has been shown to correlate with a
variety of negative outcomes for students, whether in the K-12 education setting or as
students pursue opportunities toward careers and/or higher education.
Implicit bias is a contributing factor for diverting students toward the school-to-prison pipeline.
Implicit bias impacts who is considered for mentorship or leadership opportunities.
All of the above
Implicit Bias Module Series Implicit Bias Module Series Module 1: Understanding Implicit Bias
Module 1: Recap and Quiz
- Implicit bias operates outside of our conscious awareness.
- Implicit bias is unconscious, automatic, and relies on associations that we form over time.
- We can form bias toward groups of people based on what we see in the media, our background, and experiences.
- Our biases reflect how we internalize messages about our society rather than our intent. Nevertheless, we can still act on our biases in ways that can harm others.
Not quite!
Implicit bias differs from suppressed explicit biases that individuals may conceal for social desirability purposes. Implicit biases are activated involuntarily and beyond our awareness or intentional control. Implicit bias is concerned with unconscious cognition that influences understanding, actions, and decisions, whereas individuals who may choose not to share their explicit beliefs due to social desirability inclinations are consciously making this determination.
Correct!
The main distinction between implicit and explicit bias are related to the automaticity of how we encode and access our preferences and associations. Our implicit biases reflect our thinking patterns on “auto-pilot” whereas our explicit biases are more deliberative and related to our conscious system of beliefs. The extent to which these types of bias impact our actions, cause negative outcomes, and are apparent to others is going to depend much more on the context or expression of bias.
Not quite!
Even though it is possible, or even likely, that you do not know the
implicit biases you possess we can each become aware of our implicit
associations and biases through various assessments--more on this in
Module 3
Correct!
You seem to have a great handle on how bias works! Importantly, both positive and negative biases can be constructive or destructive. Positive biases, if they do not align with reality, can have unintended harmful effects. You will see examples of this in Module 2.
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