1. Implicit Bias Portland State University June 2016
John Lenssen and Associates

3. Implicit Bias is…
Produced by the unconscious processing of stereotypes.
Not influenced by an individual’s belief that people should be treated the same.
Difficult to alter.

4. Implicit Bias
“Implicit biases are discriminatory biases based on implicit attitudes or implicit stereotypes. Implicit biases are especially intriguing, and also especially problematic, because they can produce behavior that diverges from a person’s avowed or endorsed beliefs or principles.” Greenwald & Krieger, p. 951 (2006)
In groups of three: Discuss why implicit bias may be challenging to identify. Discuss why there may be resistance to believing that we have implicit biases.

5. WHAT IS IMPLICIT RACIAL BIAS?
Implicit racial bias is a mental process that causes most of us to have negative attitudes about people or groups of people based only on their race or ethnicity.
Typically, these people are not members of our own racial or ethnic “in group,” although implicit bias can also be directed at people who look and think like we do.
Many researchers believe that implicit racial bias is fueled by “symbolic” attitudes that we all develop over the course of our lives starting at a very early age.
These attitudes are formed from distorted messages that we are exposed to every day from a variety of sources—television, newspapers, magazines, conversations with people we trust—that depict African Americans and other people of color in a negative light. 55

6. THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE…
“…because whites and blacks in America still live largely segregated lives, white America's picture of African-American life is acquired disproportionately through the media” (Kirkus Reviews, 2012) 66

7. Implicit Bias
The human brain can take in 11 million pieces of information in any one moment
We’re only consciously aware of maybe 40 of these - at best.
Only 2% of emotional cognition is available to us consciously
Racial bias tends to reside in the unconscious network
Messages can be framed to speak to our unconscious

8. Schemas DEFINITION EXAMPLE Mental shortcuts
Organize specific examples into broader categories
Schemas for objects (chair) and for behaviors/processes (e.g., ordering food at a restaurant, baggage claim, etc.)
Also apply to human beings (assign people into social categories by trait: age, gender, race, , role, etc.)
Four-equal sided figure
Category of Square
Schemas are sets of propositions or mental constructs for relationships; they create generalizations and expectations about categories of objects, places, events, activities, and people. [Bernstein]
We use schemas in order to make sense of and navigate the incredible volume of data and input encountered from day to day. [ABA Building Trust Unit 3]
The example on the slide illustrates a schema for a square. We have schemas for many objects—think about a car, a bicycle, a flower. The unconscious brain deals with the “mundane and routine,” while the conscious brain is the “mediator of novelty and learning.” [Donald, 203]
We also have schemas for ourselves and other people, and these schemas also carry certain expectations—think back to the Five Circles Exercise; think about a schema you might have for a law professor … (See next slide.)

9. Schemas come from… Parents/Families Friends/Peers School Media
Direct or vicarious (books, stories, culture, media)
Positive or negative associations/
This slide relates back to the previous slides on schemas and connects to next slide on implicit bias and its measurement. Social categories and stereotypes are kinds of schemas. We develop our generalized social categories/characteristics from many sources, including those listed here: parents, friends, media. [Dasgupta & Rivera] Our social categories can be either positive or negative, e.g., Asians are good at math, professors are smart and/or absent-minded. They can also be accurate or not. [ABA Building Trust Unit 3, Project Implicit, Nosek (images)]
Understanding the inherent and automatic nature of implicit social categorization helps explain implicit bias and its potential repercussions.
Implicit recognition forms early and quickly. Research shows we tend to implicitly and immediately classify people by gender, race, and age. [Ramirez, Gawronski & Payne]
A research study at the Children's Research Lab at the University of Texas illustrates how early we form categories and biases. The study considered early tendencies to discriminate on the basis of skin color: “Asked how many white people are mean, these children commonly answered, ‘Almost none.’ For the same question for blacks, many answered, ‘Some,’ or ‘A lot.’ [Bronson, Vedantam Hidden Brain]

10. Stereotypes
… widely held but fixed and oversimplified images or ideas of a particular type of person or thing.
Stereotypes are often based on incomplete and inaccurate information
When stereotypes are believed to be true, they are not revised even in the face of contradictory evidence.

11. Stereotypes and Mental Illness
People with mental illnesses are violent and unpredictable.
People with mental health needs tend to be second-rate workers on the job.

12. Stereotypes In pairs, make two lists:
Stereotypes others may have held about groups that you belong to or are perceived as belonging to:
Stereotypes that you have held about groups and individuals who you perceive as belonging to these groups:

13. Implicit Association Test (IAT)
1995: Research by Professors Greenwald (U WA) and Banaji (Harvard): social behavior NOT under conscious control
1997: Developed IAT assessment
Now used in over 20 countries; 4.5 million takers
Tests automatic associations between concepts

14. CEO leaders & Their Height
What percentage of American men are over 6 feet tall and what percentage of CEO/Leaders of Fortune 500 companies are over 6 feet tall?
Source: Malcom Gladwell, blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, pp. 86 – 87 (2005)

15. Leaders & Their Height
Less than 15% of American men are over 6’ tall, but 60% of corporate CEOs are over 6’ tall.

16. Implicit Bias + recruitment
Research project:
5,000 resumes, some with “typically white” name: “Emily” AND others with “typically black” name: “Lakisha.”
Resumes sent to 1,250 employers advertising jobs
Who received more callbacks?
Source: Bertrand, Marianne and Mullainathan, Sendhil, Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination, University of Chicago Graduate School of Business (2004)

17. Implicit Bias + recruitment
Resumes with “typically white” names (“Emily”) received 50% more callbacks than those with “typically black” names (“Lakisha”)
Average “typically white” named candidates received more callbacks than highly skilled “typically black” named candidates
Source: Bertrand, Marianne and Mullainathan, Sendhil, Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination, University of Chicago Graduate School of Business (2004)

18. ACLU, 2013, the war on marijuana in black and white

20. Implicit Bias predicts the extent to which…
Police Officers use force when arresting African American children as opposed to White children (Goff et al., 2014)
Arbitrators decide labor grievances in favor of men over women (Girvan, Deason, & Borgida, 2014)
Pediatricians recommend less pain medication for African American children than White children with identical symptoms (Sabin & Greenwald, 2012)

21. Debiasing AWARENESS Contact Positive exemplars Environment EXPOSURE
Making invisible visible
Mindfulness, Consciousness
ACCOUNTABILITY
Practices and Policies
Higher level processing, e.g. ,writing
Reduced cognitive load
Checklists
Procedural / organizational changes
This is a summary of approaches discussed further in the slides that follow. (See also Marsh’s list of approaches at Slide #20.
Research tells us that both implicit and explicit attitudes can change. [Fiske & Gilbert] Psychologists identify these change agents:
Change in contextual cues (e.g., expose White participants to positive African Americans and/or disliked Whites) [Fiske & Gilbert]
Addition of new information [Fiske & Gilbert, cf. Pettigrew “simply knowing more about the outgroup typically does not have a major effect on reducing prejudice)]
Directly experiencing objects so as to create “new strong associations that are incompatible with existing stereotypes or prejudice” [Fiske & Gilbert 1110]
Taking the perspective of someone in the outgroup [Aberson]
Asking questions that get at both “sides” [Plous]

22. Case Studies Form small groups
Case Studies Form small groups. Each group will select one of the case studies. Answer the discussion questions for the case study. Present your case study to the large group.

23. Thank You John Lenssen John Lenssen and Associates lenssenj@mindspring
Thank You John Lenssen John Lenssen and Associates