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Expanding the Table for Racial Equity #4: Implicit Bias - Dr. Patricia Devine & Dr. Will Cox — Transcript

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0:00[Music]
0:34hello I'm Tamara Copeland
0:37president of the Washington regional
0:39Association of grantmakers an
0:41organization that we affectionately call
0:43brag
0:44we support the philanthropic sector in
0:47Northern Virginia suburban Maryland and
0:50in the District of Columbia in 2016 we
0:54embarked upon a learning journey to
0:57explore the depth and breadth and impact
1:00of structural racism and implicit bias
1:03we called it putting racism on the table
1:07two years later we asked our members if
1:10this learning journey had made a
1:12difference we were pleased when they
1:15reported that 36% are now doing their
1:18grant making using a racial equity lens
1:21and an additional 34% is considering
1:25that strategy and while we know that
1:28philanthropy can definitely be catalytic
1:31we also know that philanthropy alone
1:34will not make this a racially equitable
1:38region so we have partnered with
1:41leadership Greater Washington to expand
1:44the table for racial equity we are
1:47joining with nonprofit leaders and with
1:50business leaders to again look at issues
1:53around structural racism and implicit
1:56bias we are delighted that you are a
1:59part of this learning journey next dr.
2:03Patricia Devine and dr. Wilcox will
2:06discuss implicit bias and how to break
2:09the prejudice habit well thank you so
2:12much it's great to be here today
2:13to share what we've been doing with you
2:15so I'm a professor at the University of
2:17Wisconsin I've been there for 32 years
2:20and during that time I've been working
2:22on issues related to stereotyping
2:24prejudice and intergroup relations and
2:25today what I want to do along with will
2:28is to share with you some of the work
2:30that we've been doing that focuses on
2:32empowering people to break the prejudice
2:34habit you're gonna find that the habit
2:35metaphor is central to a lot of what I
2:38do it'll help us to unpack this notion
2:40of unintentional bias that may make us
2:43unwittingly unintentionally complicit in
2:45the perpetuation of bias of stereotyping
2:48of discrimination and the goal is to try
2:51to facilitate creating inclusion on the
2:53pathway to overcoming bias or overcoming
2:56bias on the pathway to creating
2:57inclusion might be a better way to say
2:59that one of the things you're going to
3:00find a lot of what we're doing is
3:02focusing on addressing bias at the
3:04individual level asking the question
3:06what can individuals do in terms of
3:09their own minds and the context in which
3:11they find themselves to try to reduce
3:14bias but let me just offer a few opening
3:17reflections one of the things you've
3:19probably discovered as you've been
3:21working on these issues and thinking
3:22about them in the work that you're doing
3:23is that bias is often a difficult topic
3:26to discuss and part of the reason it's
3:28difficult is that as soon as issues come
3:30up somebody raises a concern about bias
3:32or talks about stereotyping the finger
3:34comes up they're afraid the finger is
3:36going to come up you're a racist you're
3:37a sexist you're a homophobe you're
3:39ageist
3:39we could go through lots of different
3:41biases but people become that concerned
3:45that they're being accused of something
3:46very often when they didn't intend to be
3:48insensitive or to show bias at all one
3:52of the things that I want to suggest
3:53although it's a difficult topic and
3:55sometimes people can feel accused that
3:57is not what this is about all right
4:00instead what we hope not to do we don't
4:04want to blame any one person or any one
4:06group for these things but rather get
4:08involved in a discussion that would help
4:10us to understand the origins of bias the
4:12consequences of bias and what people
4:15might do to address these kinds of
4:16issues and the reality is you're going
4:18to discover that these kinds of biases
4:21of the unintentional variety or rather
4:23ordinary and their pervasive all right
4:25now the goal
4:27of the workshop then is to try to
4:29empower people to understand the nature
4:31of bias where it comes from how it
4:33manifests and so forth
4:35to be willing within themselves to
4:38confront bias and there may be some
4:40opportunities of confronting bias in the
4:42world around them but being willing to
4:44confront bias in oneself and then learn
4:47some strategies some tools to try to
4:50manage biases and so that's part of what
4:52we're going to talk about today and
4:54really the important issue here is to
4:56think about these issues with regard to
4:58climate and inclusion one of the
5:01problems with in many organizations is
5:04that we invite people to come and work
5:05with us at the University we invite
5:07students to study with us and faculty to
5:10to work on their research and and staff
5:13to work with us and to the extent that
5:16biases pervade the experience then we're
5:19hindering people's progress and what we
5:21would like to do is to try to create
5:23opportunities for people to thrive
5:24within their positions and to the extent
5:27that there are biases that constrain the
5:30opportunities for others or otherwise
5:31diminish their experience it actually is
5:34inconsistent with institutional goals to
5:37try to create opportunities for people
5:39to make important contributions within
5:41organizations and to thrive so you'll
5:43see that throughout the presentation the
5:46goal is to try to work together as a
5:48community you have set this as an agenda
5:51for yourselves what we'd like to do is
5:53try to offer some language for thinking
5:55about these things and some tools that
5:57would help people to address the
5:59challenges of unintentional bias and
6:01then to create the opportunities for the
6:03members of the organization to thrive to
6:06achieve their goals and so forth all
6:08right so what's the roadmap for the for
6:10the workshop goals the first is to help
6:13people understand implicit bias as a
6:15habit of mind as was suggested I
6:19actually prefer the term unintentional
6:21bias because a lot of times implicit
6:24bias by itself people don't have a clear
6:26sense of what that means but if we think
6:28about people intending to be fair and
6:30then these unintended biases getting in
6:33the way the conflict is very well
6:35understood and I think it sets the stage
6:38for people to really think about this
6:40notion
6:40I suggested there's this habit of mind
6:43metaphor that is central to my work it's
6:46been central since the very beginning
6:48and it has followed through my work over
6:50the last 30 years so here you can
6:52understand that unintended thoughts and
6:54we'll talk about what those mean can
6:56contradict people's personal values and
6:58their beliefs the second thing that
7:00we'll try to do is to help people
7:02identify and label common forms of bias
7:05see how bias is manifested in people's
7:08thought patterns and how it's
7:09perpetuated over time in people's minds
7:12and in the culture the basic idea is to
7:15create what we've referred to as bias
7:17literacy so people have a new language
7:20if you will to talk about issues of bias
7:24and Will's going to take us through
7:25these types of common manifestations of
7:28bias and unpack those things and that's
7:31central actually understanding those
7:33principles to being able to confront the
7:36bias and try to reduce it the next part
7:42of the presentation will focus on
7:43strategies that people could take from
7:45this workshop incorporate into their
7:47mental life and into their everyday
7:50experiences that would help them to be
7:53less vulnerable to thinking about others
7:55through the lenses of stereotypes okay
7:57will help them to break the prejudice
7:59habit and instead respond more
8:02consistently with their overarching
8:05goals the final portion of the workshop
8:07will talk about some of the evidence
8:09that we've collected over the last 10 or
8:11so years that that that reflect the
8:15validity of this type of approach so I
8:17want to take you back to the early 1980s
8:20when I got involved in this research and
8:22tried to give you a feel for how I
8:24stumbled upon if you will some of these
8:27issues and made them the focus of my
8:29research in the early 1980s when I was a
8:32graduate student at The Ohio State
8:33University I became puzzled by and
8:36interested in and concerned with a
8:38couple of different paradoxes the first
8:41was the National paradox or what I'll
8:43characterize as a national paradox and
8:45this will be familiar to you that we
8:47have ongoing disparities in a nation
8:49found on the principle of human equality
8:51to the extent that we were truly
8:53committed to principles of human
8:54quality we should be making better
8:56progress than we have and in the 1980s I
8:58thought that was true and sadly today
9:00it's still true women are not paid
9:02equally for equal work a lot of black
9:04people don't have equal opportunity to
9:07secure loans or in hiring situations
9:10we'll learn a little bit about that
9:11later and we could go through lots of
9:13examples we are not yet achieving the
9:15ideals upon which the nation was founded
9:18but as I thought about these issues and
9:21as a social psychologist thinking about
9:22people and how they think I got really
9:25interested in the paradox as it played
9:28out at the individual level and started
9:30to think about whether we could think
9:32about this individual level of analysis
9:35to gain some leverage
9:36on efforts to try to mitigate bias so I
9:40refer to this as the personal paradox
9:42and here's what the logic of the
9:44personal paradox basically suggests that
9:47bias this kind of unintended form of
9:50bias the stereotypes that pop to mind
9:53and influence our thinking about others
9:55and judgments that that persists even
9:57among those who renounce prejudice
9:59there's a tremendous amount of survey
10:01data that suggests that the majority of
10:04Americans reject notions that black
10:07people are inferior to white people or
10:10they're not as smart as way people and
10:11they believe that women should work Minh
10:14equal pay to men and yet we find despite
10:19the fact people seem to be committed to
10:20these issues they think about others
10:23through the lenses of stereotypes all
10:25right now I want you to just reflect on
10:27your own experience have you ever sort
10:29of formed a snap judgment about someone
10:31based on appearance right you come to a
10:33conclusion and then sometimes you're
10:36like going whoa wait a minute where did
10:37that come from well where that came from
10:40is your early socialization experiences
10:42when one of the things that we find is
10:44that children are exposed to stereotypes
10:47early and often in development all right
10:50they're frequently they're pervasive if
10:52you just think about our culture and the
10:54abed embeddedness of stereotypes and
10:57biases in the culture it turns out it's
10:59not it's actually difficult to grow up
11:01in this culture without knowing some the
11:03major stereo or the stereotypes that are
11:05associated with prominent social
11:08groups and in fact children as early as
11:10three four five six can tell you what
11:13the stereotypes of groups are do they
11:15really know what it means no but they've
11:18got those associations they've absorbed
11:21them from culture they've absorbed them
11:23from the messages sometimes direct
11:25sometimes indirect from what their
11:27parents tell them from what their
11:29teachers say and do in the classroom
11:32what their peers say and do in the
11:35classroom and the consequence is that
11:37these stereotypes are very well learned
11:39and firmly entrenched in people's
11:41cognitive systems long before they ever
11:43make decisions about whether they should
11:46think that way or want to think that way
11:49in fact children don't even start
11:50questioning these notions until they're
11:53in pretty much double digits at least 10
11:5611 12 right so you've already had 10
12:00plus years of this socialization
12:02experience where these stereotypes are
12:05firmly entrenched and I argue they are
12:08so firmly entrenched in people's mind
12:10that they get automatically activated
12:13they are the default response that's
12:15what spontaneously occurs to people when
12:18they interact with people from members
12:20of different groups these are the habits
12:22of mind that turn out to get in the way
12:25of us responding in ways that are fair
12:29and without bias so habits of mind that
12:32are automatically activated and once
12:34they are activated they pop to mind very
12:37often they influence our judgments of
12:39others without our awareness we don't
12:40even notice it happened so often so
12:43frequently and easily that without
12:47intention and often without awareness we
12:49see these biases persist this is what
12:52people mean or this is what I mean by
12:54unintentional bias many people use the
12:57term implicit bias alright one of the
13:00things I want to suggest you is that if
13:02you've had these kinds of experiences
13:03where those thoughts pop to mind that in
13:07fact you're rather ordinary I'm sure
13:11you're extraordinary in other ways
13:13alright but in that regard you like all
13:17of those around you are experiencing
13:21byproducts of your socialization
13:22experiences being growing up in a
13:25culture where those are the pervasive
13:27messages easily supplied reinforce day
13:30in and day out and so these kinds of
13:32biases are rather ordinary and they are
13:35pervasive they occur in men and women
13:38black people white people Asian people
13:40all kinds of people young old we're
13:43gonna find that these are ordinary
13:44pervasive byproducts of people's
13:47socialization experiences these habits
13:50of mind turn out to be a useful way to
13:53think about these issues and it leads us
13:56to the very next question if
13:58unintentional bias is a habit of mind
14:02can individuals do anything to break the
14:05habit and of course here the news is
14:07good alright and but but so I'll give
14:11you the answer yes all right but we're
14:14gonna take a couple of minutes to unpack
14:16what the habit metaphor is and then go
14:18through some other issues before you
14:20could see how and just to ask you to
14:22think about have any of you tried to
14:23break any habit before okay so yeah
14:28everyone shyly kind of raising their
14:31hands I know I have this is one of the
14:34ones that I tried to break biting my
14:36nails and I want you to think about
14:38what's involved in trying to break a
14:40habit I mean one of the things that you
14:43have to do is you have to decide I don't
14:45want to do that anymore
14:46it's very important that it's a personal
14:48decision you have to accept the goal on
14:51your own now I can tell you when I was
14:54you know in high school and younger my
14:56mother would say to me time and again
14:58Patricia do not bite your nails it's
15:01unhealthy it's bad for your teeth right
15:03she had she had great reasons I mean
15:05they should have been persuasive but I
15:07wasn't persuaded I had to come to that
15:09conclusion and so it goes with issues of
15:12trying to address issues of stereotyping
15:14or unintentional bias all right
15:17but being motivated hi is but the first
15:20step right is that sufficient for
15:22breaking a habit what else do you have
15:24to do to try to break a habit what do
15:27you think I'm sorry
15:28practice so hold that one because that's
15:31step number four you always were ahead
15:34game weren't you okay so but but before
15:38you can practice what's required yeah
15:41have a plan yes so that's actually the
15:45motivation is part of the plan so hold
15:46that thought all right what else you
15:49have to be aware right you have to tune
15:51into when it is you do the habitual
15:54response because if you don't know when
15:56it occurs and what it looks like
15:58then you don't know what you need to
16:00disrupt all right now for breaking my
16:02nail-biting habit I became a detective
16:04of source I said when do my fingers
16:07approach my face where I start to bite
16:09my nails and so I studied my own
16:10experience and I figured it out it was
16:13typically when I sat down at the
16:14typewriter to write and I'd my fingers
16:16poised above the typewriter it was the
16:1880s right figures poised above the
16:21typewriter and I'm trying to think about
16:23what it is I want to say and as I was
16:25thinking you know I just found my
16:27fingers approached my face and one by
16:29one the nails disappeared so that turns
16:31out to be useful powerful information it
16:34tells me when it is I'm vulnerable to
16:37the to the habitual response and that's
16:40useful to try and figure out what when I
16:42have to interrupt things even if you
16:44said you don't want to do it sometimes
16:46you need to have some strategies for not
16:48doing it you need some tools you need
16:49something something else to do right so
16:53what I did is I just placed my fingers
16:55on the keys of the typewriter as a
16:57tactile reminder of what I was supposed
17:00to be doing if my fingers straight I put
17:02them back right until the words started
17:04flowing and then we need effort right
17:07because if any of you have tried to
17:09break a habit motivation being aware
17:12having some strategies is not going to
17:14get it done because you need to actually
17:16break the habit you need to work at it
17:18you need to put some effort into it so
17:21let me just formalize this so that we
17:23have all of these the necessary
17:25conditions to break a habit first one
17:27was motivation I really want to unpack
17:29what motivation does for us though
17:31because it turns out to be pretty
17:32important to understand the different
17:34components motivation certainly sets the
17:37goal right you didn't want the kids to
17:39see people see you biting your nails it
17:42generates the intentions to behave
17:44consistently with the goal we're gonna
17:46be talking about reducing
17:47so here the context focus is on that the
17:51other thing that motivation does for us
17:53is it leads to the establishment of
17:55standards that are used that tell you
17:58what is acceptable and what is
18:00unacceptable fingers in my mouth
18:01unacceptable fingers typing acceptable
18:04all right
18:05so the standards are what is acceptable
18:08and unacceptable and then we use those
18:10standards to monitor our progress so we
18:12have to see our reappropriation of these
18:40biases that can influence judgments that
18:42we make of others that's the personal
18:45vulnerability to the habit and the
18:48second component and this is really
18:50important in the context of we're
18:53talking about today is really awareness
18:56of how bias manifests what it looks like
18:59and how it is perpetuated over time as I
19:02said in people's minds and in the
19:04culture and it is this component of
19:07awareness that will is going to be
19:09unpacking for us in just a moment or two
19:12turns out it's powerful information it's
19:15necessary information because that's
19:16what gives us the leverage to know when
19:18to interrupt the habitual response we
19:21need strategies to address the habit and
19:23I'm going to share with you a toolkit of
19:25seven strategies later that would help
19:27people mitigate the tendency to think in
19:30stereotypic ways to prevent the
19:32vulnerability to to falling into
19:34habitual responses and then there's
19:37effort over time to break the habit all
19:40right so with that as background I'm
19:43going to turn things over to will and
19:44he'll talk us through the manifestations
19:46and perpetuation of stereotypes and
19:48biases what are the mechanisms both
19:51within our culture and within our brains
19:53that lead to the perpetuation of bias in
19:56the app in opposition to evidence that
19:58say the biases aren't good in opposition
20:00to people's value
20:01Tricia's been talking about and people's
20:03intentions and so that's a bit of what
20:05I'm gonna talk to you about in this
20:06section manifestations are biased and
20:09why it's perpetuated so with Trish's
20:13nail-biting example at the end of the
20:15day it's very easy to tell whether
20:17you've made progress towards your goal
20:18of not biting your nails anymore you can
20:20just look at your nails say alright did
20:22I bite them today did I not do I have
20:24nails or doing that very simple very
20:26easy to tell if you've made progress
20:28towards breaking that habit bias is not
20:30as simple as that bias manifests in many
20:33different ways many subtle ways that
20:35were not always attuned to and there's
20:39not just one way we can't just sit at
20:40the end of the day did I have any bias
20:42at all today any bias in my perceptions
20:43in my behavior and my judgments of
20:45people it's not something that we can do
20:47very easily because it can be so subtle
20:49so what I'm gonna do I'm gonna walk
20:51through a few different manifestations a
20:54few of the common forms that bias takes
20:56in the interest of building what Trish
20:58called earlier biased literacy so I'm
21:00gonna kind of give you a term of a
21:01specific way biased manifests talked
21:03about some examples some of the research
21:04behind that that bias term and then I'm
21:08gonna spend a little time on the
21:09specific perpetuation mechanisms that
21:11lead to bias being reinforced
21:13perpetuated in our minds with the goal
21:15of kind of being able to stop it and be
21:17able to say hey this is something that
21:18could perpetuate bias in my mind on in
21:21order to short-circuit it and reduce
21:23cognitive bias overall so the get us
21:26started stereotypes the basic things
21:29stereotypes do is they guide our
21:30expectations for other people they lead
21:33us to expect that someone from a
21:34particular social group is gonna have
21:36certain ability levels display certain
21:38kinds of behaviors and so on so as an
21:41example of this so we're here visiting
21:43you from Wisconsin what are some
21:44expectations that people might have
21:45about about us from Wisconsin go ahead
21:48and shut up geez what else we're really
21:52nice well well we are what else
21:56Wisconsin come on love to party all
22:00right
22:01so usually we get the last two Green Bay
22:03Packers and beer so just by the fact
22:08that we're coming here from Wisconsin
22:10you know people very often have these
22:11expertise we like cheese like beer
22:13I love the Green Bay Packers Trish
22:15definitely loves the Green Bay Packers
22:17and so you know the stereotype the idea
22:20about Wisconsin and people from
22:22Wisconsin leads to these expectations
22:23yeah before you even meet us before you
22:25even talk to us now Trish and I are
22:27probably never systematically
22:28disadvantaged by the fact that people
22:30expect that we like cheese I mean we get
22:33a you know cheese gift basket we're
22:34probably really happy about that
22:36but think about when the expectations
22:38are created by race and or gender or
22:41other group statuses that are
22:43historically marginalized the
22:45expectation is that students of color
22:47are going to perform as well in schools
22:48what
22:50how do those expectations negatively
22:53affect the experience of those students
22:54the first of these constructs I'm going
22:57to go through something called
22:58prescriptive norm so talking about how
23:00stereotypes set up expectations how we
23:01expect people are going to behave they
23:03also set up how we think people should
23:04behave and this is the prescriptive part
23:06of this thing prescriptive norms we
23:08think that people should behave the way
23:10the stereotypes tell us at least that's
23:13kind of an automatic response so the
23:16first of these bias constructs I'm going
23:20to talk about one way that stereotypes
23:22setting up expectations can lead to
23:25different evaluations especially I'm
23:27going to be talking about in a hiring
23:28context that's called reconstructing
23:29credentials so another way the
23:31stereotypes affect us is when we're
23:34evaluating someone let's say for for I'm
23:37gonna be talking on example with a
23:37police chief position so please be very
23:40masculine male stereotype sort of role
23:42if you have a male applicant for that
23:44two males type roll male applicant it
23:47just kind of fits together there's just
23:48kind of this gut feeling the stereotype
23:50tells you oh these things go together
23:51this is the right right way to go about
23:53things and what happens is people
23:56evaluating job applicants or students or
23:59what have you that initial kind of good
24:01fit comes first and then they look for
24:04evidence to justify that gut feeling
24:05that they have and this is the
24:07reconstructing credentials idea so after
24:10you have that good fit people kind of
24:11change how they're weighing different
24:12kinds of credentials one
24:14the reasons this is especially troubling
24:16is that in the end it seems like things
24:19are based on objective evidence you're
24:20pointing to credentials you have a list
24:21of no this is exactly what we want for
24:23this position and so it justifies
24:25discrimination even though it seems
24:28objective even though it's justifying
24:30discrimination and Trish is going to
24:35talk in the next are in the in one of
24:39the next sections about how we can
24:40short-circuit some of that
24:43so the third bias perpetuation and
24:48manifestation mechanism we share is
24:50called self-fulfilling prophecy
24:51it's pretty much what it sounds like
24:52essentially what this is is when you
24:54have expectations for someone often it
24:57leads you to behave in ways that get
25:00them to live up to your expectations or
25:02down to your expectations as the case
25:04may be and I'm going to share one of the
25:06classic studies demonstrating this in a
25:08classroom context so Rosenthal and
25:10Jacobson they were working with actual
25:12teachers in first and second grade and
25:14what happened in this study at the
25:15beginning of the year all the students
25:17took an IQ sort of test the researchers
25:20took it and you know scored the IQ test
25:21and then came back to the teachers and
25:22said you know a few of the students in
25:24your class based on their profile based
25:26on you know our research and
25:27understanding a developmental psychology
25:29they're really gonna blossom over the
25:30next year they're set to become what
25:32they call bloomers they're really gonna
25:34grow a lot become you're talented and
25:35gifted students and so on over this this
25:38school year unbeknownst to the teachers
25:40however those students were just picked
25:42at random there was no actual relation
25:44to so their test scores or anything like
25:46that and what the researchers we're
25:48trying to do is evaluate well if we just
25:50plant an expectation in the teachers
25:52mind is it gonna lead them to behave in
25:54different ways that leads the students
25:56to perform differently and so they
25:59followed the the teachers and students
26:01over the year took a lot of different
26:02measures that I'll talk about and at the
26:03end of the year one of the main outcomes
26:05they looked at his IQ gains that's what
26:07this graph shows so you see in the blue
26:09bar that's the IQ gains for the students
26:11that were just randomly labeled to be a
26:13bloomer in the teachers mind not saying
26:15anything to the student not saying I
26:17think the students parents just the
26:18teacher thought that they would bloom
26:19the end of the year they had much higher
26:21IQ gains than the students that didn't
26:23get randomly selected for that label so
26:27how does this happen well over the
26:29course of the year they collected many
26:30different things they looked at homework
26:31assignments all sorts of stuff and there
26:33were actually a lot of things that the
26:35teachers did a lot of ways they behaved
26:37differently towards the students that
26:39they thought were bloomers than the ones
26:40that they thought were not bloomers
26:42so they smiled more at students who they
26:45expected to be blossoming they wrote
26:48more comments on the homework that
26:49actually counted the researchers counted
26:51the number of words written on homework
26:53assignments they gave more more feedback
26:55to help the student grow more so as you
26:58can imagine the teachers at the end of
27:00the study when they found out you know
27:02the got fully debriefed on what the
27:04study was and you know their behavior
27:05levels of course they were mortified
27:07because they're not going into the
27:09teaching profession trying to hold back
27:10certain students and push forward other
27:12students they want all their students to
27:14succeed and it just kind of goes to show
27:18how subtle and unintentionally these
27:20things can be now in this case the
27:22researchers just randomly you know
27:23planted the expectations about certain
27:25students but think about how these
27:27expectations can affect things when
27:29they're driven by race when they're
27:30driven by gender and so on expectations
27:33that black students aren't going to
27:34perform well or are lazy or
27:36what-have-you
27:37in yeah and so these things can play out
27:42in very consequential ways that then you
27:45know one year of school if the students
27:46not doing as well then they're starting
27:47the next year of school a little bit
27:49behind and these things can perpetuate
27:51themselves in very pernicious ways so
27:56that's all for fulfilling prophecy the
27:57last set of things I'm going to talk to
27:59you about are ways that bias gets
28:01perpetuated in our own minds and as
28:05humans we like to think that we're very
28:08objective rational beings but the fact
28:11of the matter is that in the end we
28:12actually aren't in many ways much of the
28:15ways that we process evidence is
28:16irrational and I'm going to share a bit
28:19of that with you now the first contract
28:22here I'm going to talk about something
28:23called attentional spotlight so one
28:25thing that our brains do is draws our
28:27attention to things that confirm our
28:29expectations to confirming evidence and
28:32draws our attention kind of away from
28:33stuff that disconfirms our expectations
28:35and the study will assure that
28:37demonstrates this is also in a in a
28:39school context
28:40by some researcher just named Darlie and
28:42gross what happened in this study it was
28:46the participants were student teachers
28:48and they learned about this young girl
28:51named Hannah the owner Hannah's going
28:53into the fourth grade and then they
28:56watched a little video about Hannah's
28:57background and so they were basically
28:59manipulated to be in either either their
29:02to think Hannah is high in socioeconomic
29:04status or low in socioeconomic status
29:06and the stereotype or expectation we're
29:08dealing with here is the idea the higher
29:09socioeconomic status students are gonna
29:11perform better and be smarter and so on
29:12and lower socioeconomic status students
29:15are not so the teachers watch this video
29:19of Hannah and her background so they saw
29:21that she had a really nice house since
29:23all her playground which was all brand
29:26new equipment it had a basketball hoop
29:28with a net on it so he notes in the
29:30classy area they learned about her
29:32parents
29:32they had slightly higher paying jobs and
29:35so on or if they were learning that
29:36Hannah was low in SES she had a more
29:38dilapidated house her parents had lower
29:39paying jobs more rusty playground
29:41equipment and then it was just a plain
29:43black top basketball court that didn't
29:45have a net on it so you know it's not a
29:46good area or so the reasoning went and
29:50so they just learn about her background
29:52they learned she's going into the fourth
29:53grade what the teachers our student
29:55teachers are asked to do is estimate her
29:56grade-level ability and year in school
29:59and months so this set of teachers they
30:02saw her background they learned she was
30:03going in fourth grade that's all the
30:04information they had they're like okay
30:06she's going in the fourth grade I think
30:08she's probably about fourth grade level
30:09they have nothing else to go on so in
30:11this case just having that group status
30:13didn't lead them to change their
30:15estimate of her grade-level ability but
30:18there was another condition where in
30:21addition to getting her background they
30:22saw Hannah take a test so unless she's
30:25higher low socioeconomic status and then
30:27they watch her take a test and the way
30:29this test works it's another video all
30:30they see is the back of Hannah's head as
30:32she's talking to a teacher who's giving
30:34her the questions and she's responding
30:35to the teacher and her performance is
30:37decidedly mixed so there's some really
30:39difficult questions that she gets right
30:41some really difficult questions that she
30:43gets wrong some really easy questions
30:45that she gets right and some easy
30:46questions that she gets wrong everyone
30:49saw the same video of her performance if
30:50they were in the condition where they
30:51saw the test performance then they were
30:53asked
30:54estimate her grade-level ability in
30:56years in school and months if they
30:58thought that Hannah was low in SES
31:00they're like oh she's about third grade
31:02eight months going into the fourth grade
31:03he was high SES Hannah they thought she
31:06was high SES saw the exact same test
31:08performance
31:08she's about 5th grade level going into
31:10the fourth grade so what's going on here
31:12well this is the attentional spotlight
31:13idea so when they followed up with the
31:15teachers the teachers who thought she
31:18was highest they remembered all those
31:19difficult questions she got right which
31:21is like wow she's getting those
31:22difficult questions right they don't
31:24remember the difficult ones she got
31:25wrong and they're not remembering the
31:26really easy ones that she got wrong that
31:28should be pulling down their estimate of
31:30her performance because she should be
31:31able to get those easy ones that she got
31:33wrong the people in the low SES they
31:35forget all those difficult ones she got
31:37right and they're remembering the easy
31:39ones she got wrong so this is the
31:40spotlight the expectations are drawing
31:43your attention like a spotlight to the
31:44confirming evidence they're remembering
31:46the things that fit with this idea of
31:48Hannah being high SES and therefore
31:50probably higher performing and leads to
31:52very different from 5th grade versus 3rd
31:54grade 8 months and then if you're
31:58starting with if you kind of go through
31:59this and you then have this estimate of
32:01the student well then if you're about to
32:04teach them over the year that's kind of
32:05feed into that whole self-fulfilling
32:06prophesy sort of stuff that we talked
32:09about last
32:09Mya's didn't just appear when they had
32:12no evidence to process its this biased
32:14evidence processing where they're
32:16attending to certain things the
32:17stereotypes are drawing their attention
32:18like a spotlight that leads to this bias
32:21in this study at least so um so another
32:26term for this kind of idea that we weigh
32:29confirming evidence more heavily than
32:31disconfirming evidence is confirmation
32:33bias so during the video of her taking
32:35the test there was one part where Hannah
32:38goes and kind of taps on the desk and
32:42they asked the teachers to interpret the
32:45same big us behavior it was high SES
32:48Hannah what do you think the teachers
32:49interpreted this um kind of behavior
32:53she's thinking she's contemplatively
32:55wants to make sure that she's gonna get
32:57it right what about if it was low SES
32:59Hannah stalling she's stalling she
33:03doesn't know the answer you know
33:05completely different interpretations for
33:07the exact
33:07seeing behavior yeah thank you for
33:10putting that chess so another way the
33:14expectations lead to interpretive bias
33:18so last set of things were going to talk
33:22about first confirmation bias so this is
33:25where we weigh evidence that confirms
33:27our expectations more heavily than
33:28evidence that disconfirms and I have to
33:30get into conversations with people about
33:33this when they come to me I'm
33:34stereotyping researcher and they say
33:36well in my experience stereotypes are
33:38usually true and I say well actually if
33:41you look at systematic evidence that's
33:42not necessarily the case and one of the
33:46reasons that it seems to you like
33:48stereotypes are true or accurate is that
33:51you weigh evidence differently when it
33:53supports stereotypes than when it
33:55doesn't support stereotypes I'm gonna
33:57share one study that Trish and I did
33:58actually that demonstrates this so the
34:02what you know about this task people are
34:03going through and they're making
34:04judgments about a number of different
34:06target people that we present to them
34:08and the judgments could be influenced by
34:10stereotypes and what we're doing is
34:11after each judgment we're giving people
34:13feedback about whether the stereotype
34:15was right like actually led to the
34:16correct conclusion or if the stereotype
34:19was inaccurate in that moment and using
34:21the stereotype led you to the incorrect
34:22conclusion so this way we can kind of
34:24manipulate what out in the world in our
34:27laboratory context anyway how accurate
34:30stereotypes might actually be and look
34:32how people respond to that kind those
34:35different patterns of evidence so and
34:37one of the conditions which I'm calling
34:38the confirming condition most of the
34:40people that participants encountered in
34:42this study actually confirm stare type
34:43so 75% of time stereotypes led to the
34:46correct conclusion and only about 25% of
34:49the time to lead to the incorrect
34:50conclusion and in another condition we
34:52just reverse that so most of the times
34:53for people in the disconfirming
34:55condition the stereotypes led to the
34:57wrong conclusion and just a few times
34:59everyone saw someone the stereotype
35:01would actually lead you to the correct
35:02conclusion about them and then what
35:04we're looking at is over time how does
35:05that affect their rate of stereotyping
35:07are the stereotyping more or less
35:08learning from this evidence over time
35:10how are they weighing the evidence so
35:12with people in the confirming condition
35:15as they're learning stereotypes are
35:16usually leading to correct conclusions
35:19confirmatory evidence is more common
35:21they stereotype more overtime just what
35:23you expect they're getting evidence that
35:24stereotypes are right so they shouldn't
35:25stereotype more in that condition when
35:28people got mostly disconfirming evidence
35:31however it's just a flat line so they
35:34don't go down even though 75% of the
35:36trials are disconfirming telling you
35:38stereotypes are leading to the wrong
35:39conclusion
35:40it doesn't change their rate of
35:41stereotyping they're just flatlining and
35:45if you kind of translate this a little
35:47numerically this means that for every
35:49because they're 75 percent people of
35:51people are disconfirming stereotypes
35:52here and it's not changing that means
35:54that for every one person who confirms a
35:56stereotype takes three people who dis
35:58confirm the stereotype just to kind of
36:00balance it out in how you're weighing
36:01things in your mind not even to change
36:03it just to keep it at the same level and
36:05this is confirmation by so it's this
36:07weighing of evidence differently when
36:09someone disconfirms a stereotype your
36:10brain doesn't want to kind of upend it
36:11system and change your initial
36:13expectations that socialized over your
36:16whole life so in these two conditions
36:17we're talking about people actually
36:19having the evidence like have
36:21stereotypic assumption about someone and
36:22then I learned that it was correct or
36:24incorrect but when we're going out in
36:25the world that's not what really happens
36:27all the time like you'll be walking on
36:29Street stereotype will pop to mind about
36:31somebody makes some assumption about
36:32someone you don't run up to them and say
36:34yeah I had a stereotypic thought about
36:35you like am i right like like like that
36:38doesn't happen you just go about your
36:40day and I was very interested in that
36:43sort of how did your brain treat that
36:44kind of lack of evidence so when there's
36:47no evidence there's just an untested
36:49assumption this is the last of those
36:50constructs that I'm gonna go through
36:51untested assumptions so in the same
36:53study we had a third condition where
36:55people just got no feedback same task as
36:57everyone else except they're not
36:58learning whether their stereotypical
36:59sumption x' were correct or incorrect
37:01and what we see in that condition is
37:03people go up and it wasn't statistically
37:05different from the confirming condition
37:07basically your brain treats this
37:09assumption as if it's valid evidence
37:11it's that assumption I had oh if that
37:14person actually met that assumption your
37:16brain generates the idea and stores it
37:19as if it's valid evidence and so just
37:21encountering people thoughts pop to mind
37:23leads to the stereotypes being
37:25reinforced when there's no evidence for
37:27them at all so these are confirmation
37:29bias and untested assumptions and then
37:31the attentional spotlight those are
37:33three of the ways that our brains
37:34perpetual
37:35bias within our own minds but by
37:36recognizing them and looking out for
37:39them and and kind of putting the label
37:41to them you can work on kind of
37:43short-circuiting that process pay more
37:44attention when someone disconfirms
37:45evidence if you find yourself having an
37:48untested assumptions about someone ask
37:50how do I know do I really know anything
37:52or was that just something that popped
37:53to mind and question it put the brakes
37:55on it don't treat it as though it were
37:56valid evidence how can we move forward
37:59to try to decrease the likelihood that
38:02we show stereotypic biases see people
38:05through the lenses of stereotypes make
38:07assumptions about them based on their
38:09social category membership so I want to
38:12spend a little bit of time talking about
38:14how we can use these powerful frontal
38:16lobes to guide our efforts to reduce the
38:18likelihood that we will think about
38:20others in biased ways and ultimately
38:23what I'm going to do is to present to
38:24you as I said at the outset a toolkit a
38:27set of seven strategies that you could
38:29take from this workshop and you can
38:31incorporate into your own mental life
38:33and your professional and personal lives
38:34to decrease the likelihood that you
38:36think of others in stereotypic ways but
38:39before I can do that I really need to
38:41talk with you about some ineffective
38:42strategies strategies that actually
38:44don't work and leave you more vulnerable
38:47rather than less more vulnerable to
38:50thinking about others in categorical or
38:53stereotypic ways it turns out each of
38:55these strategies is tremendously
38:57intuitive and when I talk about them you
38:59would think they should work right and
39:01these are the ones that people tend to
39:02reach for when they want to not
39:05stereotype others or think about them in
39:07group based ways each one in turn fails
39:10and so I want to caution you against the
39:13relying on these strategies the first
39:15one is something called stereotype
39:17suppression the idea is that what you
39:19want to do is banish stereotypes from
39:20your mind all right push them out of the
39:23way put them under the rug under the
39:24table sweep them away whatever you do
39:26don't think about stereotypes and so far
39:29from banishing it from consciousness to
39:32know if you've done that you actually
39:33have to bring it to mind and think about
39:35it the consequence is that once people
39:37are released from the obligation to
39:40suppress the unwanted thought what you
39:43what you find is that those those
39:45thoughts sort of surface with abandon
39:48they come top of the mind the cognitive
39:50psychologists say they become hyper
39:52accessible and once they are so highly
39:55accessible top of the mind you're more
39:57likely to rely on them than if you had
39:59never tried to suppress in the first
40:01place so although we can do this in the
40:03short term and we can try to suppress
40:05these things this stereotyped rebound
40:08notion that the stereotype pops to mind
40:10it rebounds with abandon top in the mind
40:13leaves us more rather than less
40:15vulnerable to thinking of others in
40:17stereotypic ways treating them in the
40:19context of stereotypic assumptions and
40:21so forth a second strategy I want to
40:23caution you against though it seems like
40:25it should work and you I'm sure you've
40:26heard about this kind of general
40:28approach is color blindness let's call
40:30it group blindness it could be aids
40:32blindness it could be gender blindness
40:33it could be you know whatever the group
40:35might be but in the context of talking
40:38about color blindness the basic idea is
40:41attempting to ignore race when
40:43interacting with racial minorities there
40:46are three at least three problems with
40:48this approach one I already told you it
40:50didn't doesn't work I'm gonna tell you
40:51how it doesn't work and in just a moment
40:53but the first problem is that it is not
40:56possible that is our sensory systems
41:00right I mean our sensory systems
41:02immediately pick up cues to skin tone
41:04and other group diagnostic
41:07characteristics that activate regions of
41:09the brain that connect to stereotypes
41:11and so on we're not aware of these
41:12processes it unfolds quite
41:14unintentionally alright so one it's not
41:17possible we detect these kinds of
41:18variations in skin tone we detect lines
41:21on the face for age we do every right
41:23there all white hair even when I color
41:25it it comes back right all of these
41:27these kinds of things that are kind of
41:30cues to group membership so one it's not
41:32possible the second thing is it's not
41:34desirable that as many people derive
41:37considerable esteem and positive
41:39identity from their group memberships
41:41they value those memberships they are
41:43important to them and to say I do not
41:46see you as a member of that group I
41:48don't notice race seems inauthentic okay
41:53and and it seems can be can be demeaning
41:56of people's experience right so not
41:59possible not desirable third
42:01it tends to backfire alright so there's
42:04some research very interesting research
42:06done by Victoria plout and her
42:08colleagues conducted in a health care
42:10organization in which she measured among
42:13white employees within these healthcare
42:16organizations the extent to which they
42:18endorse these colorblind notions right
42:21colorblind ideology items like it's
42:23important not to notice race I try not
42:25to notice race when interacting with
42:26racial minorities and so on and so forth
42:28so there's several items that capture
42:30that you can be lower you could be high
42:32on that what she's really interested in
42:34is what is the experience of black
42:35co-workers as a function of interacting
42:38with people who either embrace or don't
42:39embrace that kind of colorblind ideology
42:41and what she finds across 117 healthcare
42:45organizations is that the more the white
42:47co-workers embrace colorblind ideology
42:49the less good is the experience of the
42:52black co-workers the less they feel like
42:55they belong to the or with you within
42:57the organization and the less
42:59effectively they work within that
43:02organization all right so what's going
43:04wrong well one of the things I want to
43:07highlight and I want to be cautious here
43:09I think for a lot of people when they
43:10say I want to be colorblind that's
43:12important what they mean to say is that
43:15I don't want to treat people unfairly
43:17based on group membership but I want you
43:20to think about if you say I'm going to
43:22be color blind and I want you to think
43:23about this for a second how do you do
43:26that and so what I would argue is that
43:28not possible not desirable and it
43:32doesn't work so it's probably not a
43:33particularly good strategy and as with
43:36stereotypes oppression I'm gonna try to
43:38give you some alternative ways to
43:40approach these these kinds of issues the
43:42third strategy I have to highlight
43:44before we move on to the toolkit of
43:45effective strategies is having too
43:47strong a belief in your own personal
43:49objectivity I mean this one should work
43:52right what is better than being biased
43:54be objective right the idea here however
43:58is that the more people reflect on their
44:01personal objectivity what the research
44:03evidence is suggesting is it leaves them
44:06more rather than less vulnerable to
44:09showing the bias that their objective
44:11selves say they shouldn't so I would
44:14argue
44:15that rather than having too strong a
44:16belief in our personal objectivity we
44:18might be better served by accepting the
44:20humbling possibility that we could be
44:22biased and then learning some strategies
44:25that would help us to avoid bias to use
44:28the power of those frontal lobes our
44:29executive function to try to regulate
44:31bias put the brakes on it and respond
44:34consistently with values so in this
44:36context what I'd like to do is share
44:37with you a toolkit of strategies there
44:39are seven and all that as I said
44:41previously you can take from this
44:43workshop incorporate into your mental
44:45life your personal in your professional
44:46life and to the extent that you learn
44:49them and start to practice them they
44:51could help to reduce the likelihood that
44:52you would fall vulnerable to falling
44:54into the habit of the the habit of mind
44:59in terms of thinking of people in
45:01stereotypic ways and so forth
45:03now I'm going to present each strategy
45:06one at a time because it's just easiest
45:08to present them one at a time what I
45:09want you to recognize however it is
45:11truly a toolkit the tools have
45:13synergistic effects they have
45:15overlapping implications and use of one
45:18strategy can facilitate and enhance the
45:20use of another strategy right so that's
45:22very important to recognize second thing
45:25I want to tell you is and this is really
45:26good news none of them are hard to do
45:29all right so let's talk about the first
45:32strategy it's something called
45:33stereotype replacement and to try to
45:36help you understand how to implement
45:37this strategy we have a mnemonic that
45:40would give you an idea about how this
45:42particular strategy would unfold so if
45:45you can remember the mnemonic detect
45:47reflect and reject you'll be well on
45:49your way to understanding how to
45:50implement the stereotype replacement
45:52strategy in contrast to stereotype
45:55suppression which says push stereotypes
45:56out of the way stereotype replacement
45:58says no we need to recognize we need to
46:01put it front and center we need to work
46:02on this issue recognize the bias and
46:04then work to mitigate it so what's
46:07involved the first step is detecting
46:08when it is that stereotypes pop to mind
46:11when is it that we see the influence of
46:14stereotypes and biases in our own minds
46:16and in other people's minds perhaps in
46:20what they say and do in media that we
46:22could detect the influence of
46:24stereotypes in the media recognizing
46:26their powerful impact
46:28in perpetuating bias overtime so we want
46:31to detect tune in to become aware of
46:34when it is we're vulnerable to thinking
46:36in stereotypic ways and detect the
46:38influence of these biases it becomes
46:40important to think it through detecting
46:43it is it sufficient if we understand why
46:45in the ways that we'll was talking about
46:47all those perpetuation mechanisms that
46:49could lead to makes help us understand
46:52why the bias persists that will be
46:55helpful in terms of addressing the issue
46:57so reflect on the source of the
46:59stereotype whether it's one of these
47:00bias constructs whether it's social
47:03roles as they historically for my
47:05students era thinking about the doctor
47:06nurse example reject the stereotypical
47:09portrayal or thought if we're talking
47:11about the media you could recognize why
47:14screenwriters create stereotypic
47:16characters well then they don't have to
47:18do as much work because they know your
47:19minds will fill in the gaps right but
47:22then we have to really reject the idea
47:24saying well they may have portrayed a
47:25woman in a weak highly emotional way but
47:28surely not all women are like that right
47:30and you know women who are not like that
47:33or if they portrayed an Asian person as
47:36shy and retiring well we know Asian
47:39people are not all shy and retiring and
47:41you have to really recognize that reject
47:44that notion and then replace it one the
47:46final step is the replacement of that
47:49stereotypical thought with one that is
47:51less biased perhaps more reflective of
47:53people's values so you can think about
47:55all kinds of ways and contexts in which
47:58you could deploy this type of strategy
48:00it's not hard but it requires a little
48:03bit of effort right and once you start
48:05to work on it you'll start to notice
48:07these things more and perhaps become
48:09more efficient in the identification the
48:11detection reflection rejection and
48:14replacement process second strategy is
48:19we call modifying your environment I you
48:22know you could think within your
48:23organization's you have websites and
48:25other things where you kind of give an
48:27idea of who it is that populates your
48:29organization and I think it becomes
48:31important to evaluate the images that
48:34pervade our environments to try to act
48:37right ooh evaluate the extent to which
48:39people who are different
48:42different social category memberships
48:43can feel like they belong and that
48:46there's a good fit in the environment so
48:49you can look at your website you can
48:50look at images of people perhaps you've
48:53celebrated over the years and their
48:54contributions evaluate what messages
48:57there are about who belongs and who can
48:59succeed then the question is what to do
49:02about it so what we're trying to do is
49:05to broaden the set of images to increase
49:08the representation of underrepresented
49:11groups and we're trying to be attentive
49:13to our website and any other type of
49:15public display about who we are and who
49:18is welcome within the organization
49:21alright so again especially with that
49:23you know iPhones and other devices I
49:27quite easy to start to address but you
49:31need to be mindful of the need to do it
49:32put some effort into it you want them to
49:34look as good as the other images and and
49:37so forth make sense all right
49:39so again not hard to do but requires a
49:40little bit of effort third strategy is
49:44seeking individuating information I
49:47mentioned a moment ago and I think we'll
49:49talked about this earlier that
49:50stereotypes actually serve to filling
49:52gaps if there's something we don't know
49:54about someone that a lot of times we can
49:55rely on stereotypes to fill in the gap
49:58if we don't know what a person's
49:59interests are we might use stereotypic
50:02assumptions that I might not be
50:04interested in math and I might be
50:05interested in some other type of
50:07activity well being mindful of that
50:10turns out to be important so that we
50:13could recognize the vulnerability to
50:16seeing others through stereotypic lenses
50:18suggests that we might want to put some
50:19effort into collecting individuating
50:23information about people focus on
50:25details that make someone a unique
50:27person this turns out to be really
50:29important in job application situations
50:32where a lot of times things start to get
50:34sorted you know this one's viable this
50:36one not this one good this one not and
50:39very often we're guided by stereotypic
50:41assumptions and particularly if there is
50:44an area where the assumption is not
50:46addressed in the materials that are
50:49provided recognizing that would give us
50:52an opportunity to collect some addition
50:54information do a little bit more
50:56homework to make sure that we have a
50:58full profile a full complement of
51:00information upon which to make a
51:03decision make sense
51:05now one thing that's nice about this
51:07strategy is it can be deployed
51:08proactively in advance of making
51:10decisions recognizing the vulnerability
51:13to thinking of others in stereotypic
51:15ways that is pervasive and rather
51:17ordinary but we can counteract it or we
51:21could do it retroactively Lee so for
51:23made a decision and recognize that we
51:25may have fallen vulnerable to this to
51:28work on it into the future we want to
51:30make sure we have a full complement of
51:32information rather than relying on
51:35stereotypic assumptions that could leave
51:37us vulnerable while we were talking
51:39about that I said you know this could
51:40work in lots of different ways right so
51:42when I was in high school I was a
51:45basketball player I also am rather short
51:47of stature turns out being short of
51:49stature isn't necessarily a bad thing
51:51except for rebounding right short of
51:54stature people dribble down here it's
51:57harder to steal the ball if you're a
51:59tall person if someone's dribbling down
52:00here and when you're short of stature
52:02you learn to shoot from outside right so
52:05I added I had a deadly three-point shot
52:07before there was a three-point line
52:09right and so you know there that left
52:12the other people vulnerable so you can
52:14imagine the way in which you can lose
52:15out in lots of different contexts some
52:18more consequential than others make
52:20sense all right fourth strategy
52:23perspective taking this will make sense
52:25to you you've probably done it over time
52:27the logic here is to try to imagine what
52:30it would feel like from a first-person
52:33perspective what would it feel like to
52:35be in another person's situation now
52:38fully recognizing you can't really know
52:41what a person's experience is but the
52:43idea is you at least try to imagine what
52:46it would feel like for example to have
52:49your abilities in stem context called
52:52into question not because of any problem
52:54you tried to solve or any work product
52:56that you generated but because of your
52:59gender being assumed not being capable
53:02or that you cannot be a good leader not
53:05because of your efforts but because of
53:07your Gen
53:08to have your motivation and abilities
53:11called into question in the classroom
53:13not because of anything you've done but
53:15because of the color of your skin to
53:17imagine what it would be like to be
53:20thought of as a terrorist in the TSA
53:22line not because of any suspicious
53:24behavior you were doing in the TSA line
53:27but because you had a job on or were
53:30assumed to be Muslim what does that feel
53:33like and what about that when it happens
53:36time and again over people's experience
53:39it turns out three things tend to happen
53:42if people just spend a few moments
53:44reflecting on this when they say you
53:46know that's not really fair and we love
53:49fairness so that's actually good because
53:51we love fairness they say it's not fair
53:53and because they're trying to imagine
53:55what it would be like they say I
53:57wouldn't want that to happen to me and
53:59the combination of those two things
54:01leads people to start to experience some
54:03empathy for that person's experience
54:05they start to care a little bit more
54:07than they had previously about how
54:10people are treated and the ways in which
54:12those assumptions that people make may
54:15be experienced in negative ways all
54:17right so this was a sort of
54:19transformative experience I think when
54:21people spend a little bit of time
54:22thinking about things it alters the way
54:25their perspective and how they're
54:27viewing these issues and it makes them
54:30less vulnerable to falling into the
54:32habit of thinking of others through the
54:35assumptions guided by stereotypes all
54:37right so deployed proactively or
54:41retroactive Lee v strategy it says
54:44consider situational explanations I have
54:46to give you a little bit of social
54:47psychology to understand how this one
54:49unfolds one of the things that turns out
54:52to be true of human beings is that
54:54they're tremendously curious about why
54:56other humans do the things they do and
54:58social psychologists in trying to
55:00identify explanations or causes for
55:04behavior have generated - two major
55:07categories of explanation one category
55:09of explanation reflects internal
55:12personal characteristics of the person
55:14we call those dispositional explanations
55:16looking inside the person his or her
55:19ability levels for example to explain
55:22performance the other category of
55:25explanation focuses on aspects of the
55:27situation the surrounding circumstances
55:29that may have contributed to and caused
55:33the behavior dit Nisbet and Lee Ross
55:37have identified a very strong bias that
55:41we show they call it the fundamental
55:42attribution error which suggests that
55:44when we're trying to explain other
55:46people's behavior we jump to
55:48dispositional conclusions we favor
55:51dispositional over situational
55:53explanations partly we're attending to
55:55people we're looking at them as active
55:57agents and we're not attending to
55:59circumstances as much Tom Pettigrew took
56:02the logic a bit further and he
56:03identified what's called the ultimate
56:05attribution error which suggests that
56:08when we are explaining the behavior of
56:10minority individuals or for example
56:13women in in contexts where they maybe
56:15hate their behavior could reflect
56:16stereotypic assumptions or even more
56:19likely to jump to those dispositional
56:22conclusions it's an exaggerated tendency
56:25to jump to dispositional conclusions so
56:28I want you to think about women in a
56:30stem context that's taking the exam
56:32context there is a chemistry exam or
56:34some other stem context exam and the
56:37woman performs poorly or we have an
56:39african-american student in the
56:40classroom who performs poorly on an exam
56:43can you think of any other reason than
56:46academic prowess or mathematical prowess
56:49for the stem why someone might perform
56:52poorly on an exam anything else yes bad
56:56sleep you didn't get a good night's
56:58sleep I didn't get a good night I hope
57:00I'm doing okay today I didn't get a good
57:01night's sleep because I was obsessed
57:02with politics but but that could
57:04undermine your performance right can you
57:07attend to the task at hand which is
57:09reading exam items and working through
57:11the problems and giving answers anything
57:13else yes test anxiety all right that's
57:17sort of internal to the person but it's
57:19not the dispositional quality that comes
57:20from assumptions about their ability
57:22right right anything else
57:25death and a family again think about
57:28what all these things have in common if
57:30you're had a death in a family and
57:32you're emotionally rot then you're not
57:34you don't have the
57:35cognitive energy and focus for the task
57:38at hand when I was talking about this
57:40particular strategy which is thinking
57:43about how a situation may have
57:45influenced someone's behavior more than
57:48or at least in addition to an individual
57:51characteristic that it can serve as a
57:53protective factor leaving people less
57:55vulnerable to jumping to stereotypic
57:58conclusions I was talking about this
57:59with some educators from Oakton
58:02Community College and this one I'm gonna
58:03do a second impression if you could bear
58:05with me as I was taught I'll take my
58:07glasses off for this as I was talking
58:09about this her eyes opened wide her jaw
58:12literally went down and then she said oh
58:15and I was you know in that moment I
58:19was like oh oh what's going on I just
58:20said is there anything you'd like to
58:22share and what she said was that she
58:24recognized as I was talking about this
58:28particular strategy that she did not
58:31accord her minority and white students
58:35the same opportunity to explain
58:36themselves and she went on to say when
58:39the minority students were late to class
58:41or didn't finish a homework assignment
58:43I made a dispositional assumption about
58:45they didn't care to get there on time or
58:47they didn't have the ability to do the
58:49assignment or weren't motivated but when
58:51my white students didn't show up in time
58:53I just said hey what's going on how come
58:55you were late something happening right
58:57you know just this sort of natural
58:59tendency to give the benefit of the
59:03doubt if you will that situational
59:05forces may be at work for the white
59:08student that the minority students were
59:10not given for her it was transformative
59:12right tuning in to these things
59:15recognizing them actually serves as the
59:18cue I need to do something and here's
59:21the thing that you can do at least
59:22entertain the possibility that
59:25situational circumstances could be at
59:28work all right
59:30protects creates a kind of protective
59:32factor committing to credentials is
59:35strategy 60 so if you are thinking about
59:37job positions staff positions whatever
59:40it might be to think about the
59:42credentials that should allow for
59:44success in that position what does the
59:47position require what are the
59:49characteristics we think would and allow
59:51for success commit to those and then
59:54event choose me evaluate the
59:56applications in light of the criteria
59:59not leaving yourself vulnerable to that
1:00:02kind of slippery process alright now
1:00:04this can be done by individuals you hold
1:00:06yourself accountable to those
1:00:07credentials but if you're making a
1:00:09decision in a group context there's
1:00:10often search committees that work on
1:00:12hiring that the the committee decides
1:00:15what the credentials are and you hold
1:00:16each other accountable to them now this
1:00:19isn't going to necessarily route out all
1:00:21of the problems but it's going to set
1:00:24you up on the pathway to trying to
1:00:27ensure that you're giving all candidates
1:00:29the equal opportunity to to show their
1:00:32their credentials does that make sense
1:00:34yeah okay all right so the final
1:00:39strategy and this will make sense to you
1:00:42I mean is increasing opportunities for
1:00:44contact trying to create circumstances
1:00:46where you could have meaningful contact
1:00:48with people who are different from
1:00:49yourself
1:00:50so seeking opportunities for greater
1:00:52interaction with members of other groups
1:00:54in some cities in some locations that's
1:00:57easier than others in terms of the
1:01:00diversity of people who are present in
1:01:03organizations through a lot of people
1:01:05there are two main obstacles to having
1:01:08intergroup contact one is they're
1:01:10they're uncertain right they don't want
1:01:12to do it wrong necessarily and they
1:01:14don't know what to say or do and they
1:01:15feel anxious and so the reality is
1:01:18there's a lot of anxiety that can
1:01:19surround intergroup contact and I want
1:01:21to say yes there is and I'm gonna say
1:01:24this ever so gently please understand
1:01:26get over it so I'm not trying to be
1:01:30tongue-in-cheek but if you put yourself
1:01:32out there and you create the opportunity
1:01:34for contact that you might actually
1:01:36discover some individuating information
1:01:38about someone and you might learn to
1:01:40take their perspective and you might see
1:01:42these other types of tools that they
1:01:45could work in synergistic way but
1:01:47there's another problem beyond the
1:01:48anxiety there's a phenomenon called
1:01:50pluralistic ignorance and let me just
1:01:53describe to you what this is and then I
1:01:56think the term will make sense my
1:01:57colleagues Jennifer Richardson and
1:01:59Nicole Shelton were
1:02:01we're interested in this phenomenon when
1:02:04at Princeton University they had made
1:02:05great strides to diversify their student
1:02:07body and they had increased the minority
1:02:11representation at Princeton they were
1:02:13achieving their goals but what Nicole
1:02:15was noticing in different locations on
1:02:17campus like the student eating places I
1:02:21forget what they're called at Princeton
1:02:23that the black students at together and
1:02:25the white students sat together and
1:02:27there were not having contact right so
1:02:29there was the opportunity for contact
1:02:31but it wasn't being realized and in
1:02:33those circumstances and so they decided
1:02:35they would try to do some research about
1:02:37this and try to figure it out
1:02:38and so they developed some questionnaire
1:02:40items and they asked black students and
1:02:42white students the extent to which they
1:02:44wanted to have contact with people from
1:02:46the other group lo and behold white
1:02:48students and black students want to have
1:02:50contact with people from the other group
1:02:52or at least they've reported high levels
1:02:53of interest they had another question
1:02:55though and the question was how much do
1:02:57you think white student black students
1:02:59want to have contact with white students
1:03:01and vice versa and they're all the
1:03:05students got it wrong white students
1:03:07assume black students didn't want to
1:03:09have contact with white students and
1:03:10black students assumed white students
1:03:12didn't want to have contact with black
1:03:13students they were ignorant if you will
1:03:15of the intentions and interests of the
1:03:17others but in a pluralistic way
1:03:19everybody got it wrong so recognizing
1:03:22that maybe that can help to address the
1:03:25anxiety knowing in fact that people
1:03:27would like to have this kind of contact
1:03:29may ease that tension at the University
1:03:31of Wisconsin a lot of the students tell
1:03:33us that I'd like to know more about
1:03:34LGBTQ issues but I actually don't know
1:03:37who all the LGBTQ people are right
1:03:40sometimes people think that you know
1:03:41they don't actually all right they make
1:03:43assumptions often cued by stereotypic
1:03:46things but they could participate in
1:03:49something like activities sponsored by
1:03:51the gay-straight Student Alliance or
1:03:53they could join the gay-straight Student
1:03:55Alliance that would give them those
1:03:57opportunities and then it would be
1:03:59natural rather than just showing up at
1:04:01the Blackstone saying hi I'm here you
1:04:03know be a friend of mine right because
1:04:05you want it to be authentic as well and
1:04:08so you can start to think about
1:04:09different kinds of contexts that might
1:04:11lend themselves more naturally to
1:04:14creating that
1:04:15type of contact events that occur around
1:04:18DC right I'm sure there all kinds of
1:04:20opportunities where there are speakers
1:04:22who are addressing related issues and so
1:04:24on you might have an opportunity to have
1:04:26contact and this is a special category
1:04:28these days but I like to raise it
1:04:32because this is one of the areas in
1:04:34which there may be the strongest
1:04:36stereotypes operating these days there
1:04:38are very strong assumptions made about
1:04:41Republicans by Democrats and by
1:04:43Democrats by rules and conservatives and
1:04:46I don't be naive I mean they have
1:04:48differences in terms of beliefs about
1:04:50social policies and and so on but it
1:04:53often goes much further to questions
1:04:55about intelligence and and so forth that
1:04:58are not borne out by evidence and in
1:05:00fact when people get beyond those
1:05:02general social category memberships and
1:05:05they get to know people who are actually
1:05:07liberal or liberal or conservative
1:05:10Republican or Democrat what they
1:05:12discover and the evidence supports this
1:05:14is that there's more similarities than
1:05:16there are differences and that it
1:05:18becomes important to look beyond social
1:05:20category membership recognizing we may
1:05:23be making assumptions about people that
1:05:25are not fully founded again there are
1:05:27differences but there are also some
1:05:29similarities when circumstances don't
1:05:32present themselves naturally what we
1:05:34encourage people is to do is to seek out
1:05:36opportunities for greater exposure to
1:05:39people's backgrounds and experiences
1:05:41through the movies they watch the books
1:05:43they read the media they consume I'm
1:05:45just gonna give two quick examples you
1:05:47could generate so many more but I don't
1:05:50know how many of you read this book by
1:05:51Tana Hussey Coates between the world and
1:05:53me it's a book written by Coates as a
1:05:57letter to his teenage son about his
1:06:00concerns his fears his worries about
1:06:02what this young black man will face in a
1:06:05racially divided America commenting on
1:06:08some of his experiences in the
1:06:10historical context of a racially divided
1:06:12America the vulnerabilities and so forth
1:06:14I if you haven't read it I highly
1:06:17recommend it it is not an easy read it
1:06:20may bring you to tears it may make you
1:06:23frustrated it may make you just agitated
1:06:25and angry
1:06:26our society in some ways but but it
1:06:29opens your eyes to a set of issues and
1:06:32experiences if you're a white
1:06:33middle-aged person from Wisconsin woman
1:06:36from Wisconsin and I couldn't possibly
1:06:38have access to based on my own
1:06:42experience and so for me it was
1:06:44eye-opening and it was important and it
1:06:46contributed to my understanding of
1:06:48racial dynamics in our both historical
1:06:50and contemporary society the same is
1:06:53true for hidden figures have you seen
1:06:54this movie all right if you haven't seen
1:06:56it again I highly recommend it for all
1:06:58the reasons moviegoers like to go to
1:06:59movies it's entertaining it's well acted
1:07:01it's well directed visually it's nice
1:07:03I'm sure they got some awards for
1:07:05something right
1:07:06but but what's really important about
1:07:08this is the story the story of these
1:07:10three young black women trying to make a
1:07:12contribution in a white male dominated
1:07:15world of Nassau the problem being worked
1:07:17on in 60s at this time when Katherine
1:07:21Johnson played by taraji P Henson as the
1:07:27the sort of central character in here
1:07:29was getting John Glenn out into space
1:07:31they had figured that out the question
1:07:32is how do you get him back
1:07:33how do you get him back safely through
1:07:35the heatshield right without the rocket
1:07:37ship blowing up and it's a very
1:07:39complicated issue to address in terms of
1:07:44the angle of entry and there's all kinds
1:07:46of geometry and physics and and so forth
1:07:49and math involved and as a young black
1:07:52woman she had a number of strikes
1:07:53against her when she was young - she was
1:07:56a woman 3 she was black and put that
1:07:59trifecta together she was not respected
1:08:01and not welcomed in that context not
1:08:04even seen as a possible contributor and
1:08:07yet she ended up holding the secret and
1:08:09she was gradually through different ways
1:08:11allowed into the white world the white
1:08:14campus on the other side of the the
1:08:18location where the work was being done
1:08:19but she couldn't be a full participant
1:08:23in that she couldn't use the restrooms
1:08:25that said white and when you start to
1:08:27think about think about some of the
1:08:29things we were talking about before when
1:08:31she had to use the facilities something
1:08:33we all have to do from time to time she
1:08:36had to go a mile across to the other
1:08:38campus where the black the
1:08:40colored restrooms were that was the
1:08:42language in those days right so you've
1:08:44walked a mile before you know how long
1:08:46it takes and even if you're trying to go
1:08:47quickly and your high heels which you
1:08:49have to wear as a woman in that context
1:08:51right then it took her a while to get
1:08:54there a while to get back what kind of
1:08:55assumptions you think they were making
1:08:57when she wasn't at her desk maybe she
1:08:59doesn't care she's not as committed and
1:09:01so on and so forth
1:09:02really thinking through the challenges
1:09:04that these women experience there was a
1:09:06story I did not know I should have known
1:09:08I did not know and it contributes again
1:09:11to my understanding of these issues in
1:09:13our contemporary society so I think
1:09:15there's opportunities to gain exposure
1:09:17let's go through just a few examples all
1:09:19right and then we'll we'll take you
1:09:21through some of some of the evidence
1:09:23that supports this approach many of you
1:09:25may have seen this this is from
1:09:27Hurricane Katrina in 2005 we have a
1:09:29black man carrying a case of a 12-pack
1:09:32of Pepsi and there's some food in that
1:09:34sack and the caption reads a young man
1:09:37walks through chest deep flood water
1:09:39after looting a store in New Orleans
1:09:432005 anything noteworthy about that I'm
1:09:49sorry yeah it's not allege it's assumed
1:09:54that he did it and did it means looting
1:09:57yeah and it becomes even more poignant
1:10:00if you will and noticeable when you see
1:10:03this one where you have two white people
1:10:06also going through chest deep water
1:10:08where it says they wade through chest
1:10:10deep water after finding bread and soda
1:10:13an innocent explanation for the white
1:10:16people's behavior a criminal explanation
1:10:19for the black person's behavior and I
1:10:22guess in these circumstances what I want
1:10:23to encourage people to do you said it
1:10:26was assumed not know somebody said it
1:10:27was assumed not known ask the question
1:10:30how do I know I mean how do we know he
1:10:32didn't take those groceries from his own
1:10:33house right and that these people stole
1:10:38we don't know they may have taken it
1:10:40from their house too but just stopping
1:10:42to ask the question how do I know turns
1:10:44out to be important the juxtaposition of
1:10:47these two things makes it very salient
1:10:49yet we need to learn to tune into these
1:10:51things without the second
1:10:54example necessarily being present so to
1:10:56illustrate this I want to suggest it the
1:10:59way that black people are represented in
1:11:00the media particularly with regard to
1:11:02violent crimes is different than for
1:11:04white people so our colleagues and
1:11:07communication communication arts do
1:11:10media content analyses to see how black
1:11:12people and white people are portrayed
1:11:13across a lot of different domains and
1:11:15one of the things to try to by way of
1:11:17illustrating in this point I want to
1:11:19suggest to you is that any if any one of
1:11:21us was the victim of a violent crime in
1:11:23in this contemporary society it would be
1:11:25twice as likely to be at the hands of a
1:11:27white person than a black person part of
1:11:29that is just numbers just actual numbers
1:11:32of people the second part of that is the
1:11:34black people are actually not more prone
1:11:36to violent behavior dispositional II
1:11:38then are white people so you put those
1:11:41together and you kind of come up with
1:11:42that reality and yet you've all
1:11:44experienced the evening news when
1:11:47there's been a violent crime if the
1:11:48alleged assailant is black very often
1:11:50the picture of the person is presented
1:11:53but if the alleged assailant is white
1:11:54for a violent crime you don't see a
1:11:56picture notice what's that doing
1:11:58strengthening that association between
1:12:01dark-skinned and criminal behavior not
1:12:04showing the same association for white
1:12:06people all right so it's about fifty
1:12:09percent more likely that you will see
1:12:11that black image with the story the
1:12:14words we use matter how we characterize
1:12:17our own and other people's behavior
1:12:19matters the assumptions that we make
1:12:22about whether this is sort of the lone
1:12:25person walking around or the resident it
1:12:27matters right in terms of whether we're
1:12:30really including people in the New
1:12:32Orleans community and so forth
1:12:35right the more we tune into these things
1:12:37the more we can regulate the extent to
1:12:40which we at least think about people in
1:12:42those ways I'm going to show you this we
1:12:45talked about media visa very little bit
1:12:48here's a commercial for a baby formula I
1:12:51just want to present it to you and does
1:12:52the sound work well okay it goes by very
1:12:55quickly so see if you notice anything
1:12:59since their very first days your baby
1:13:02starts to write their future okay so the
1:13:06baby formulas gonna be really important
1:13:07in charting the future actually what I
1:13:09would argue is prescriptive norms maybe
1:13:11setting the stage for what those futures
1:13:13may be or is there anything unusual
1:13:14about the characterizations yeah yeah so
1:13:19the abacus for the boy the dancing for
1:13:22the girl now I want to be very clear
1:13:23there's nothing wrong with being a
1:13:24dancer it's it's a perfectly acceptable
1:13:29laudatory profession right but what
1:13:32we're seeing in here is that the
1:13:34prescriptive norms are saying that's
1:13:36what girls do
1:13:37and boys do math and science right now I
1:13:40like science and I like math right and I
1:13:44might have liked this toy as a kid but I
1:13:45never had that toy right and it wasn't
1:13:48set up as an assumption you gotta think
1:13:50about the messages that are being
1:13:52presented to the adults and culture and
1:13:54two kids in culture this particular
1:13:56advertisement came under tremendous
1:13:58scrutiny and Britain in the UK last
1:14:02summer because they were concerned about
1:14:05what we were telling adults is
1:14:07acceptable for boys and girls and what
1:14:09they were really concerned about is the
1:14:11assumptions that little boys and little
1:14:13girls might have about themselves and
1:14:15what's possible for their futures so let
1:14:18me just turn things over to will who
1:14:20will take us through some of the
1:14:21evidence that would give you reason to
1:14:23believe that if you put some effort into
1:14:25working on these strategies with the
1:14:28background that we provided it would
1:14:30assist people and being less biased so
1:14:32I'm mindful over our time so I'm going
1:14:33to try to go through some of this
1:14:34quickly so very often we don't always
1:14:38present this workshop as part of a
1:14:39series like you're putting racism on the
1:14:41table series that that this is it's very
1:14:43often we're brought into a company or
1:14:46some other sort of work environment
1:14:49where it's kind of like this is their
1:14:50diversity training here this is their
1:14:52bias training and very often what we
1:14:54encounter is that people have had bias
1:14:56trainings before that they kind of
1:14:59weren't happy with it kind of it teaches
1:15:01you oh hey you might have bias but
1:15:02doesn't give for instance the strategies
1:15:04on how to address it and a lot of BIOS
1:15:07dreams out there aren't evidence-based
1:15:09and aren't assessed over time for their
1:15:11effect
1:15:12so people kind of pull pull together a
1:15:15bias training born out of good
1:15:17intentions and you know trying trying to
1:15:19help I'm a problem but it's not based on
1:15:21scientific evidence and that's part of
1:15:23where ours is different that you know
1:15:26it's built on 30 years of Tricia's work
1:15:28and about 12 or 13 years of me
1:15:31adding to that and so what some of the
1:15:33research has shown is that most bison
1:15:34diversity trainings they either aren't
1:15:36assessed at all or win on occasion they
1:15:38are actually rigorously assessed they
1:15:40either have no effect or sometimes they
1:15:42actually make things worse so just
1:15:44speaking in a race context for a moment
1:15:46they make white people nervous about
1:15:48displaying bias and doesn't many of
1:15:51these by strangers just don't give them
1:15:52tools and so they just avoid their black
1:15:54co-workers because we're like oh I could
1:15:55be unintentionally biased and I don't
1:15:56know what to do about it so it actually
1:15:58ends up very often making problems worse
1:15:59so we wouldn't be here presenting this
1:16:01to you if we didn't have evidence so now
1:16:04over the about the last 10 years showing
1:16:06that this kind of habit model
1:16:07approaching these things like a habit
1:16:09the awareness strategies and effort over
1:16:12time actually has positive effects for
1:16:14individuals and reducing the expression
1:16:17of bias I'm gonna share just a snippet
1:16:19of some of that research with you so
1:16:22everything to share it's a version of
1:16:23what we call a randomized controlled
1:16:25experiment where people are randomly
1:16:26assigned to either go through an
1:16:28experience like this or to serve as a
1:16:30control group so we can actually say
1:16:31that going through this experience
1:16:32causes the effects that we end up seeing
1:16:35the first one we shared it was one of
1:16:37our initial tests of this with
1:16:39undergraduates at uw-madison we have to
1:16:41start somewhere and build from there
1:16:42basically they get into the study we
1:16:44collect some different measures from
1:16:45them and then the randomly assigned to
1:16:47be the control group or they go through
1:16:49a computerized version of this workshop
1:16:51you get to they get to listen to me
1:16:52talking to them for a while walking them
1:16:54through slides showing them the Catrina
1:16:55news example and so on and we teach them
1:16:58a subset of the strategies that you've
1:17:00learned today and then in the initial
1:17:02study we followed up with them two weeks
1:17:03and eight weeks later and since then
1:17:06we've we've done additional follow-ups
1:17:08where we've shown two-year trajectories
1:17:10of some of this work so um one of the
1:17:14first things we wanted to assess was
1:17:16well are they thinking that
1:17:18discrimination and bias etc isn't a
1:17:19serious problem because if not taking
1:17:21seriously they don't think it's a
1:17:22pervasive problem in society they
1:17:24they're not gonna have that motivation
1:17:26to address it's one of the first
1:17:27necessary steps and so that's what this
1:17:28first graph is going to show it's a
1:17:29measure we call concern about
1:17:31discrimination and you can see what you
1:17:33see here is at baseline both the
1:17:35intervention and control groups they
1:17:36were at the same level they were mildly
1:17:38concerned about discrimination thinking
1:17:39it's a problem but as we go over the
1:17:41course of the study the control group
1:17:43doesn't change but the intervention
1:17:44group as a function of getting this
1:17:46kinds of experience they go out into the
1:17:47world they start seeing these things
1:17:49were talked about seeing expressions of
1:17:51bias in the media and in the world
1:17:53around them and they become more
1:17:54concerned about bias and discrimination
1:17:57as a serious social problem now us up to
1:17:59six weeks here and then out to two years
1:18:02later in some of our other studies
1:18:03another thing that's really important is
1:18:05this awareness component and we spend a
1:18:06lot of time on at the beginning and we
1:18:08also have measures of that so this is a
1:18:10measure of people's awareness of their
1:18:12own potential to express bias and you
1:18:14can see they start off at about the same
1:18:16level and then over time the people who
1:18:18got this intervention are more aware
1:18:20that they could express bias
1:18:22unintentionally now I don't have a slide
1:18:25for the the next part I'm going to talk
1:18:26about what we've assessed other measures
1:18:28where they're also more likely to notice
1:18:29bias in the world around them they're
1:18:31more likely to label things as bias when
1:18:34their friend makes you know some kind of
1:18:35joke that might be offensive they're
1:18:36more likely to say hey that's
1:18:37inappropriate and here's why one of the
1:18:40follow-ups we've done so two years after
1:18:43the intervention people have gone
1:18:44through an experience like this we put
1:18:46them in a situation where we're trying
1:18:49to look out are they willing to confront
1:18:50bias in a public way so they get an
1:18:53email from what they think is our school
1:18:54newspaper
1:18:55it's called the Badger Herald and says
1:18:57we're testing out this new thing that
1:18:59we're gonna do where people write an
1:19:00editorial and then we get some students
1:19:02to write responses to it and then we'll
1:19:04publish this editorial with your
1:19:05responses so kind of putting it out
1:19:09there putting your name on it a message
1:19:11that's going on the article that they
1:19:13were asked to respond to was something
1:19:16along the lines of stereotypes or useful
1:19:17tools they don't hurt anyone they get a
1:19:20bad rap
1:19:20black people overreact etc etc saying
1:19:23that stereotypes are good they create
1:19:24cognitive efficiency saying that they're
1:19:26just a great harmless thing so we assess
1:19:29how people disagreed with the message in
1:19:31that essay and whether they were willing
1:19:32to write a response
1:19:33everyone disagreed with the essay even
1:19:35the control group who didn't get her
1:19:36image they were like I don't think this
1:19:37is right Dave
1:19:39they scored that they disagreed with it
1:19:40strongly on our measures but the people
1:19:43who went through this intervention were
1:19:44more likely to write a response and so
1:19:47they wrote actually stereotypes are
1:19:48harmful here's why here's some of the
1:19:50negative effects they have and some of
1:19:52our favorite participants two years
1:19:53after they went through our thing
1:19:54actually like I went through this
1:19:55training two years ago and it said this
1:19:57this and this and so this is very
1:19:59encouraging to us because it's something
1:20:01that they're taking carrying with them
1:20:03over time and applying it in their daily
1:20:05lives so these are students sometimes
1:20:08people say well what about real people
1:20:10we always say well they're we think they
1:20:11are real people but we've done it in
1:20:14other contexts as well this is going to
1:20:17be in the gender context so this is
1:20:18professors at our University one of the
1:20:21big problems in stem is under
1:20:24representation of women and so what we
1:20:28did is we developed a version of this
1:20:29workshop that's very focused on science
1:20:31and gender and just like the other study
1:20:34people we randomly assigned groups to be
1:20:37controller intervention what we did we
1:20:39did this at the department level so we
1:20:41have 98 stem departments and so we
1:20:43randomly assigned those so that you know
1:20:45there's control and then departments
1:20:47that get a workshop just like this and
1:20:50then we followed them over time because
1:20:53we're tight on the end I'm gonna skip
1:20:55forward a little we have some similar
1:20:56effects people in the departments of
1:20:58government intervention were more aware
1:20:59of gender bias more they reported
1:21:02greater self-advocacy to address that
1:21:04bias in their departments but they know
1:21:07they're in a study so we also got some
1:21:09other evidence we hooked up with an
1:21:10office on campus that does a general
1:21:12Climate Survey so that we could get some
1:21:14measures in those departments where the
1:21:15people don't know that it's related to
1:21:17the study they're a part of departments
1:21:19that had our intervention they had much
1:21:20more positive climate people in those
1:21:22departments reported that they were
1:21:24their work was more respected both men
1:21:26and women in those departments and they
1:21:29were more comfortable raising family
1:21:31obligations which is typically a
1:21:32gendered sort of thing
1:21:33so had some positive effects to climate
1:21:35for climate even in a survey that they
1:21:38you know didn't know was related to the
1:21:40research study but what about behavior
1:21:42so one other thing we were interested in
1:21:45where we really cared about the
1:21:47under-representation of women in these
1:21:49STEM departments so we looked at hiring
1:21:51data we can
1:21:52with the HR and looked at hiring it so
1:21:55what we did is we looked at the
1:21:56percentage of new faculty hires who were
1:21:58who were men and women in the two years
1:22:00before we started her study and what we
1:22:03see is about thirty to thirty three
1:22:04percent women both intervention and
1:22:06control departments about the same then
1:22:08we looked to the two years after we
1:22:10administered the workshops control
1:22:12departments still about thirty to thirty
1:22:13three percent with the intervention
1:22:15departments jumped up about 1415
1:22:17percentage points so almost at the 50/50
1:22:20that you would imagine if they're
1:22:21equally qualified men and women applying
1:22:24to jobs so we really want to explore
1:22:27this more we want to know the details of
1:22:28how this came to be but because we have
1:22:31this randomized controlled study we
1:22:33can't say that our intervention one way
1:22:34or another caused this now is it that in
1:22:37the meetings where they're hiring people
1:22:38are they committing to credentials or
1:22:40are people more likely to just raise
1:22:42issues of gender bias and discuss them
1:22:44during the process is it that they're
1:22:46climates are better as I was saying so
1:22:48everyone offers jobs to women and women
1:22:50only accept them at a higher rate in
1:22:51these departments that have more
1:22:52positive climate we don't know yet and
1:22:54that's one of the things we're
1:22:55interested in continuing to pursue it is
1:22:57no other research that we're doing on
1:22:58this habit breaking approach in we're
1:23:00doing in schools and medical groups and
1:23:02and so on to continue understanding how
1:23:05these processes unfold but one of the
1:23:07things we want to communicate to you
1:23:09about this is this is an individually
1:23:11focused sort of intervention we're
1:23:14talking with these strategies you can
1:23:15use in your own minds but it leads to or
1:23:17can lead to change in institutions as
1:23:19well and we think that's very promising
1:23:21so a few concluding thoughts sorry for
1:23:25keeping you over a little unintentional
1:23:27bias it's a habit that can be broken
1:23:29with effort it's a process expect to
1:23:33slip up but if you return to these
1:23:34strategies and return to this general
1:23:36approach it it can be accomplished stay
1:23:38committed and then as I've sort of said
1:23:41already people can be agents of change
1:23:43that create change within institutions
1:23:45and as Trisha said a couple of times we
1:23:47don't think this is a silver bullet this
1:23:49is not the only thing that needs to be
1:23:51done to fix racism racial disparities
1:23:53and other sorts of bias and sight but it
1:23:55is one approach that can be part of a
1:23:58multi-faceted way of addressing these
1:24:01problems in society and say thank you
1:24:04and we're gonna send you these slides so
1:24:06you
1:24:06hey Rach thank you to United
1:24:12philanthropy forum for making the videos
1:24:14possible with every video there's a
1:24:16viewing guide and a discussion guide to
1:24:19facilitate your use of this resource I
1:24:22really want to thank you for being a
1:24:25part of this learning series for being a
1:24:27part of expanding the table for racial
1:24:30equity and in the words of James Baldwin
1:24:33not everything that is faced can be
1:24:37changed but nothing can be changed until
1:24:40it is faced thank you
1:24:43[Music]
1:24:57[Music]
1:25:08you

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