This essay will argue that an individual’s prejudice is not something that is simply set in stone but is something that can be influenced and changed over time, through people’s ability to adapt to new information they receive. This essay will discuss the factors that influence racial bias and how that has an effect on groups in society’s life though scientific theories. Through the use of experiments, they will provide evidence that intervention programs work in reducing an individual’s prejudice towards race, that it isn’t formed, unwilling to change but something that can be influenced by information received in these programs. The work done specifically by Aboud and Doyle (1996), Lebrecht, Pierce, Tarr and Tanaka (2009) and Devine, Forscher, …show more content…
Devine et al. (2012) designed a long term intervention program to help break racial bias and the help bring awareness of people’s biases and the people’s need to eliminate them from their daily lives. The experiment had a control group and intervention group and consisted of 91 non-Black psychology students. Each person’s prejudice level was measured using the Black-White IAT and also several explicit measures. The IAT is a dual categorisation task with participants given stimuli based on whether it was ‘pleasant or unpleasant’ or Black or White faces by pressing key. Explicit measurements included the use of Attitudes Towards Blacks (ATB) with twenty items using a scale of strongly agree to disagree. The experiment was a twelve-week long program in which all participants received an initial measure of the implicit bias and feedback on their level of bias. The intervention group over the 12 weeks was involved in number of training programs which the aim was to provide an awareness and concern for their racial bias and then provide strategies for those individuals to limit their racial bias. They received a number of strategies to reduce their racial prejudice and how to engage themselves in self-regulating their bias and were asked to report back on which strategy was best for them in reducing their prejudice. …show more content…
An intervention study done to illustrate that individual’s prejudices towards race aren’t concrete is by Lebrecht et al. (2009). They conducted a study in which they wanted to prove that socio-cognitive attitudes towards implicit racial bias could be changed through training programs. They had two groups of White subjects who over the course of 5 sessions looked at the same African America faces in a training program. They used the Affective Lexial Priming Score to get a baseline implicit racial bias score, this tests provides individuals with a face followed by a word and they must decide if the word is valid English word or nonsense, the words can have a negative, positive or neutral connotation. One group was the individuation condition where subjects were taught how to distinguish between the faces they saw. The other was the categorisation group, where they learnt to differentiate if the faces they saw were African America or not. In the individualisation group participating in perceptual expertise training with African America faces and the categorisation group were trained to categorise faces as African America or Asian only. Their results found that the perceptual training undertaken in the individualisation group significantly reduce implicit racial bias taking longer to associate negative words or not associating negative words with other
According to Blumer (1958) there are numerous key factors that contribute to racial prejudice. First, when Blumer is explaining racial prejudice it is tremendously important to note that when defining racial prejudice he is not looking at an individual‘s feelings in particular, he is analyzing racial prejudice within a group. He states that there is an important relationship that needs to occur between various racial groups in order to have prejudice. The individuals within these racial groups need to identify themselves within a particular group, as well as understand where they stand with another racial group.
Blindspot, authors Mahzarin R. Banaji and Anthony G. Greenwald reveal how people formulate decisions and judgments automatically based on their exposure to cultural attitudes regarding age, gender, race, ethnicity, social class, religion, disability status, and nationality. They claim a section of our brain, a“blind spot,” is responsible for storing the hidden biases that lead us to select choices and decisions in our life. Furthermore, the authors aim to unfold the scientific logic of their analysis of the effects of hidden biases so people will be “better able to achieve the alignment,” between their behavior and intentions (Banaji and Greenwald, 2013) preface
Explicit Racial Attitude. No main effects or significant two way or three way interactions in the explicit anti-black racial attitude of a participant were observed. A significant interaction was observed between the victim impact statements and the race of the victims on the pro-black explicit racial attitude with F(1,107) = 4.916, p = 0.029. Wi...
It is only human to be biased. However, the problem begins when we allow our bigotry to manifest into an obstacle that hinders us from genuinely getting to know people. Long time diversity advocate, Verna Myers, in her 2014 Ted Talk, “How to overcome our biases? Walk boldly toward them” discusses the implicit biases we may obtain when it comes to race, specifically black men and women. Myers purpose is quite like the cliché phrase “Face your fears.” Her goal is to impress upon us that we all have biases (conscious or unconscious). We just have to be aware of them and face them head on, so that problems such as racism, can be resolved. Throughout the Ted Talk, Verna Myers utilizes an admonishing yet entertaining tone in order to grasp our attention
Ponterotto, Joseph G., Jerlym S. Porter, and Shawn O. Utsey. “Prejudice and Racism, Year 2008--Still Going Strong: Research On Reducing Prejudice With Recommended Methodological Advances.” Journal of Counseling and Development 86.3 (2008): 339+. Academic OneFile. Web. 18 Mar. 2014.
...r own unique ways.; however, the authors focus on different aspects of prejudice and racism, resulting in them communicating different ideas and thoughts that range from racial discrimination to stereotypical attitudes. The range of ideas attempt to engage the readers about the reality of their issues. The reality about a world where prejudice and racism still prevail in modern times. But when will prejudice and racism ever cease to exist? And if they were ever to cease from existence, what does that mean about humankind?
Implicit Bias refers to the attitudes or stereotypes that affect our understanding, actions, and decisions unconsciously. (Kirwan, 2015) The implicit bias, which includes both favorable and unfavorable being personal, are activated involuntarily and without an individual’s awareness or voluntary control. The implicit interaction subconscious
In 1954, social psychologist Gordon Allport published a book regarded as the point of divergence for modern researchers into the nature of prejudice, and it highlighted methods for mitigating prejudice in the society. Allport delineates the inclusive origins of intergroup discrimination and also series of recommendations to eliminate prejudice. Undoubtedly, for the past fifty years, Allport theories have made the most practical attempt to promote intergroup relationship. Allport defined prejudice as a social aversion based on a faulty and obstinate generalization of an individual or a group of people grounded on their social category or group membership (Allport, 1954). According to Allport (1954), prejudice and stereotyping emerged partly due to normal human thinking
Pascoe, Elaine. Racial Prejudice: Why Can't We Overcome?. 2nd ed. New York: Franklin Watts, 1997. 21+ 33+ 79-80+ 99+ 116.
There are three types of racism. The most visible type is personally mediated racism where say a black man is being beaten due to the color of his skin. The effects on his health are obvious to see, the physical aspect is apparent. When people over a period of time have been subjected to, racial prejudice and discrimination begin to doubt their own worth and abilities they become victims of internalized racism. Constant, numerous instances in their respective environments have all abst...
Jr., Bernard E. Whitley and Mary E. Kite. The Psychology of Prejudice and Discrimination. Belmont: Cengage Learning, 2010. Web.
We live in a culturally diverse society where there are many differences among various racial and ethnic groups. When these different groups come into contact with one another they interact in many different ways. Prejudice and discrimination are key factors in understanding intergroup relationships. Competition, religious ideas, fear of strangers and nationalism are elements that contribute to prejudice. Many expressions of negative prejudicial attitudes, stereotyping and discriminatory behavior can have negative impact on the social relationships between dominant and minority groups. Many prejudices are passed along from child to parent and the influence of television and movies perpetuate demeaning portrayals about specific groups. Although prejudice continues to flourish, education plays an import role in combating prejudice and racism by providing courses and programs that help to recognize the distinction between various ethnic groups and develop an appreciation of these cultural differences.
Growing up in a very accepting and forward home, I always found myself to be free of most bias. Having been the target of some racial prejudice in the past, I always told myself that I would make sure nobody else had to feel the same way. While this may be a great way to think, it really only covers the fact that you will not have any explicit bias. What I have realized during the course of this class is that implicit bias often has a much stronger effect on us than we might think, and even the most conscious people can be affected.
Attitudes are associated with specific individuals. One’s attitude is not necessarily regarded as collective attitude maintained in the particular society (Lieberman and Fredrick, 157). Each of the individuals affiliated with the social group can chose their won attitudes towards a particular individual or group in the particular social context. The cases of negative attitudes and discrimination in society more often than not prevail on the basis of racial differences. Hence, individuals’ attitudes in the perpetuation of discrimination and racial inequality have lowered significance in
This brings attention to why race and ethnicity exist so predominantly in society. There are a number of theories that observe why racism, prejudice, and discri...