Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See, Think, and Do

by Jennifer L. Eberhardt

Implicit bias is a kind of distorting lens that’s a product of both the architecture of our brain and the disparities in our society.

Our ideas about race are shaped by the stereotypes to which we are exposed on a daily basis. And one of the strongest stereotypes in American society associates blacks with criminality.

For nearly fifty years, scientists have been documenting the fact that people are much better at recognizing faces of their own race than faces of other races—a finding dubbed the “other-race effect.”

That cringe-worthy expression “They all look alike” has long been considered the province of the bigot. But it is actually a function of biology and exposure. Our brains are better at processing faces that evoke a sense of familiarity.

Our experiences in the world seep into our brain over time, and without our awareness they conspire to reshape the workings of our mind.

How does race shape who we are and how we experience the world? That question is the starting point of bigger questions about identity, power, and privilege that have molded our country and roiled the world for centuries.

The brain is not a hardwired machine. It’s a malleable organ that responds to the environments we are placed in and the challenges we face.

The process of making these connections is called bias. It can happen unintentionally. It can happen unconsciously. It can happen effortlessly. And it can happen in a matter of milliseconds. These associations can take hold of us no matter our values, no matter our conscious beliefs, no matter what kind of person we wish to be in the world.

“confirmation bias.” People tend to seek out and attend to information that already confirms their beliefs. We find such information more trustworthy and are less critical of it, even when we are presented with credible, seemingly unassailable facts that suggest otherwise. Once we develop theories about how things operate, that framework is hard to dislodge.

The power of adults to shape that lens is heavily vested in parents.

Unsurprisingly, studies confirm that biased parents tend to produce children who are biased as well.

Bias, even when we are not conscious of it, has consequences that we need to understand and mitigate. The stereotypic associations we carry in our heads can affect what we perceive, how we think, and the actions we take.

the skills they develop through goal-driven, repetitive practice can override the effects of bias on their actions.

While blacks made up 67 percent of Ferguson’s population, they accounted for 85 percent of vehicle stops and 90 percent of citations. And though black drivers were twice as likely to be searched by police, they were 26 percent less likely than whites to be found in possession of contraband. The federal investigation concluded that “this disproportionate burden on African Americans cannot be explained by any difference in the rate at which people of different races violate the law. Rather . . . these disparities occur, at least in part, because of unlawful bias against and stereotypes about African Americans.”

My research at Stanford has shown that what dictates whether a routine stop escalates can be something as basic as the way police officers talk to the drivers they stop.

That evaluation found that the officers were professional overall. But when officers were speaking to black drivers, they were rated as less respectful, less polite, less friendly, less formal, and less impartial than when they spoke to white drivers. These variables were all conceptually overlapping, so we collapsed them into one variable that we labeled “respect.”

The pretrial detention rate for blacks is four times greater than that for whites charged with similar offenses. That is, in part, because the formulas used to calculate bail often rely on factors—job stability, arrest history, family resources—that circumstantially disadvantage young black men. Analysts estimate that the bail premium charged to black male defendants is 35 percent more than what white defendants pay.

However, in the eyes of the public, each criminal record, regardless of its origin, becomes another thread that ties blacks, as a group, to crime.

The prison experience has been shown to dramatically deepen social inequality, marginalizing former inmates in almost every significant sphere of life and stigmatizing their families and communities. A prison record can stifle earning potential, limit housing options, and derail educational aspirations. Many ex-inmates are barred from living in public housing, screened out of low-income housing-assistance programs, and deemed ineligible for food stamps. In some states, former inmates are banned from certain professions—dental hygienist, barber, nursing-home aide. And even absent formal prohibitions, potential employers are often wary of prospects burdened with criminal records.

Research shows that inmates who participate in vocational training or academic remediation behind bars are up to 43 percent less likely to re-offend and return to prison. Yet only about one-third of American prisons offer education or job-training programs. On the whole, little is done in prison to prepare inmates for reentry, despite the obvious financial payoff for the investment; it costs less to help with reentry than it does to fund another prison term.

Looking “more black” more than doubled their chances of being sentenced to death, even though we controlled for factors like the severity of the crime, aggravating circumstances, mitigating circumstances, the defendant’s socioeconomic class, and the defendant’s perceived attractiveness.

For decades, IQ testing helped to map and tally supposedly inherent differences between ethnic groups—that is until Hitler’s “Final Solution” exposed the ultimate evil of sanctioned racism.

Our brains, our minds, are molded and remolded by our experiences and our environments. We have the power to change our ways of thinking, to scrub away the residue of ancient demons. As social threats rise, cultural norms shift, and group polarization turns extreme, we are being subjected to ever more brazen displays of dehumanization—magnifying our worse impulses. We can’t afford to let them flourish.

Just as drivers are conditioned by how the roads are constructed in their native land, so too are we conditioned by racial narratives that narrow our vision and bias how we see the people around us.

But living with diversity means getting comfortable with people who might not always think like you, people who don’t have the same experience or perspectives. That process can be challenging. But it might also be an opportunity to expand your horizons and examine your own buried bias.

Our brains, our culture, our instincts, all lead us to use color as a sorting tool.

Research shows that people tend to grossly overestimate the extent to which they will speak out against prejudice, particularly when they are not the target of the offense.

It was as if the moral high ground belonged to those who exercised their free speech rights and not to those who acted to protect the rights of others to live with dignity.

“Diversity” has been a corporate watchword since before they were born. That’s supposed to reflect an enthusiastic embrace of new perspectives and a willingness to hear and accommodate previously marginalized voices. Instead, it seems to have become a numbers game.

But they are part of a process that is skewed toward prioritizing a comfortable fit and away from valuing differences. They are practicing in-group favoritism rather than out-group derogation. And that’s the sort of mind-set that allows bias to flourish, under the radar and unchecked.

More than half of white Americans—55 percent—believe there is discrimination against white people in the United States today, according to a 2017 survey by Harvard University’s School of Public Health, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and National Public Radio.

Implicit bias may not be as easy to recognize and fight, but it can be addressed. And as it turns out, believing that it can be addressed is a critical ingredient to progress.

So addressing bias is not just a personal choice; it is a social agenda, a moral stance.