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social dynamics
You carry unconscious biases that contradict your explicit values.
A 1998 study found that participants were slower to associate positive words with non-white faces, even when they stated no conscious bias.
The brain builds associations based on frequent exposure in the environment. Even when your conscious mind rejects prejudice, your reaction times reveal deeper, embedded patterns you did not choose to adopt.
Your brain holds files you did not authorize.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Greenwald, McGhee, and Schwartz (1998), Implicit Bias
- What the check found
- The paper cited (Greenwald et al., 1998) is the foundational IAT study; Experiment 3 specifically used Black and White faces to demonstrate the effect.
- Confidence
- Solid, with limits
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.