Bias in Action
I like to delude myself that I am a reasonable, logical being and that all my thoughts and actions are strictly under my conscious control. I really don’t like tiptoeing down to the lower parts of my mental subbasement, where the unconscious part of my brain lives. Call it a dark little “Mini Me” that flies under my conscious radar. We all have one; it drives a good deal more of our behavior than we’d like to think.
When I first came face to face with this, I was a newly minted management analyst, being professionally analytical in the big Yankee city. I heard the familiar twangy tones of a man from the Deep South. “What a goober!” I thought. My next thought was that all the men I knew with Southern accents were dim hillbillies. Whoa. Where did that come from? When that thought presented itself to my conscious mind, I knew how silly it was. I am myself a Southerner, as are all my relations. But deep down in the mental dark, “Mini Me” had incorporated the usual cultural prejudice, and applied it, without my conscious knowledge, to any Southern man that I met.
Those stereotypes still apply in today’s culture. The only ethnic humor that is politically correct for everyone is the Redneck Joke, built on the vision of Southerners as ignorant, bigoted, and hyper religious. The list of things you’ll never hear a Southerner say, per “Redneck humor,” includes: “I’ll take Shakespeare for $200, Alex” and “Checkmate.” When Garrison Keillor was here, he mentioned our Raptor Center, “Not,” he said, “to be confused with the Rapture Center.”
In other cases, only members of the group are allowed to use ethnic humor in public, but such humor can give you an idea of the sorts of stereotypes that attach to each group. I have a personal collection of Scottish jokes, mostly involving the words “cheap” and “sheep.”
Psychologists have studied the phenomenon of unconscious bias for years. Nearly half a century ago, when I was a psych major at what was then Queens College, we learned about a classic study of what has come to be called the “Goldberg paradigm.” Scientists have done variations on it over the years, and the results are always the same. Groups of subjects will evaluate a paper or a speech by, say, “Richard;” other subjects will evaluate the identical paper or speech by “Rachel.” “Richard” is always superior to “Rachel.” Always. In one variation, male and female actors were filmed playing the role of supervisor and employee. These actors said the same words, using the same inflection and body language. Boss “Richard” is “strong,” “assertive,” “commanding.” Boss “Rachel” is “bitchy,” “shrill,” “bossy.”
Like my reaction to Southern men, these assessments are based on unconscious stereotypes. All the subjects in these studies insisted, and really believed, that they were evaluating “Richard” and “Rachel” fairly and objectively.
You may think, here, of Sen. Clinton, and indeed, the cultural stereotypes that dog her campaign are stark. She can be viewed as “strong and capable,” or as “likeable,” but not both.
However, her primary opponent doesn’t get off Scot free. One variation on the Goldberg Paradigm study featured identical resumes, with names like “Richard,” and with names like “Maleek.” I don’t have to tell you how that came out. And now, we voters have in our hands the resume of a man named “Barak.”
In recent years, any hint of racial bias has come to be radioactive. The merest hint of any overt racism can kill a political career – ask Trent Lott. But this does not mean that racism isn’t there, lurking in the mental underground. This leads to the phenomenon that has come to be called “The Bradley Effect.” Tom Bradley was the very popular African American mayor of Los Angeles who lost races for governor of California in 1982 and 1986, despite polls showing him winning easily. In 1989, L. Douglas Wilder of Virginia became the first African American governor since Reconstruction. However, despite the fact that polls showed him far ahead, he won only narrowly. And who in Charlotte can forget Harvey Gantt, who lost two Senate races by larger than expected pluralities?
People don’t like to tell pollsters that they are uncomfortable voting for an African American. But somehow, once inside that voting booth . . . .
Finally, McCain must deal with stereotypes about us older folks: “Now, where did I put that red phone?”
This is not to say that Angus doesn’t squeeze that nickel too tightly, or that Bubba isn’t a bit dim, or that there aren’t excellent, rational reasons why a particular candidate just isn’t Presidential timber. But still, remember that Mini Me sometimes knocks on the basement door . . .
When I first came face to face with this, I was a newly minted management analyst, being professionally analytical in the big Yankee city. I heard the familiar twangy tones of a man from the Deep South. “What a goober!” I thought. My next thought was that all the men I knew with Southern accents were dim hillbillies. Whoa. Where did that come from? When that thought presented itself to my conscious mind, I knew how silly it was. I am myself a Southerner, as are all my relations. But deep down in the mental dark, “Mini Me” had incorporated the usual cultural prejudice, and applied it, without my conscious knowledge, to any Southern man that I met.
Those stereotypes still apply in today’s culture. The only ethnic humor that is politically correct for everyone is the Redneck Joke, built on the vision of Southerners as ignorant, bigoted, and hyper religious. The list of things you’ll never hear a Southerner say, per “Redneck humor,” includes: “I’ll take Shakespeare for $200, Alex” and “Checkmate.” When Garrison Keillor was here, he mentioned our Raptor Center, “Not,” he said, “to be confused with the Rapture Center.”
In other cases, only members of the group are allowed to use ethnic humor in public, but such humor can give you an idea of the sorts of stereotypes that attach to each group. I have a personal collection of Scottish jokes, mostly involving the words “cheap” and “sheep.”
Psychologists have studied the phenomenon of unconscious bias for years. Nearly half a century ago, when I was a psych major at what was then Queens College, we learned about a classic study of what has come to be called the “Goldberg paradigm.” Scientists have done variations on it over the years, and the results are always the same. Groups of subjects will evaluate a paper or a speech by, say, “Richard;” other subjects will evaluate the identical paper or speech by “Rachel.” “Richard” is always superior to “Rachel.” Always. In one variation, male and female actors were filmed playing the role of supervisor and employee. These actors said the same words, using the same inflection and body language. Boss “Richard” is “strong,” “assertive,” “commanding.” Boss “Rachel” is “bitchy,” “shrill,” “bossy.”
Like my reaction to Southern men, these assessments are based on unconscious stereotypes. All the subjects in these studies insisted, and really believed, that they were evaluating “Richard” and “Rachel” fairly and objectively.
You may think, here, of Sen. Clinton, and indeed, the cultural stereotypes that dog her campaign are stark. She can be viewed as “strong and capable,” or as “likeable,” but not both.
However, her primary opponent doesn’t get off Scot free. One variation on the Goldberg Paradigm study featured identical resumes, with names like “Richard,” and with names like “Maleek.” I don’t have to tell you how that came out. And now, we voters have in our hands the resume of a man named “Barak.”
In recent years, any hint of racial bias has come to be radioactive. The merest hint of any overt racism can kill a political career – ask Trent Lott. But this does not mean that racism isn’t there, lurking in the mental underground. This leads to the phenomenon that has come to be called “The Bradley Effect.” Tom Bradley was the very popular African American mayor of Los Angeles who lost races for governor of California in 1982 and 1986, despite polls showing him winning easily. In 1989, L. Douglas Wilder of Virginia became the first African American governor since Reconstruction. However, despite the fact that polls showed him far ahead, he won only narrowly. And who in Charlotte can forget Harvey Gantt, who lost two Senate races by larger than expected pluralities?
People don’t like to tell pollsters that they are uncomfortable voting for an African American. But somehow, once inside that voting booth . . . .
Finally, McCain must deal with stereotypes about us older folks: “Now, where did I put that red phone?”
This is not to say that Angus doesn’t squeeze that nickel too tightly, or that Bubba isn’t a bit dim, or that there aren’t excellent, rational reasons why a particular candidate just isn’t Presidential timber. But still, remember that Mini Me sometimes knocks on the basement door . . .
posted by Mooms at 9:30 AM
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