Research Guides: Critical perspectives on the "implicit bias", "microaggression" and "stereotype threat" research programs: implicit bias

Critical perspectives on "implicit bias" research

"Stretching the Limits of Science: Was the Implicit-Racism Debate a 'Bridge Too Far' for Social Psychology?" "The IAT certainly has been a rich revenue source for elite researchers and consultants, but, when the cost–benefit analysts have tallied up the numbers, we predict the returns to society will be net negative."
"Has Research on Implicit Bias Produced Anything Important with Any Scientific Certainty?" A dialogue between psychologists Paul Bloom and Lee Jussim.
“Self-Reports Are Better Measurement Instruments than Implicit Measures" "self-reports demonstrate greater reliability, with higher internal consistency and test-retest stability than implicit measures... self-reports exhibit stronger predictive validity for both deliberate and spontaneous behaviors"
Implicit Bias: What Is It and How Does It Matter for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion? "While claims such as 'everyone has implicit biases' are common among practitioners, there is no evidence to date on the presumed pervasiveness of unconscious bias... the IAT and other indirect measures should be avoided when explaining unconscious bias"
"Implicit Attitudes, Science, and Philosophy" "philosophers failed to even listen and a fortiori to give a fair hearing to the dissenting voices challenging the relentless hype by implicit-attitudes cheerleaders" [See also the extensive comments thread featuring dialogue among philosophers and psychologists.]
"12 Reasons to Be Skeptical of Common Claims About Implicit Bias" "It's not that there is 'no evidence' This is not a case of 'absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.' It is a case of 'there is tons of evidence, but most of it shows little or no effect.'"
"The Implicit Association Test in Introductory Psychology Textbooks: Blind Spot for Controversy" "The laudable goal of reducing prejudice and discrimination does not justify blind support for poor science. Critical thinking demands allegiance to the science and blind spots to political agendas, ideology, and popular conceptualizations of 'social justice.'"
Brief summary on "the recent scientific literature on implicit bias" "Implicit bias, as measured with the Implicit Association Test, is uncorrelated with behavior... There is not a single study showing that people’s implicit associations have a causal impact on behavior... Raising awareness about implicit biases has negative side effects."
"A brief intellectual history of implicit bias" "To say that this was discouraging for me was a severe understatement: it completely upended my opinion on implicit bias as a useful target of intervention. It also severely challenged my opinion that implicit bias plays any causal role in impacting behavior..."
"So close, Yet So Far: Stopping Short of Killing Implicit Bias" "the strong activism by early implicit bias researchers was far beyond the state of knowledge not only at the time, but even today"
"The 'Implicit Bias' Wording Is a Relic. Let’s Move On and Study Unconscious Social Categorization Effects" "It would be wise to acknowledge the corrosive persistence of explicit biases. And it would be beneficial to critically assess the educational value of the information that research around 'measures of implicit bias' has disseminated within and beyond academia for the last 25 years."
"Metaresearch, Psychology, and Law: A Case Study on Implicit Bias" "To summarize, the evidence linking implicit bias to behavior is weak; thus, the overall body of research does not support the contention that discriminatory behavior can be reduced by reducing implicit bias... The common legal view of implicit bias training as a quick fix for social change was predictable... In some ways, it also mirrors the overly simplistic ways that IAT’s creators pitched it in the media"
"Prejudice Reduction: Progress and Challenges" "Recent scholarly reviews have asked whether implicit bias is related to behavior and if implicit prejudice can be reduced. These reviews have not reported results that justify the widespread enthusiasm for implicit bias interventions in the real world; neither does our current investigation... Together with the lack of evidence for diversity training, these studies do not justify the enthusiasm with which implicit prejudice reduction trainings have been received in the world over the past decade."
"Anomalies in implicit attitudes research: Not so easily dismissed" "Leading scholars should set the record straight forcefully, correcting not only the misunderstanding of indirect measures in psychology, but also their misuse in the social world. They should state forcefully that indirect measures of attitudes do not measure anything that resembles what we take racism, sexism, homophobia, and so on, to be; they should be willing to challenge the debiasing programs based on mistaken interpretations of indirect measures."
"A radical revision of experimental social psychology is still needed" "As we will see again and again in what follows, the problem with implicit bias generally is the fact that an imprecise and weak theory allows for any outcome to be interpreted as supporting that theory."
"Unconscious Bias? With Adam Hahn" [audio] "what people seem to hear is we have inaccessible biases that we don’t know and that we can’t know, and that is just not true... I don’t think this idea that the public needs to go to the Project Implicit webpage to find out if they’re biased is true... I think it’s important to get away from the presentation of unconscious bias"
"Targeting DEI solutions based on how discrimination shows up" "Telling first year students they are likely behaving in biased ways outside their awareness is likely to be counterproductive: aside from being untrue based on our data, this message often has the effect of discouraging them from interacting across group boundaries for fear of doing or saying the wrong thing."
"The Implicit Association Test is unreliable and has little value for training" "The test — and the training it inspires — is problematic in at least three ways: Its findings are unstable; the same score could indicate either sinister, neutral, or even benign sentiment; and it is not a useful predictor of the commission of racially discrepant harm."
"The internal validity obsession" "Take the case of implicit bias. To our knowledge, no implicit bias training program implemented by a police department or other organization has ever been shown to have net behavioral benefits or to be justified under any cost–benefit analysis, yet countless dollars and work hours are being spent on such programs rather than other programs that might prove more effective... If the goal of social psychology is to create an ideology, rather than a science of social behavior, then it appears to have succeeded in the short term, but we suspect that success will erode its long-term credibility and its ability to provide long-term solutions to social problems."
"Is Implicit Bias Training Useless?" "Claiming the mantle of 'science' for false claims and misinformation, no matter how earnest or well-intended is bad. Misinformation is one harm; opportunity costs are another."
"Unconscious bias training is no way to solve ethnic disparities" "...it is far from clear whether ethnic disparities are caused by unconscious bias. An example of why comes from a systematic review of 492 laboratory studies that I co-led..."
"What Can Experimental Studies of Bias Tell Us About Real-World Group Disparities?" "It is striking that the concept of implicit bias has been pushed into federal policy at the highest levels of the U.S. government without any convincing evidence concerning even basic questions about the measurement or the effects of implicit bias."
"Interpreting discrepancies between Self-Perceptions and IAT scores: Who is defensive?" "Of course, people are defensive when they are confronted with unpleasant information and inconvenient truths. A prime example of defensiveness is the response of the researchers behind Project Implicit to valid scientific criticism of their interpretation of IAT scores."
"Generalizability challenges in applied psychological and organizational research and practice" "[T]he uptake of implicit bias interventions for operational use has outpaced evidence supporting them."
"‘I *love* women’: an explicit explanation of implicit bias test results" "We argue that the dominant implicit bias tests assume crude and implausible conceptions of explicit prejudice, leaving open the possibility that the morally bad and wrong actions supposedly best explained by something interestingly implicit are instead best explained by non-obvious but nonetheless explicit prejudice."
"Anomalies in implicit attitudes research" "These issues would not be too concerning for a budding science; they are anomalies for a thirty-year old research tradition that has been extremely successful at selling itself to policy makers and the public at large. So, should social psychologists pack up and move to other research topics or should they stubbornly try to address the anomalies pointed out in this article?"
"Defund Implicit Bias Research" "In short, the evidence that started the implicit revolution is invalid and casts a shadow over the whole notion of prejudice without awareness."
"The Problem with Implicit Bias Training" "What this all means is that, despite the widespread calls for implicit bias training, it will likely be ineffective at best; at worst, it’s a poor use of limited resources that could cause more damage and exacerbate the very issues it is trying to solve."
"The Validity of the IAT and the AMP as Measures of Racial Prejudice" "It is fair to say that the scientific and legal implications of this result are considerable."
Critique of the article directly below ("Implicit Social Cognition") A twitter thread by Lee Jussim (Rutgers) critiquing the below article ("Implicit Social Cognition"), followed by a response from article co-author Calvin Lai, followed by further comment by Jussim.
"Anti-Black Bias on the IAT predicts Pro-Black Bias in Behavior" "First, there is no evidence that IAT scores reflect some form of unconscious or implicit bias. Rather, IAT scores seem to tap the same cognitive and affective processes that influence explicit ratings. Second, there is no evidence that processes that influence IAT scores can bypass conscious control of behavior. Third, there is no evidence that a pro-White bias in attitudes automatically produces a pro-White bias in actual behaviors."
"Implicit Bias Training Doesn't Work" "...despite the growing adoption of unconscious bias training, there is no convincing scientific evidence that it works. In fact, much of the academic evidence on implicit bias interventions highlights their weakness as a method for boosting diversity and inclusion."
"Predicting Behavior With Implicit Measures: Disillusioning Findings, Reasonable Explanations, and Sophisticated Solutions" "We strongly argue not to take the validity of implicit measures like the IAT for granted. Instead, we should take into account the complexity of these measures, especially when it comes to the predictive value for real-life behavior."
"The Implicit Association Test: A Method in Search of a Construct" "Thus, it seems problematic to provide individuals with feedback that their IAT score may reveal something about their attitudes that is more valid than their beliefs... [The Implicit Association Test] is not a window into people’s unconscious feelings, cognitions, or attitudes."
"Psychology’s Favorite Tool for Measuring Racism Isn’t Up to the Job" "The IAT’s myriad problems pose profound challenges to its underlying theory, and to the practice of labeling people in certain ways based on their test results. So why has the test managed to mostly avoid critical scrutiny, except in academic papers members of the public generally don’t read?"
"A meta-analysis of procedures to change implicit measures" "I don't think this research is ready for application... It could even be true that implicit bias doesn't have a strong impact on behavior. Even if this is not true we should not be using this body of research in its current state to inform public policy."
"Can We Really Measure Implicit Bias? Maybe Not"
"An Implicit Bias Primer" "Consensus now exists among implicit bias researchers that current measures of implicit bias cannot reliably identify who will or will not discriminate in any given situation and that programs aimed at changing implicit bias produce very limited effects."
"Psychology's favorite tool for measuring implicit bias is still mired in controversy"
"The Implicit Association Test in a Social Psychology Textbook. Science or Propaganda?" "In conclusion, the textbook does not provide an accurate and balanced account of the controversies surrounding the IAT. It repeats the controversial claim that the IAT is a valid measure of some hidden prejudices that can only be revealed by the IAT. This is a strong claim that is not supported by evidence. Students deserve a better textbook, but I am not aware of a social psychology textbook that is more scientific in the introduction of the IAT."
"What's Wrong with the IAT?" [audio]
"How racist are you? Companies spend a fortune on 'implicit bias tests' — but they are next to useless" "Why — in the face of all these problems — is the notion of implicit bias so sticky, then? Why is it something we all know about, and which companies still spend vast resources trying to eradicate?"
"For years, this popular test measured anyone’s racial bias. But it might not work after all." “I personally think structural and individual racism are serious problems and are something we need to address as a society. I worry that an obsession by some with implicit bias, given its overall empirical track record, may potentially divert attention and resources away from us addressing factors that are far more influential and important in shaping discriminatory behavior and that create the unjust ethnic disparities we sorely need to do something about.”
"An excellent response to well-intentioned but ineffective 'implicit bias training''" A Twitter thread by IAT co-founder Brian Nosek on the weak evidentiary base for "implicit bias" training programs.
"The world is relying on a flawed psychological test to fight racism" “For other aspects of psychology if you have a test that’s not replicated at 0.7, 0.8, you just don’t use it."
"Are You An Unconscious Racist?" "[D]oes the IAT really capture unconscious prejudices? Can the test predict whether people will actually behave in a biased or discriminatory way? The evidence is now pretty clear that the answers to both are 'no.'"
"What you might be missing: startling stories about how our minds work can too easily neglect the bigger picture" "It appears, then, that the IAT is claiming to find racism, ageism, sexism and all sorts of interpersonal biases in people who probably don't possess them."
"Mandatory Implicit Bias Training Is a Bad Idea" Features correspondence with a co-founder of the Implicit Association Test.
"Reliance on individuating information and stereotypes in implicit and explicit person perception" "Our findings are consistent with a slow-moving shift in the understanding of how implicit beliefs function."
"Why Doesn't Diversity Training Work? The Challenge for Industry and Academia" "A number of recent studies of antibias training used the implicit association test (IAT) before and after to assess whether unconscious bias can be affected by training. A meta-analysis of 426 studies found weak immediate effects on unconscious bias and weaker effects on explicit bias. A side-by-side test of 17 interventions to reduce white bias toward blacks found that eight reduced unconscious bias, but in a follow-up examining eight implicit bias interventions and one sham, all nine worked, suggesting that subjects may have learned how to game the bias test. Effects dissipated within a few days."
"Rethinking implicit bias: I want my money back" Also see the comment thread for comments by, among others, Lee Jussim.
"Mission Creep (On Carrying Implicit Bias Too Far)" [audio] Interview with law professor Jonathan Kahn about his book RACE ON THE BRAIN (available from CSU Libraries).
"Unlearning implicit social biases during sleep: A failure to replicate" "...recent research using counter-bias procedures to reduce implicit social biases has had mixed success, and has not demonstrated that such procedures can in turn reduce explicit biases or affect behavior."
"Most implicit bias training in health care lacks proper foundation, research finds"
"The Bias of Individuals (in Crowds): Why Implicit Bias Is Probably a Noisily Measured Individual-Level Construct" "...in the absence of substantial advances in the accuracy of measurement tools, single tests of implicit bias cannot and should not be used for the purpose of diagnosing with any certainty the long-term level of bias of any given individual."
"Are You An Unconscious Racist?" "How ironic that this well-intended effort to illuminate a dark side of our natures now obfuscates the very thing we’re trying to understand."
"Invalid Claims About the Validity of Implicit Association Tests by Prisoners of the Implicit Social-Cognition Paradigm" "The IAT was developed within the implicit social-cognition paradigm that gained influence in the 1990s. Over the past decade, it has become apparent that the empirical foundations of this paradigm are shaky."
"More Error than Attitude in Implicit Association Tests (IATs), a CFA-MTMM analysis of measurement error." "These results demonstrate unequivocally that IAT scores are predominantly composed of measurement error not implicit attitudes."
"Rethinking Unconscious Bias" "the evidence doesn't even come close to proving that most of us walk around with unacknowledged and unconscious biases in our heads"