Implicit Bias - Take The Test

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Implicit Bias

What it is:
Thoughts and feelings are “implicit” if we are unaware of them or mistaken about their nature. We have a bias when, rather than being neutral, we have a preference for (or aversion to) a person or group of people. Thus, we use the term “implicit bias” to describe when we have attitudes towards people or associate stereotypes with them without our conscious knowledge. A fairly commonplace example of this is seen in studies that show that white people will frequently associate criminality with black people without even realizing they’re doing it.

Why it matters:
The mind sciences have found that most of our actions occur without our conscious thoughts, allowing us to function in our extraordinarily complex world. This means, however, that our implicit biases often predict how we’ll behave more accurately than our conscious values. Multiple studies have also found that those with higher implicit bias levels against black people are more likely to categorize non-weapons as weapons (such as a phone for a gun, or a comb for a knife), and in computer simulations are more likely to shoot an unarmed person. Similarly, white physicians who implicitly associated black patients with being “less cooperative” were less likely to refer black patients with acute coronary symptoms for thrombolysis for specific medical care.
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My results:
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Why should she? Stating the truth about white racism is not bias.

Take the test again

Why? That doesnt make sense. You should only take the test once to get a true indication of what you feel.

If a test is not repeatable, it has no predictive value. It seems someone is urging you to keep throwing the dice until you get the score they want. Then, for some arbitrary reason, only that score is "meaningful", not any of the discarded scores. Such a measurement is not test based, it based on what another views as "meaningful" rather than observations that are grounded in reality.

All this test measures is differences in reaction times, and if those reaction-times differences haven’t been proven to predict real-world behavior, it doesn’t make sense to tag someone with a high IAT score as “implicitly biased.”

Over and over it was prematurely implied that there was a connection between IAT scores and real-world outcomes. Countless media outlets all echoed the idea that the IAT measured something that had implications for real-world manifestations of prejudice and discrimination.

Greenwald and Banaji had found around the turn of the millennium were certain predictable patterns in how quickly different sorts of people responded to different sorts of stimuli. Majority groups tended to score higher than minority groups on the IAT, for example. That’s interesting, but there has been little establishing any solid, real-world connection between these scores and any observable marker of discriminatory behavior.

IAT’s most impressive claims do no rest on sound empirical footing. Many people, particularly members of the public not up on the latest literature, remain ignorant of this.

There have always been alternate potential explanations for what the IAT really measures. From early on, skeptics of Greenwald and Banaji’s claims have highlighted the possibility that the test doesn’t really, or doesn’t only, capture implicit bias; in 2004, for example, Hal Arkes and Tetlock published a paper entitled “Would Jesse Jackson ‘Fail’ the Implicit Association Test?” in which they argued that it could be the case that people who are more familiar with certain stereotypes score higher on the IAT, whether or not they unconsciously endorse those stereotypes in any meaningful way. Along those same lines, some researchers have suggested that it could be the case that those who empathize with out-group members, and are therefore well aware of the negative treatment and stereotypes they are victimized by, have an easier time forming the quick negative associations with minority groups that the IAT interprets as implicit bias against those groups.

Psychology’s Favorite Tool for Measuring Racism Isn’t Up to the Job

 

[Zorro!]

Implicit Bias

What it is:
Thoughts and feelings are “implicit” if we are unaware of them or mistaken about their nature. We have a bias when, rather than being neutral, we have a preference for (or aversion to) a person or group of people. Thus, we use the term “implicit bias” to describe when we have attitudes towards people or associate stereotypes with them without our conscious knowledge. A fairly commonplace example of this is seen in studies that show that white people will frequently associate criminality with black people without even realizing they’re doing it.

Why it matters:
The mind sciences have found that most of our actions occur without our conscious thoughts, allowing us to function in our extraordinarily complex world. This means, however, that our implicit biases often predict how we’ll behave more accurately than our conscious values. Multiple studies have also found that those with higher implicit bias levels against black people are more likely to categorize non-weapons as weapons (such as a phone for a gun, or a comb for a knife), and in computer simulations are more likely to shoot an unarmed person. Similarly, white physicians who implicitly associated black patients with being “less cooperative” were less likely to refer black patients with acute coronary symptoms for thrombolysis for specific medical care.
​

The tests: Select a Test

My results:
View attachment 209174

This test that is supposed to reveal implicit racism does not meet the repeatability standards of psychology and high scores are not predictive of discriminate behavior. That is, it's a junk fad. IAT (Implicit Association Test) scores are not strongly connected to prejudice.

Look at the claims you have posted:

Thoughts and feelings are “implicit” if we are unaware of them or mistaken about their nature. We have a bias when, rather than being neutral, we have a preference for (or aversion to) a person or group of people. Thus, we use the term “implicit bias” to describe when we have attitudes towards people or associate stereotypes with them without our conscious knowledge. A fairly commonplace example of this is seen in studies that show that white people will frequently associate criminality with black people without even realizing they’re doing it.

But, all this test is testing is reaction speed. So those with slower processing speed score "higher" and which is to be understood as more prejudiced, yet, they simply process slower, or they were distracted at the time of the test, the leap from processing speed to "implicit bias" is without firm real world support.

Other controlled studies of this test have revealed that higher levels of background noise at the site test will result in scores more associated with bias, when, all it is really measuring is levels of background noise.

Repeatability is the Gold Standard of science and psychological testing. This is expressed in terms of r= and then a number from zero to 1. 1 being perfect repeatability, 0 being no better than a random number generator. The minimum r=rating for psychological testing is .80, This test doesn't reliability achieve even half that measure.

And if that wasn't enough it's not a trustworthy measure for propensity to engage in biased behavior. For a substantial minority of people, the implicit negativity revealed by the IAT isn’t connected to prejudice in any way, shape matter or form. Even the creators of this test now admit that it has no reveal value in terms of predicting biased behavior.

And look at your next claim:

Our implicit biases often predict how we’ll behave more accurately than our conscious values....

Except that after 20+ years of this test being widely available, there is no real world association between high test scores and real world biased behavior, in fact, some studies have show a negative correlation to high test scores and biased behavior!

Even proponents of the test have acknowledged it can’t predict individual behavior with any useful degree of accuracy.

The overheated language is presumptive and divisive with IAT scores described not as differences in reaction times, but as signifying “anti-black feelings” or “pro-white bias” or “implicit preference for white people over black people.” And that nicely sums up the problem with using the IAT in any meaningful way. There is little in the way of real world evidence that these extravagant claims are true.

Proponents of the test have retreated now to the claim that while the test has no predictive power at the individual level, that it is has reliable predictive power at the society level. But using this test at the society level assumes that the test itself is valid. Once you’ve acknowledged that a given tool is too noisy to make valid individual-level measurement, and you’re not willing to say what the positive IAT score means at the individual level, you have no idea what it means at the aggregate level. In other words, If I’m willing to give 100 kids an IQ test, and not willing to say what an individual kid’s score means, how can one make descriptive statements about the group? The fog at the individual level does not disappear simply because you aggregate more of it.

Our schools are now filled with this crap. In the course of being “educated,” individual test-takers are being provided with confusing, misleading, or improperly hedged information about their own propensity to act in a racially biased manner, and that's a big problem because they believe it and feel guilt over it, because they are presuming it's true. Psychology has sturdy norms in place against exposing test-takers to misleading assessments, and it isn’t hard to see why: A depression or anxiety test that was wildly inaccurate yet popular would lead to a lot of false diagnoses, and could do serious harm.

Except for this test, the field of psychology mightily frowns upon the idea of people in positions of authority and respect misleading test-takers. That’s why the IAT’s proponents are so adamant that the IAT shouldn’t be seen as “diagnosing” anything.

“We have always argued that the IAT should NOT be used as a diagnostic tool,” said Banaji in an email. “It is not, as I’ve said, a DNA test. The good news is, it has never been used that way, not with the developers of the test (us) speaking against any such use.” Nosek echoed that sentiment in an email as well. “Across the history of the website and our writing, we collectively have been opposed to interpretation of the IAT as a diagnosis of any kind, and of its application for selection purposes,” he wrote.​

Just as you left that out in your post, so that is widely left out of most of the real world interactions with this test.

Psychology’s Favorite Tool for Measuring Racism Isn’t Up to the Job