Unconscious Bias Sandra Reyes, Esquire

What is Unconscious Bias? Unconscious bias is not intentional for most part. It is a blind spot. We need to consciously examine

how we think. We use unconscious bias to make sense of things

around us by creating rules to process information to the advantage of some & the disadvantage of other.

Bias is an inflexible positive or negative conscious or unconscious belief about a particular category of people.

Unconscious bias learning is designed to recognize where there may be bias.

Considering the Unconscious Mind

Types of Unconscious Bias Skin color, gender, and age are generally what people think

of when they consider biases, but individuals can harbor unconscious prejudice about a myriad of characteristics, including:

Height and weight Introversion and extroversion Marital and parental status Disability status Foreign accents Where someone attended college or grew up Volunteer activities Body piercings/manner of dress http://www.shrm.org/publications/hrmagazine/editorialcontent/2014/1214/pages/1214-hidden-

bias.aspx#sthash.vi1gG1FW.dpuf

Actions that Demonstrate Unconscious Bias

Body language – over 95% of meaning taken away involves body language

Eye movements – blinking, eye rolling Repeatedly mispronouncing someone's

name or remember someone’s name Interrupting a person/implying credit for

someone’s work Taking credit for work Not introducing someone Not saying hello to someone Distance between two people

Learning Objectives Introduction and awareness of Unconscious Bias and

how it can affect our actions, particularly in the workplace.

Understand unconscious bias and how it can distort our relationships and affect our behavior, decisions, and impact diversity and inclusion in the workplace.

Develop skills to become more aware of and recognize unconscious biases/automatic assumptions regarding ourselves and others, particularly in the workplace.

Implement change regarding unconscious bias in the employment process.

“We’d like to believe we are open-minded, fair and without

bias, but research shows otherwise. This is an important,

even if uncomfortable, realization for most of us.”

Dr. Mahzarin Banaji

Decision Making and Bias The question is not "do we have bias?" but rather "which

are ours?” An enormous body of literature confirms that we all have

biases—some explicit, many implicit. Perhaps most disturbing, implicit biases can be at odds

with our own conceptions of ourselves and our conscious values and standards.

You may believe yourself to be open-minded and you

may be determined to select the most meritorious candidate before you.

Implicit Association Tests Project Implicit

https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/

Women Endure Surprising Bias in the Workplace

Gender Diversity Despite many CEOs’ intentions to prioritize gender

equality, McKinsey & Co.’s 2015 Women in the Workplace study revealed only one-third of employees surveyed believe gender diversity is a top priority for their direct manager.

What’s more, the same study stated that while 70 percent of men view gender diversity as important, only 12 percent believe women have fewer opportunities for advancement, and 13 percent of men see gender diversity programs as a hurdle to their own advancement.

Perception - Audio and Visual Exercises What do we hear and what do

we see

BLACK CHAIR

Image Credit: KidKraft

What Am I Doing? The procedure is quite simple. First, you arrange

things into different groups. Of course, one pile may be sufficient, depending on how much there is to do. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities, that is the next step; otherwise you are pretty well set. It is important not to overdo things. That is, it is better to do too few things at once than too many. At first the whole procedure will seem complicated. Soon, however, it will become just another facet of life.

Citing: Toni Schmader

Department of Psychology

University of British Columbia

Basketball Awareness Test

Can You Guess My Rule

Exercise

How a Name Affects Employment and Job Opportunities

A National Bureau of Economic Research Paper shows that job applicants with white names had a 50% chance of getting a callback over those who had African-American names. That is, traditional white sounding names only had to send 10 resumes to get one callback, while those that didn’t had to send out 15 resumes per callback.

A total of 5,000 resumes were sent out in response to help wanted adds in Boston and Chicago newspapers.

One of their unsettling findings is that maybe it’s employer bias in play, or the perception that race is tied to productivity.

Why does John get the STEM job rather than Jennifer? - A 2012 study explored the hiring decisions of biology,

chemistry and physics faculty members — professions that pride themselves on objectivity. They were given applications identical in every way except for the applicant’s sex. The professors favored the male job applicant “John” over the female job applicant “Jennifer.” They rated him as more competent, offered him more mentoring and selected a higher starting salary for John.

http://gender.stanford.edu/news/2014/why-does-john-get-stem-job-rather-jennifer#sthash.7VsHAqdI.dpuf

Types of Bias We May Not Be Aware Of

Stereo Type Bias

Confirmation Bias

In-group vs. Out-group

Stereo Type Bias

Stereotype The difference between bias and stereotype is that a bias is a personal preference, like or dislike, especially when the tendency interferes with the ability to be impartial, unprejudiced, or objective. On the other hand, a stereotype is a preconceived idea that attributes certain characteristics (in general) to all the members of class or set.

What is the Effect of

Stereotypes on Behavior? Social groups are categorized into in-groups and

outgroups. Once people are categorized as belonging to one group rather than another they tend to emphasize similarities to individuals in that group and exaggerate differences between groups. Stereotypes of outgroups are often central to group identity.

People tend to pay attention to stereotype-consistent information and disregard stereotype-inconsistent information (confirmation bias).

Negative stereotypes may be internalized by stereotyped groups (stereotype threat).

(SEE, Princeton Trilogy)

In Group Bias This bias can make us so much more comfortable

with those who we unconsciously feel are like us and in our group. We tend to over-estimate the abilities of our immediate group.

What do you think the effect of this is on people we do not know?

Confirmation Bias

Agreeing with people who agree with us. We seek out groups, people sources that agree with our views. Often there are unconscious act of referencing only what agrees with our pre-exiting views.

Unconscious Bias In Employment

Literally, there are thousands of research studies on the topic of

Unconscious Bias.

(See, Journals of Psychology)

Evidence of Racial, Gender Bias Found in Faculty Mentoring

Shankar Vedantam

Studies on Unconscious Bias and Behavior

A growing number of studies show a link between hidden biases and actual behavior. In other words, hidden biases can reveal themselves in action, especially when a person's efforts to control behavior consciously flags under stress, distraction, relaxation or competition.

Unconscious beliefs and attitudes have been found to be associated with language and certain behaviors such as eye contact, blinking rates and smiles.

True Colors - Racial Discrimination in Everyday Life

Summary of Studies A now classic experiment showed that white interviewers sat farther away from

black applicants than from white applicants, made more speech errors, and ended the interviews 25% sooner. Such discrimination has been shown to diminish the performance of anyone treated that way, whether black or white.

Those who showed greater levels of implicit prejudice toward, or stereotypes of, black or gay people were more unfriendly toward them.

Subjects who had a stronger hidden race bias had more activity in a part of the brain known to be responsible for emotional learning when shown black faces than when shown white faces.

Studies indicate that African American teenagers are aware they are stigmatized as being intellectually inferior and that they go to school bearing what psychologist Claude Steele has called a "burden of suspicion." Such a burden can affect their attitudes and achievement.

Similarly, studies found that when college women are reminded their group is considered bad at math, their performance may fulfill this prophecy.

Southern Poverty Law Center

What Can Be Done For instance, Carnegie Mellon University

increased the percentage of women in Computer Science from 7 percent to 42 percent in five years by decreasing the requirements about previous levels of computer experience, as it is an ability that can be taught. This change did not impact the quality of Computer Science graduates.

Activities to Tackle Unconscious Bias

Encourage facilitated, voluntary dicussions on bias. Self-awareness is critical.

Survey employees on their experiences with unconscious bias within your organization. Tailor training and intervention on your findings.

As your organization tackles bias, additional ideas relate to the challenges you face in your workplace. Portraying those who may be subject to unconscious bias in different light is helpful through literature, posters, and social media.

One large corporation took on renaming the corporate conference rooms from previously almost 100 percent white male names.

Suggestions also include depicting person with a disability in leadership roles, women in traditionally male dominated positions, an older person involved in a technology related project.

Arrange for employees to have interaction with people who are different. This interaction allows people of diverse backgrounds to get to know each other as individuals with common goals, not merely as members of a group about which they might hold an unconscious bias.

Recruitment Create concrete and core competencies for recruitment,

interviewing, promotions, and assignments, that lead to promotional opportunities and open positions.

Are the criteria for a vacancy strictly defined? How do you ensure that the job criteria (person specification

and required experience) are based only on the essential requirements of the position, to avoid creating barriers to any qualified individuals?

Do you use standardized application forms, so all candidates are submitting the same types of information and can be compared fairly?

http://gender-decoder.katmatfield.com/

Unconscious Bias in Higher Education” http://www.ecu.ac.uk/publications/unconscious-bias-in-higher-education

Recruitment

Perception – perception can be our reality First impression – must acknowledge this and not

allow to drive the recruitment process Behavior – interaction and receptiveness to all

groups of people Attitude – how to we first react when we are

interacting with a person of a different race/gender/religion/disability

Listening – Do we actively listen to what certain people say

Recruitment Are the criteria for a vacancy strictly defined? How do you ensure that the job criteria (person

specification and required experience) are based only on the essential requirements of the position, to avoid creating barriers to any qualified individuals?

Do you use standardized application forms, so all candidates are submitting the same types of information and can be compared fairly?

Unconscious Bias in Higher Education” http://www.ecu.ac.uk/publications/unconscious-bias-in-higher-education

Social Network Recruiting and Bias CareerBuilder studied the use of hiring through

social networks. The results were that 34% of hiring managers

use social networks to find reasons not to hire a candidate.

Bias? Subjectivity?

Interview

Acknowledge to yourself and evaluate your first impression.

How do selection panels specifically consider equality

and diversity issues when preparing for recruitment? Do you use diverse selection panels?

Encouraging panel members to consider the similarities,

rather than the differences, of people from minority and majority groups.

“Unconscious Bias in Higher Education” http://www.ecu.ac.uk/publications/unconscious-bias-in-higher-education

Promotions How do you ensure decisions on promotions are

justified on objective rather than subjective grounds? For example, are justifications based on the specific

skills and knowledge of a candidate, and not on their ‘fit’ in the team?

Are all decision-making processes documented to

ensure that justifications are consistent, based on the defined criteria and in compliance with your legal obligations?

Unconscious Bias in Higher Education” http://www.ecu.ac.uk/publications/unconscious-bias-in-higher-education

Questions to Ask Yourself Are my hires the same “type”? Have I used the term “right fit” and what do I mean?? Do I make sure my list of candidates is diverse? Have I had successful hires. Have I thought about

unsuccessful hires? What can I learn from successful and unsuccessful hires?

How do I assign work? Do I go to a certain person? How do I organize a project team?

Who do I give opportunities to for face time within the organization or on the outside?

Do I encourage anyone more than anyone else on projects or in meetings and why? Do introverts receive the same opportunities?

What is my process for promotion and succession?

See,http://www.shrm.org/publications/hrmagazine/editorialcontent/2014/1214/pages/1214-hidden-

bias.aspx#sthash.vi1gG1FW.dpuf

Discomfort With a Co-worker

Often Signals Bias

Next time you find yourself cringing in a colleague’s presence, fill in one or more of these blanks.

I do not feel comfortable with this person because … I am skeptical about this worker’s ability to do a good job

because … I would be hesitant to put this employee in front of a

customer because … I would prefer not to have this individual on my project team

because … Eight Ways to Help End Workplace Prejudice - Leigh Steere

U.S. Women's Team Files Wage-Discrimination Action vs.

U.S. Soccer

Summary

Extraordinary people are not extraordinary because they are

invulnerable to unconscious biases. They are extraordinary because they choose to do

something about it.

Citing: Shankar Vedantam “The Hidden Brain”

Conclusion