The Harvard IAT and our Hidden Biases

Implicit biases are the automatic beliefs we hold towards other people and groups. These biases can lead us to unintentionally treat people differently, which can look like discrimination. Prior to this assignment I had not taken the Harvard Implicit Association Test or even learned much about it. I had an understanding of what implicit associations are and how common these biases are, but did not understand anything about how they could be recorded or measured.

The first test I took was the Weight IAT answering the first questions I was feeling unsure about how accurate these tests may be. I found myself struggling to respond to some questions because I didn’t know if I was being dishonest about the beliefs I held in order to appear more impartial than I am. I was excited to get to the timed “E” vs. “I” portion of the test. When taking this portion, I began to develop an understanding about the way in which these biases can be truly automatic, even when we do not think we hold those beliefs.

My implicit biases were shown to me in the results of the Weight IAT more than in the results of the others I took, such as Race and Weapons-Harmless Objects. I found myself having to really slow down during a couple of the rounds and feeling frustrated. I learned of my own, somewhat hidden, biases surrounding weight, which to an extent I had already guessed I had. It was a different experience to understand my implicit biases through this type of concrete result.

I spent a little bit of time reading about Project Implicit as a whole and how far it has reached and it is truly amazing! For a long time it was not widely accepted that people can have biases that are contradictory to the way they portray themselves and think they are. In the context of the projects we are going to be working on, these tests prove helpful in understanding our own biases and not allowing them to come in the way of working with and helping others.