How not to be racist

Kaleb

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In short:
Large-scale online study at Harvard examines prejudices; nonracism stems from generally positive outlooks and significant positive interracial exposure.

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Whether out in polite society or answering the questions of nosy psychologists, most people insist to the utmost that they’re not racist. But when those same psychologists test people's subconscious feelings, they find a much different story. More than 80 percent of white people show some measurable prejudice against black people, for instance.

About 7 percent of white people, though, actually show a distinct lack of racism on probing psychological tests, says psychologist Robert Livingston of Northwestern University. ... It turns out that the nonracists share a unique emotional style: They rarely form any negative associations, whether they're thinking about meaningless symbols or real human beings.
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In this type of experiment—which has been used by other scientists studying race psychology—subjects look at pictures of faces on a screen and press one button if the face is black and another if it is white. Interspersed with the faces are words that are either positive (“glorious,” “joyful”) or pejorative (“terrible,” “nasty”). In one round, subjects use one key for white faces and positive words and another key for black faces and negative words. In another round, the keys are switched so that the white faces are matched with negative words and black faces with positive words. If a person takes longer to press the “black” key when it’s paired with the “good” key than when it’s paired with the “bad” key, psychologists believe, that comes from a subconscious resistance to associating black people with goodness—a sure sign of racial prejudice. You can take this test yourself on Harvard University's Web site.
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The researchers say that negative associations likely have such power in most people's minds because evolution prepared us to notice bad things more than good things. “If there’s a lion hiding in a bush, you’d better see it,” Livingston says. “Whereas if there’s a tree of mangoes, it’s unfortunate if you don’t notice it, but it’s not as critical to your survival.” Since each negative association has more weight in the brain, one must overcompensate with many positive links just to get back to neutral. ...

Other recent research on race has shown that the desire to look past these powerful negative associations is, unfortunately, not very effective at decreasing people's actual level of prejudice. “It’s not a matter of teaching people that prejudice is wrong,” Livingston says. “They know that already. You need to expose them to positive associations.” So how do you motivate people to form positive feelings for people they don't like? Psychologist Linda Tropp of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst calls Livingston and Drwecki’s paper “provocative and important,” but she says that the desire to avoid being racist can compel people to seek contact with the very people they're biased against, which is known to be the best way to reduce prejudice. So maybe our conscious angels can help us silence those subconscious devils after all.
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Full article:
http://discovermagazine.com/2007/oct/how-not-to-be-racist

Testing (Topics span race, religion, disabilities, political orientation, etc.):
https://implicit.harvard.edu/

Published Results:
Dense reading in PDF format, scanable charts towards the end Link

Charts I came across during testing...
https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/images/arabbreakdown.gif
https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/images/racebreakdown.gif
https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/images/weaponsbreakdown.gif

my test results



Your data suggest a slight automatic preference for Black People compared to White People.




Your result, reported above, is already corrected for the order in which you took the parts of the IAT. If you have a question about the effect of order, please read the answer to FAQ 1 on the page of FAQs for this test.

The interpretation shown above is described as 'automatic preference for Black People' if you responded faster when Black People faces and Good words were classified with the same key as opposed to White People faces and Good words. It is marked 'automatic preference for White People' if you were faster when giving the same response to White People faces and Good words. Depending on the magnitude of your result, your automatic preference may be described as 'slight', 'moderate', 'strong', or 'little to no preference'.
 
Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between European American and African American.

I... have no preference? Wow. And I always thought of myself as being so damn racist.
 
i have no preference...






...dammit
 
Your data suggest a strong automatic preference for European American compared to African American.

:o
 
We did this in school. You're not racist if you have a preference.
 
Your data suggest a moderate automatic preference for African American compared to European American.




tehcorzorz.jpg



:huh:
(I'm mexican living in the southmost border of Texas)
 
Your data suggest a slight automatic preference for European American compared to African American.

And I'm white. Oh noes.
 
This test is bogus.
Sometimes it shows attractive Black/White people, sometimes it shows hideous Black/White people.
Your measured preferences for faces are tainted by your preferences for nice-looking people and your revulsion for ugly people, and that is always subjective.

I may be a white racist, but I'd still prefer to look at a picture of Vivica Fox than a picture of Rosie O'Donnel.
 
Your data suggest a strong automatic preference for European American compared to African American.
 
why are you doing this? this thread should be removed
 
This test is bogus.
Sometimes it shows attractive Black/White people, sometimes it shows hideous Black/White people.
Your measured preferences for faces are tainted by your preferences for nice-looking people and your revulsion for ugly people, and that is always subjective.

I may be a white racist, but I'd still prefer to look at a picture of Vivica Fox than a picture of Rosie O'Donnel.

here here brother.... according to this test i also should be applying to the arian brother hood.

oh and the thread title is misleading... i have no idea how to stop myself from being racist, and harvard gave me no help for that.
 
Too many errors. :csad:

I gave up on the last segment (too damn long :cmad:) and I just kept pressing "e" and "i" randomly, though sometimes getting 6 right in a row. :yay:
 
"Your test shows that you are a Japanophile. Now go back to Chopstick land you Kame!"

Ironic for a test that determines if your racist.:huh:
 
The test sounds bogus on it's face. but that's my opinon. Computer I'm now on doesn't have the flash player needed so I'll have to take it at a later time.

Oh, and I don't know why but the term "European American" pisses me off for some reason. PC be damned, I'm white.
 
True, but even the appearance of racism is a huge social faux pas these days. I remember I was talking about the Green Lantern oath once, and some guy over heard and got really pissed off. He didn't like the term "Blackest Night". Weird too... he was white, but acted like my use of the term was racist.
 
That test is bogus and as Wilhelm said has the potential to be tainted by other, universal biases, such as beauty and ugliness.
 
That test is bogus and as Wilhelm said has the potential to be tainted by other, universal biases, such as beauty and ugliness.
or how about routine?

They set the test up so that first the "Black" button is also the "Negative" button.

Going through the first test like that, conditions you so that you will have a bias on the portion where the "Black" button is also the "Postitive" button.
 
here's how not to be racist...realize that all people, regardless of color, are either...

1. Lazy
2. Stupid
3. Stupid and lazy
4. Smart, but a**holes
5. Stupid, and a**holes
6. Whiney little b**ches
7. Stupid whiney little b**ches
or 8. Stupid, lazy, whiney little b**ch a**holes

then race is no longer a factor, and you'll just hate everyone the same.
 
that was a truly boring test, and i sincerely doubt its efficacy at producing accurate results across the board... the questionaire part at the end was just as tained as the rest of it, since it should be easy to establish someone's position simply by their answers to those questions, regardless of how they actually performed on the first sections of the test...
 

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