Living in a patriarchal, white supremacist, ableist, transphobic, and homophobic society means we’re all susceptible to acting on biases we may not even be aware we have. The Equity Council programming committee has assembled an incredibly talented group of panelists to help us all identify and fight against our implicit biases as individuals, teams, and an organization. A video of that panel, which was held earlier this year, is below, along with a transcript.
April Siese
Our panelists who—Thank you, Michelle—who I will have introduce themselves in a second. If y'all have any questions, there is a Slido link that I'm about to put into the chat for Q&A. We'll have an hour for the panel itself, and then a half hour for any questions after. And those questions will not be recorded. So if you feel more comfortable asking something like anonymously, and in that space, feel free.
Whoever on the panel would like to kick things off in terms of intros, feel free.
Calvin Lai
All right, um, I think I can start. Hi, everyone. I'm Calvin Lai, he/him. I'm a social psychologist by training. I'm an assistant professor at Washington University in St. Louis, and the chair of the Scientific Advisory Board at Project Implicit, which is a nonprofit for research and education on implicit bias. My research primarily focuses on studying implicit bias and subtle or hidden forms of discrimination. And I specifically specialize in trying to figure out, well, what can we actually do about it, right? Given that social sciences spend so much time just documenting that it exists? And that it's linked to behavior? What are the ways that we can try to reduce implicit bias, or if we cannot reduce it, at least try to mitigate its impact on behavior?
So yeah, that's me.
Should I popcorn it? Ivy do you want to go next?
Ivuoma Onyeador
Sure. Hello, everyone. My name is Ivy Onyeador. I'm an assistant professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. In my research, I'm really interested in how people understand diversity and discrimination, how people think about disparities. And I have another line of work, trying to translate the social science about diversity and diversity interventions to organizations, and how they can best implement those findings.
And I've been consulting with organizations for probably well over a decade now on some of these issues. And I'm really excited to be here today with all of you, and I will popcorn it to Keith.
Keith Maddox
Hi, everyone. My name is Keith Maddox. I'm a professor of psychology at Tufts University. I'm also a social psychologist. So you, you have very good representation on this panel. My research is done in stereotyping and prejudice and discrimination. And I'm really interested in sort of the social cognitive side of things. So, related to implicit bias, but how we mentally represent people in groups and how we use those representations to make judgments and make decisions about interactions with other people. I'm also very interested in trying to understand how, in particular, anxiety around the impression you're going to make on other people can influence and get in the way of making good impressions and having favorable intergroup interactions and trying to figure out ways to mitigate that anxiety.
Also, this Calvin mentioned, I'm on the board of Project Implicit. I'm one of the board members. I'm also a co-director of a diversity and inclusion leadership program at Tufts, which is a program that trains individuals to start to think a little bit more about taking on leadership roles with respect to equity, diversity, inclusion, and justice in organizations. And I think that kind of covers it, so and I will, I'll pass it to Rex.
Rex Wilde
Thank you so much, Keith. My name is Rex Wilde, they/them pronouns. I'm the founder and CEO of Rex Wilde Consulting, where I work directly with businesses, organizations, especially in the corporate space around justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion issues. With a specific emphasis around TGX, or trans/nonbinary and gender-expansive and intersex issues. I do a lot of work within organizations to help them understand how to create cultures of inclusion, especially for TGX communities, both through training as well as direct consulting around policy and organizational development, especially as we are shifting and seeing so many more individuals come out as TGX, as we're seeing younger and younger generations promote more visibility. I work a lot with the national and local Los Angeles LGBTQ Chambers of Commerce. And I'm currently at the National LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce conference here in Vegas today, where I'm calling in from, and I think that's it. So thank you, excited to be here.
April Siese
Yeah, I am your moderator. My name is April Siese, my pronouns are she/her. I am a member of the Equity Council, and I'm also a senior staff writer. With the company, I focus on climate change and environmental justice. And I know a lot of implicit bias, unfortunately, factors into environmental justice issues. Just to get started, let's start with the basics. What is the difference between implicit bias and explicit bias? This is open to all y'all.
Keith Maddox
So the way I think about it is that— so one way of sort of thinking about it is that explicit bias is sort of the kinds of sort of ideas that you are aware of that you have about people, other people, so stereotypes that you're aware of, prejudices that you might be aware of, and situations under which you are aware that they may be operating. Whereas implicit biases are the kinds of thoughts and feelings, knowledge that you have this sort of under-the-surface that you're not necessarily aware of, at any particular time, or in any particular context or situation. So really, it's sort of thinking about an iceberg. It's sort of the stuff that's above the surface versus the stuff that's below the surface. And all of those things contribute to the ways in which we think about and interact with other people. But again, sometimes we're more or less aware of those. And implicit bias, obviously, is the stuff that's less aware. So we don't think it's influencing our behaviors and judgments, when in fact, it could be.
April Siese
Anyone who has any other feedback on that, feel free to jump in. I know implicit bias can look like a lot of things. So I'm kind of curious how implicit bias can inform other kinds of poor behaviors such as microaggressions. I'm not sure how familiar everyone is with microaggressions. So if y'all are comfortable defining that, and then kind of explaining how that factors into implicit bias, that would be perfect.
Rex Wilde
Well, to jump off of what Keith was talking about with, you know, first starting with implicit versus explicit bias, I think it's helpful to give like, an example of what implicit bias might look like. And so, for example, one of the things about implicit bias is, this is something that we all have, and we all experience, right? We've really been enculturated into a system that categorizes folks in ways that just influence our own thoughts, regardless of whether we have a lot of awareness around them. And so one of the things that I noticed just a couple of weeks ago, my grandma's in the hospital right now. And so when my mom called me to let me know that my grandmother's in the hospital, she said, ‘Yeah, the doctor is going to meet us and going to give us the prognosis soon of what's going on with her.’ And I said, 'Oh, great, I can't make to wait to meet with him.' And she was like, 'Oh, actually, the doctor's a woman.' And so that is one of the ways in which we see implicit bias kind of plays out in the real world, is when we make assumptions. You know, so I was making an assumption without realizing it, of this person's gender, just based on the position that they had. And so that's one of the ways they think that we often see implicit bias play out.
And another example that I can give this is, I have a cousin who we're six weeks apart in age. And so we've, you know, grown up together throughout our lives. And it's interesting, because the thing that we'd love to do the most together is actually to go hiking, and to do with like backpacking adventures, things like that. And yet, I realized that for the past, I don't know, probably about five plus years, for her birthday, I bought her jewelry every single year, to the point where she let me know, like, 'Rex, like, I'm actually not interested in receiving jewelry. I would much rather you buy me like a beanie or something that has to do with camping or backpacking.' And that was the, again, a way that my own implicit bias around her being a femme-presenting woman and assuming that she would want, you know, jewelry, or just defaulting to this rather than being more thoughtful and conscientious, was a way that this played out. And so I think it's something that plays out in a lot of different ways. And so just to give context to some examples around what implicit bias can look like, and I'll go ahead, I'll pause here and pass it off to someone else, if you want to continue with that and talk more about microaggressions.
April Siese
Absolutely. Thank you.
Calvin Lai
Guys, I can kind of continue riffing. I think that, you know, as Rex mentions, a lot of it kind of can come out in terms of like these kinds of hidden assumptions or that we're, we're not necessarily reflecting on when that we make of other people, a lot of times. But there are lots of microaggressions. That might be for different reasons, right? Because sometimes you might microaggress on someone you might meet, engage in, when these subtle slights, maybe because you actually do have that kind of pretty blatant prejudice against them. But you're trying to hide it, right? You're trying to be passive-aggressive about it. And sometimes microaggressions can just happen because of ignorance, right? You just, you don't know what the right thing to say is, or, you know, the right etiquette or the right manners. And so those are ways that microaggressions might be disconnected from implicit bias, but they all kind of fall into the broader banner of just being somewhat subtle. Right now the kind of weight and stuff that we might sometimes talk about.
Ivuoma Onyeador
On that note, I, so, in some of my research, I talked about some of the consequences of framing discrimination in terms of implicit rather than explicit bias. Some of Calvin's work has shown that it's really hard to shift implicit biases, and things like that. And I remember seeing him give a talk at our fields major conference, and I was like, 'Okay, so we're doing all this talk about implicit bias.' It's hard to change, sometimes a direct relationship between that and behavior can be difficult. So I wondered about what the consequences of the focus on implicit bias could be. And so we ran some studies showing that when you frame incidents or discrimination in terms of implicit as opposed to explicit bias, people are less likely, less willing to hold people accountable for that discrimination. And so I just sort of put that out there. And to raise the idea that, you know, it's important to understand implicit biases.
I don't want my message to be that we shouldn't be thinking about it, but that sometimes there's discrimination or biases happening in our organizations. And this idea that it's operating outside of our control, or, you know, we don't really mean to, if we don't mean to, then there is not that sort of motivation to address it sometimes. And so I feel similarly about microaggressions. Often, it's like these subtle slights, but they're subtle, or whatever, to the person who is perpetrating the microaggression, they're often not subtle to the person who is receiving the microaggression, who's received the same sort of like, odd comment for their whole life. And so, again, you know, we don't need to change the labels or anything like that.
But I just want to sort of offer that there are these ways sometimes that the concepts that we created to understand what's going on in these organizations might be undermining our willingness to kind of forthrightly or sort of, with some urgency try to address them.
April Siese
I'd say this factors very well into the first question that we have, which is, how do you notice when you have implicit bias? It seems like the whole deal is that it's not very naturally visible to the person.
Calvin Lai
A thing that I try to emphasize a lot in my public writing, at least, is that oftentimes, implicit biases are not like unconscious in this kind of like, deep Freudian sense of like, you can never know about them. But they're unconscious in the sense that you're just not, you're just not dwelling on them, you're not reflecting on them, you're not paying attention to them. And so one way that I see as a kind of, like, partial solution, that kind of Ivy's problems, as she's posed it is, is to just get people to pay more attention, right? Do the homework, do their reading, you know, really take it to heart when when someone is offended or feels slighted. And I think that that's one way that I think kind of bridges, you know, some of the fact that while these things are oftentimes not totally unconscious view, it also at the same time doesn't mean that like, it's totally outside of your control. It's kind of like within your control and in kind of weird, like, indirect sense, right? You could you could do the work so that you don't act on these biases.
Ivuoma Onyeador
I like to suggest that we focus on like the disparities themselves. So like, the fact that maybe there's there aren't enough women in leadership in the organization, or we haven't hired enough people of color, whether that's due to implicit or explicit bias, we don't know often, it's hard to like pinpoint, you know. It's you that didn't hire these people. And it's because you're actually, you know, you're explicitly racist, or you're implicitly racist. But at the end of the day, we don't have enough, you know, nonbinary folk in this in this company, or the people who are here are not feeling welcome, or whatever the case may be, and we need to address that kind of directly. And so, I think it can be useful to do focus groups or surveys actually ask people how they're feeling in this organization and what is making them maybe feel not included? And then what can we do directly to address those things?
And I, I've, I've found that to be useful as I navigate my own workplace as a person of color. I don't know why, you know, I might be feeling outside of, or unincluded or whatever, or I might know some things. And so I'm kind of the best person to talk to and ask, and then the question is kind of like, is my organization willing to do what it takes to shift things so that those things that are making me feel unincluded? Are these people who are sort of not that. Well, you know, there are other there are things you can look at kind of intentionally or, you know, where did you decide to live and your neighborhood is segregated? How are you feeling as you know, various equity policies are being put forth? What's coming up for people, I think, just more like what Calvin was saying, more intentional reflection on the disparities that exist and our role in place in relation to them, I think is really useful. And then of course, action beyond that.
Keith Maddox
I kind of, if I can jump in, I kind of like the framing of this question. I like the way Rex sort of frames the example. Right, and the example was that she was made aware of kind of bias, potential bias. And she was using, in terms of making assumptions about a doctor or somebody assumption about her friend, through confrontation, through somebody speaking up and telling her that she was making an assumption, and that wasn't necessarily warranted. And I think, you know, this idea of having the opportunities for us to have our question assumptions questioned by other people. So creating environments and situations and contexts where people feel empowered, to let somebody know that they might have made an assumption about them, they're doing something that they don't like, et cetera, those are the ways that we find out that sometimes our behavior is guided by these underlying assumptions.
And I think I agree with what's been said so far is that, you know, the idea of trying to change our biases, which everybody wants to know, isn't the key isn't sort of like changing you interpersonally it's changing the data that you have been taking in your entire life, the environments, the context, all the ways in which disparities have been baked into those contexts, and how you oftentimes see things and then ultimately, recapitulate those things that you see. So in our environments, we've been learning these associations about particular groups, about gender, about race, about etc. And a lot of that has to do with structural and interpersonal discrimination that's taking place over time. And the way to change that environment is to change what we're learning is to change those situations. So focus on the disparities, and doing work to try to mitigate those disparities so that the environments that we are living in environments that we, you know, the data that we're exposed to is different over time, and that the kinds of biases or the nature of our biases are going to change over time.
But yeah, I mean, I think the question is, everybody's got these biases, right? So knowing whether you have them or not, it's not the question of whether you have them, it's, which ones do you have? And I think I'd be alright, just talking about thinking about some of the assumptions that you make that maybe based on the environments, what you've seen in the past, and sort of maybe your lack of exposure to diversity, or what have you, all of these things contribute to the ways in which we think about the world and we need to start to question those things a little bit more.
Rex Wilde
I, and just to jump off at that point, and to share, you know, I think it's interesting, because I think this is a great opportunity, actually, that we're experiencing in real-time to, like, address something that happens, which is like around pronouns, for example. So like, I use they and them pronouns, and Keith, I don't know if you realize that you use different pronouns for me. But that happens quite frequently, right? Even when people do know that I use they/them pronouns, because of how they perceive my presentation, or I have a higher voice or whatever it may be. And so I think it's, you know, one of the things that I wanted to jump off of both what Keith and Ivy had been saying, is that when we're thinking about, you know, microaggressions, and implicit biases, is there's also a point of like, what does it look like for us, as people who want to become aware of these biases and like, how do we actually become aware of them? And part of that is through a standpoint of education, about the things that we don't know, because at the end of the day, we don't know what we don't know.
And then once we do come into awareness of things that we do know, there's a certain level of having to kind of continuously educate ourselves around those things, in order to become aware of when biases occur or when things like microaggressions occur, and then be in conversations with ourselves of, 'Okay, now that I am aware of this within myself,' because we all have implicit biases, we all perpetuate microaggressions at some point, 'Now that I have this awareness,' among a variety of other reasons. But when we have the willingness to make mistakes, and the willingness to listen to what someone's experiences, rather than kind of speaking over it right away, it actually provides us with a really wonderful opportunity for connection. Because at the end of the day, the more that we understand implicit biases, the more we understand microaggressions, and the more that we are able to make shifts and changes in order to address those things within ourselves. And globally, the better we can connect with each other. And I think that, you know, that's the point of all of this.
April Siese
Yeah, and y'all are answering questions before I even get to them, and I love it. I really appreciate the framing of doing that kind of internal work and self-assessment in order to better grow and sort of the humbling nature behind knowing that you're at some point you're going to be wrong and willing to learn. I think that's very key. In terms of intentionality, though, like, we have a question right now about sort of the other side of things, somebody who's experiencing a microaggression. And that question is, 'how do you deal with microaggressions that seem deliberate versus accidental? What are the differences in how you handle those?' I know, intent can be very tricky on these kinds of matters.
Calvin Lai
So I think this is a type of question that, I don't, at least, does not have a clear, like research-based answer. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna be very clear that I'm like talking based on my informed intuitions as opposed to like, here's the data for this.
I think that my, my reading is that, you know, if it's something that, well, first off, it's just really hard to know, if it's deliberate or accidental. One of the things that's just been really sobering about becoming a psychologist is that it's really hard to know other people's minds. And it's also really hard to know our own minds. I think that, at least, the way that I carry myself is that I often try to err on the side of being more charitable, when someone does commit a microaggression, I think that if you start from assuming that it, it's coming from a position of ignorance, at least the first time or so like, you know, people are less likely to become defensive and hunker down.
So in effect, that we do often, you know, worry about in the literature is about, like, confrontations that are so severe that people just shut down and, you know, become even more entrenched than they were before. At the same time, there are times where, you know, the kind of soft-touch approach is not going to work. And kind of relatively direct confrontation, where if you're saying, 'That's really just not cool,' or that, you know, 'That really hurt my feelings and the feelings of other folks in this room,' it can be the type of message that you want to get across. A lot of it though—and there's why the research is not helpful—depends on the kind of complexities of our interpersonal relationships, right? The type of thing that you can kind of get away with a stranger is going to be different from how you might talk to your family, which is going to be different from your coworkers, who may be your bosses or your subordinates. And so it's hard to have like a, here's the one simple life hack of how you ought to confront different types of microaggressions. So sorry to be a typical academic to say it depends, but it depends.
Keith Maddox
Well, I was gonna say, you had a great example because I just misgendered Rex and didn't realize it, but Rex assumed perhaps that I didn't realize it. So that particular confrontation, which I appreciate, Rex, apologize for that particular confrontation, I think started, like Calvin decided. Decided, you know, kind of giving the benefit of the doubt in maybe assuming that perhaps I wasn't aware and that I wasn't clear.
But you know, you could also sort of imagine that as the question asked it, there might be contexts where that's not true. And, uh, you know, a lot of that is, is challenging. I mean, I imagine it, as Calvin said, it depends a lot on sort of on the nature of the relationships that you have with that person, whether or not there's some kind of a coworker-worker power dynamic, what have you, friend, family, etc. Right. So all those things could probably factor in. But yeah, sometimes a direct confrontation is necessary.
I think oftentimes it's interesting or useful to know sort of the foundation or the motivation behind somebody. Someone's actions right? And that there are consequences for that person if they don't do that. So I think, you know, in a way, I guess, I was kind of saying: Just tell on it. Right? And hopefully, we have structures, and we've developed structures and organizational structures that are gonna allow us to communicate the norms that we have about how we should interact with one another. And if somebody is violating those norms, there are going to be consequences. So that's not always the case.
But I think, you know, outside of having institutional structures that provide that opportunity, the the kind of direct confrontation that we're talking about is, is often necessary, and again, can be challenging because maybe you might find yourself in a situation where it's dangerous. So it's, it's really hard to say, but I think, again, assuming perhaps, that it's not intentional. But if you start to feel like that it is intentional, then you have to start to examine what's the nature of your relationship? And is there an opportunity to repair or if you're in another context, whether or not there are structures that allow people to, to learn about and get the consequences of misbehavior?
Rex Wilde
And one thing I'll add to this is, you know, when we're thinking about experiencing these things, and this reality of like, is it intentional, is it not, you know, and maybe you experience the same thing over time, over and over again, from someone and you can, you know, you will learn that it is specifically intentional, etc, even in one, you know, some instances, you may be able to immediately learn that it is intentional. I think that there's something to be said about, how are you relating to yourself around these things? Because I think when things like microaggressions and implicit bias happen, we as individuals who are experiencing them have this tendency to question ourselves: 'Is that real? Did that actually happen?' And sometimes we can't know exactly, again, what's going on in someone else's mind.
It's hard to know that, but what we can know and what we can work with ourselves on is, ‘Well, how did I perceive that experience? And how did it impact me? How is it impacting my internal relationship with myself? How is it impacting how I'm able to show up in this environment because of this experience that I have, and the way that I'm processing and receiving it?’ And I think that when we allow ourselves the opportunity and the room to be in process with ourselves around that, it brings us to a point of one validating whatever thoughts and feelings do come up, regardless of what the experience is. Because no matter what the reality of the experience is, it still may trigger things within our own emotional and spiritual bodies that need to be addressed and need to be validated.
You know, so having an experience of, ‘Well, I think this person said something, you know, that felt like it might be transphobic. But I can't tell.’ Well, for me, regardless of what happens externally, it still elicits this experience of how difficult it is to be a person in this world who is trans and does experience regular incidences of things like X, you know, explicit and implicit biases and microaggressions.
And so how do I understand what's coming up for me internally, and then take care of whatever my own needs are around that? Maybe it is addressing the situation, in and of itself, maybe it's choosing to just spend some time internally with myself in order to like, validate whatever I need to validate. Or maybe it's calling in some help and saying, 'Hey, this thing happened,' or 'This thing keeps happening. And I'm wondering if you can help me strategize around how to address it if it happens again, or how to strategize how to address it without me needing to be the one to address it because it feels too hard or icky or difficult for me,' etc. So I think that there's a lot of different things to consider when we are, especially in this place where we're thinking about actually addressing something and the ways that we want to address it.
April Siese
Oh, go ahead, Dr. Ivy. Sorry.
Ivuoma Onyeador
That's okay. Um, I was just gonna say that in addition to all these other great suggestions, each person said like something that I was gonna say, I think, in the aftermath, I like to debrief with people that I know. So if I did have to confront—or if it was kind of, no matter what I chose to do, whether I didn't confront, or I did confront, whether it was intentional or not—it's important for me to kind of download with other people that what happened and kind of like, receive that social support. Or just like a check-in, like, 'Did you— Did you also see that this happened?' etcetera. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I don't know, sometimes we are the ones who have to confront, and then other people are like, 'Thank you so much for saying something, I'm so glad that you said something.' And that's really frustrating, because sometimes it would be nice if someone else said something.
But I like to remind myself that, you know, I'm in some places for that reason, and I'm very grateful that I was there so that I could push back on whatever racist thing happened, or sexist, or so on and so forth. And so yeah, but I just wanted to put out that like, beyond checking in with just yourself, it can be good to check in with other people. Because those interpersonal conflicts are actually really difficult. It's easy to say, confront or speak up, or that's why you're here or whatever. But it's important to kind of check, do whatever you need to do to get back to your equilibrium.
April Siese
I think self-care is really key that way, and also sort of recognizing the many ways that implicit bias can look very different for different people, I'd kind of like to talk a little bit about how intersectionality factors into that. Rex, if you're comfortable discussing how implicit bias affects you as a trans person, I'd love to hear your thoughts.
Rex Wilde
Yeah, absolutely. Um, so I think that there's a multitude of ways that this can happen, and to get to some examples of what it's looked like in my life. So, for example, when it came out to my mom, my mom was really immediately like, I love you so much. And I, you know, can't imagine how difficult it's been for you to, you know, realize this about yourself, and what it's going to be like to walk through the world as a trans person.
And the way implicit bias had played out with her, especially towards the beginning, after I came out, was around her difficulty seeing me as a nonbinary person, and wanting me to exist within a binary gender. And so one of the things that she said to me was, 'Wouldn't it just be so much easier if you were a man, can't you just be a man?' as if there was some choice that I had, you know, as if there was this idea that, you know, being nonbinary is not legitimate in and of itself.
And so I think that for a lot of people who are of third gender, especially, we can experience this kind of delegitimization, of being a person of a third gender experience, and not someone who identifies with a binary gender, because we've grown and been raised in this binary system that in so many ways in the world, only recognizes men and women. And it is very new to our cultural conversation in the U.S. that we're having to understand that third genders do exist. And the many, many ways that an individual can move through the world look, express themselves as a third-gender person or as a nonbinary person. And so I would say that bumping up against the ways in which the gender binary really has informed the systems that we exist within is something that's happening on an ongoing daily basis.
You know, I think the other things that we can see with regard to implicit bias in the trans community. So for example, in the context of the workplace, I was talking to someone who is a trans man. And for folks that go through medical transition and might go on hormones, you basically go through a second puberty, and a lot of people end up for at least a period of time looking much younger, because of the ways that this additional second puberty and hormones impact your body, change your skin, etc. And so there was a man that I was working with, who had gone on testosterone had just been on testosterone for a couple of years, was, you know, had his doctorate degree, he was over 35 and kept going for job interviews at institutions, where they were like, 'Oh, my God, you're so young,' and they thought he was fresh out of undergrad. And so it was really interesting to see how ageism kind of intersected in this way, where instead of looking at his credentials, and really looking at the work that he had done, as an academic and as a professional, that they were so caught off guard by how young he looked that they allowed that to delegitimize his actual credentials. And so there's a lot of ways as well that there are intersectional experiences that end up impacting the way this that implicit bias especially plays out in the trans community.
April Siese
And we actually have a relatively relevant question in terms of just representation. If on media portrayals especially regarding LGBTQ disability, and here, it was police, it's something that can definitely cause implicit bias, how can we best combat negative reinforcement? Calvin, do you want to go ahead and take this?
Calvin Lai
Yeah, sure. Um, so a lot of my particular a lot of my earlier research, look to see the what the kind of power of these media portrayals are. And this is somewhat like interesting paradox where -- or at least interesting paradox to me—where, you know, if you if you have a particular media portrayal, that's either stereotypical, kind of stereotypical, right that like, defies your stereotypes in some ways, those can be incredibly powerful at changing your implicit biases. I can sit you down for five minutes and cut your implicit racial biases in half. But if you check back with that same person 24 or 48 hours later, it seems to bounce back to baseline, suggesting that, you know, these meaningful changes are having a -- can have a lot of effect on a short term basis.
But that these implicit biases are also really hard to change in the sense that they're quite resilient, that they bounce back a lot. Another layer of this kind of paradox is that, although it looks like media portrayals might not be having that much long-term impact, what we have seen, at least at the kind of cultural level, is that many forms of implicit bias, whether it be on the basis of race, or gender, or other social categories, have been kind of gradually declining over time, a little bit slower than the kind of corresponding explicit prejudices, but they are declining.
And presumably, what might be going on is that for any given media portrayal or media experience that someone might have, right, like watching a really great movie, or not so great one, it's gonna have moved the needle, just the tiniest bit almost in ways that are probably not so perceptible to social scientists. But when you have hundreds of them, thousands of them, tens of thousands of experiences over a long period of time, that can accumulate into what we see as these kind of relatively stable, implicit biases. And that's going to be especially true for stigmatized groups that people have relatively little experience with, right?
You know, if you're in a place that's relatively integrated, racially, right, those media experiences are gonna matter a lot, are gonna matter a lot less. But if you're in a place where say, here in St. Louis, where about 2% of where I live is Asian American, right? Oftentimes, most of how people are responding to me is based on what they've learned through media, not through direct experience with folks that are Asian American. So that's another way you're in terms of thinking about media portrayal.
April Siese
Thank you, I really appreciate it. If you're comfortable, I guess sharing a little bit more about your experience with implicit bias from an intersectional perspective, I'm going to go to all panelists on this. Because I know my experience is very different from anyone else's experience. It's a very unique thing, even as you say, just based on location, like I'm in a majority Black city in New Orleans. St. Louis would be a very, very different feel. If you want to continue, Dr. Lai.
Calvin Lai
Oh --
April Siese
Sorry. I'm trying to make it conversational. It might be too conversational. Oh, yeah.
Calvin Lai
I mean, yeah. And I think like, also, especially, you can't really see on Zoom. And I don't really want to stand up right now because I'm wearing shorts. But like, I'm also really short. And I've always like been a little bit baby-faced. And so, you know, to this day, like almost every cab driver like thinks that like, I'm a student at Washington University. I'm 33 years old, just for the record. And so like, I think that you can kind of think about how, you know, some of these things can really compound each other. Right? You know, looking young. You know, being Asian American, like all these things can sometimes compound some of these stereotypes in many different ways. But yeah, so I think that's just like one example, top of my head. I don't know if other folks want to kind of talk about some of their experiences that cross intersectional lines.
April Siese
Yeah, Dr. Ivy, if I could call on you, followed by Keith.
Ivuoma Onyeador
Sure. Um, I also look kind of young, but I'm the same age as Calvin. But I teach MBAs, so MBAs tend to be a little bit older. So during when I was teaching in the fall, I had my students doing an activity and I came out to eat breakfast quickly to, you know, feel myself for the rest of the teaching. And this woman came up to me and she's like, 'Are you running late for class?' And I said, 'What do you--?' I was so confused, because she came with a lot of hostility. And so that alone was just bizarre. So I'm like, 'what?' And she's like, 'already late for class.' And I was like, 'No, I'm--' and then I understood that she thought I was a student, like, not in class, I guess.
But either way, even if I wasn't like, the MBAs are paying tens of thousands of dollars, if they don't want to go to class, like, it's fine. It was like really bizarre that she was like, really policing in that way. But we've seen all the videos like people have that energy. Yeah, I had to, I was like, 'No, I'm a professor,' or caught my classes doing an activity. So I'm out here eating. And it felt it was just frustrating to even have to explain that I'm eating and period. And she then was like, 'Oh, well, what class are you teaching? And What room are you in?' And it was very like, 'again, man,' like, it actually doesn't matter. What class or me you're not, you know.
And so I get that a lot. I don't mind. Sometimes the students think I'm a fellow student, as well. And they're kind of like, 'who are you? We haven't seen you around my blocks,' students are excited to see Black professors. So. But yeah, just being questioned like that, I'm trying to, like think, prepare and like, come out. And being assumed to be a student, it's not like the worst thing in the world are being assumed to be different, you know, different staff, or whatever. But it certainly takes energy.
The other thing I'll say, again, I giving examples of implicit bias feels hard. But the other side of this is that I started my job in 2020. So this is in the midst of the racial uprisings and reckoning that was happening. And so I hadn't even really started my job or moved into my condo or anything like that. And people are like, 'Dear Dr. Onyeador, can you come and help us solve racism at the company,' or whatever? And I'm like, 'No, I can't do that.' If I could, I'd be rich, and I also wouldn't be doing it.
So. So I think, and then I was asked to be like, on editorial boards in my first year, people like, because there's such a dearth of women of color, or people of color. In these positions, those of us who have like, overcome all these obstacles to get to where we are, then are inundated with a number of requests. And so that, again, none of that, that those kinds of things helped me keep my job, or helped me attain tenure, I think some of them are important. So I do try to do some of them. But that's a way in which the structure that makes it so that more people like me aren't in these positions, then puts all these burdens on me as one of the few who is here, and then makes it less likely that I'll even be able to persist. And so I think in all in various industries that are competitive, or high status, those same dynamics are at play where the people of color who are marginalized and underrepresented when everyone finally is like, 'Oh, shoot, this is not good. You guys come and fix it.' But that's on top of your job, you're not compensated often. And so I like to encourage organizations to ensure that they're compensating their employees who engage in this diversity work. The because it's beyond their—generally beyond their job description.
Keith Maddox
I would honestly just, I mean, just to add to that point, before I answer, the question is, I mean, we have to build allies. Like this can't be done if you have organizations that are, you know, that have literally under representations of the people that you put all the work and the burden on to do this work. It's not going to get done. So as I think actually, what he's describing is probably something that's contributed to my own career trajectory, in the sense that it's been a successful trajectory, but it's been sort of like a flat trajectory.
So I was, I got tenure after sort of the probationary period, about seven years, six, seven years, but then I just became a full professor this year. And so there was another 20, or sorry, 14, 15 years, between getting tenure and becoming a full professor, it might be longer than that. I think I'm sort of trying to make it sound shorter. But the idea is that a lot of the work that again, that people sort of have expectations around equity and inclusion. Before 2020, that work wasn't really valued and it wasn't compensated.
And when you are a person that just looks like me in a place where I'm relatively rare, and again, where it has identities that are underrepresented compared to others. You're ended up focusing on doing a lot of work. that'll a lot of it is beneficial because you are called on to sort of help and benefit other people who look like you to kind of help them to get through the organization. But if you spend all your time doing that, you're not going to be able to do your job for very long, at least in the context of academia. So you have to sort of decide what you're going to do what you're not going to do, you have to say no to some people, and take some time. But all the work that you do in that way, isn't rewarded in the same sense with respect to career trajectory.
So as it was mentioned, the kinds of things that are going to get you tenure, the things that are going to get you promoted to sort of associate in full professor, those efforts are not valued to the point where that trajectory now the extent to which I did all that stuff, kept me from getting to a point where I could sort of build up a resume that had to, but included some of the things that people do, in fact, value. So I think a lot part of this is changing what people value, right, recognizing and understanding that this equity work that people are doing is important. It's integral to organizations in terms of, you know, from a social justice perspective, but also, not that it's the primary motivation. But it's also there's a business case for it as well, in a lot of contexts. So the extent to which you can align those motives, the social justice motive with the business motive, that's great, but for the most part, that social justice motive has to be overriding, because it's better for our society overall in the long term.
And I think that's one of the biggest challenges in terms of dealing with organizations trying to get them to see that they have to invest in getting some of the equity around this. And that means not only investing in the people who you know, who may be underrepresented in our organization, but also making sure that they empower opportunities for people who don't look like me, people who are in the majority, to also take on a lot of the burden a lot of the work. So that can make all of our jobs a lot easier to transition into.
I mean, this is I guess it's funny, it's, I consider it a kind of a light-hearted example. But I can imagine it could be impactful for some people, but I am a little older now. But when I was younger, not too much younger, I had dreadlocks, so I just recently cut my hair probably two, three years ago. And I had this experience where I would, let's say, be in an airport. And I usually dress down when I'm in airports. So I'm wearing a sweatshirt or something like that. And I'd always get—not always, but more often than not, I remember getting asked whether or not I played football. And in part, this is because I'm probably wearing a college sweatshirt. And one of the sweatshirts I had actually is a Michigan football sweatshirt.
But I thought that there was sort of this combination of being a relatively young but not really young Black man having dreadlocks wearing this football shirt, all people put all of that together and make some assumptions. And I think the thing that I found that was sort of striking about that is that, you know, as Calvin sort of alluded to, I'm not a big guy, I'm five foot nine, I'm, you know, I'm a little chubby, but not at all, like a football player. So I'm always asking people, I mean, I know there are football players who are five-nine, but they look very different than I do. And so I think there was sort of this intersection between this expectation of what people were seeing in the media in terms of a dreadlocked Black man, the football shirt, put all that together and made this quick little assumption. And, again, it was a mistake, so it wasn't hurtful for me. In fact, sometimes I was a little flattered.
But again, it goes against the point. But you're right, this, there's the nature of the ways in which these sorts of ideas all sort of come together. And people make these quick judgments without really, really thinking. And what we need to do is to try to get people to focus a little bit more on not necessarily speaking off the cuff, not using those assumptions to guide their judgments, but interrogated with assumptions to some extent, and being putting them into context where they can have the opportunity to make more informed judgments before they start, you know, interacting and talking to other people.
April Siese
We are getting closer to the end of our formal panel, but we have a great question. Just sort of slide into the Q&A period. Dr. Ivy, Keith, I think what y'all said really resonated for folks who are watching. Our question is about the real world impacts implicit bias has on career growth or person's long-term economic growth. If you're with anyone on the panel, if y'all want to discuss that.
Ivuoma Onyeador
Have lots of thoughts about that, actually, again, I just started my career a couple years ago, I moved to Chicago bought a condo in a nice area of Chicago called Lincoln Park, which is not very diverse, and I didn't fully realize that I visited right before the pandemic and I saw different types of people there. But then when I moved there, I realize that there are barely people with brown hair who lives in Lincoln Park. Apparently it sounds very conspicuous, kind of like walking around. And then my neighbor is also, I think, you know, it's really hard actually to figure out what is about implicit bias. ‘What about these people being assholes?’ Oh, sorry. Are they took the whole thing swiftly. I'm so sorry, but I most descriptive term for these folk. So essentially, I mean, these people were like, hated each other. They like, yeah, I don't need to go into that group therapy session. So I'll stop.
But, um, I had to sell my condo, and move, and I'm renting now. So that is actually directly impacting my ability to sort of like build equity, build wealth for my family, and all that those kinds of things. It's very, it was very intense to, to have that experience. I study these things in a sort of abstract kind of way, I think about this all the time, but to literally kind of be run out of a segregated neighborhood. And 2021 2020 2021 was a really surreal experience. And, like, literally, these people were really kind of hostile to me, like, as I was in the park, like working out, people are staring. And not, I mean, obviously, no black people in the neighborhood. So I'm obviously new to the neighborhood, it would be easy to be like, obviously, you're new to the neighborhood, like, welcome, what's up or whatever. But there was none of that. I was just kind of like, ‘What are you doing here?’
And so, you know, we're talking about implicit biases. But this was a very, this is very hostile. And maybe they don't know that they're being hostile to me in particular, I don't know. But it wasn't like, they thought they were being friendly. And they weren't, you know, and so that was very stressful for me, I had to move in the dead of winter in the middle of our conference, and I had a really hard time trying to find a place. And all of that is impacting my ability to complete my work. And so I think, when we have these discussions, I mean, that's almost it's not minor, but people are, you know, especially during the pandemic that had disproportionate consequences for a different community. So people were losing loved ones, people were, you know, our caregivers and things like that. There's all this stuff going on, sort of outside of the workplace.
And if you don't have a social media, a family network that can sort of spot you, or who doesn't need any help, then that's going to impact your work. And you know, we're in a meritocracy, you're still compared to people who come from generations of privilege and things like that. And we kind of just talk about racial privilege or white privilege, but the economic and class-based privilege, that that shapes, the opportunities and the resources that we have to do the same work. We don't I think we don't talk enough about that. So I can honestly go on rants and things like that I'm gonna, I'm gonna keep it tight.
But you know, I have to ask for extra time on my tenure clock, in part because I spent literally a year, you know, dealing with an A Nazi safe or not healthy home environment. And I have a lot of class privilege now in this job, and still the racial dynamics that didn't that money, money didn't protect me. I thought, you know, I was like, okay, cool. I can like, I can do what I need. And I can address some certain things. But still, and perhaps even because I was a black woman and single black woman able to buy in this neighborhood by myself. I think my neighbors were like, you know, not they weren't happy about that. So did they know, I don't know. But it doesn't matter, because I still was dealing with like, they're kind of saltiness and things like that. So those are, those are some thoughts, I have stories for days, I can continue. But I'll stop there.
Keith Maddox
I was going to add the, you know, the hearts with respect to implicit bias, people don't at least psychologists don't talk about these things as being as similar. But there's another concept called attributional ambiguity in psychology and social psychology, which sort of relates to what we were talking about before, this idea that you don't always know how people are treating you and whether it's motivated by characteristics that you have, or characteristics that are surface characteristics, their own bias or prejudice their own racism.
And so oftentimes, that that ambiguity is something that that people who have multiple sort of potential category dimensions like some that might be based on racism, or might be based on some kind of bias, versus their own personal qualities and characteristics. If you can't tell, then it's hard for you to sort of know how other people are treating you. And if that's the case, it's hard for you to kind of get really valid and accurate feedback about what you can do. So when you're sort of getting feedback from people, if it's based on bias, you never really find out anything about yourself. And if you're attributing it to bias then it means that you discount a lot of different kinds of feedback. And oftentimes people will use that situation to say I can't, I can't achieve in this domain, I need to go into something else. So that's the kind of bias that again, it's contributing people's biases, right are sort of sometimes implicit, sometimes explicit. But those implicit biases are the situations that are so ambiguous for most of us that it's hard for us to sort of know whether or not someone's like treatment of us is really valid, that we should listen to it and use it to get better.
Or if it's based on some kind of bias, and if we just leave the fields where we feel like we're not getting treated well, that we're not getting accurate feedback, it makes sense for us. But sometimes maybe we shouldn't leave those fields, maybe the kind of feedback that we're getting isn't necessarily about our own aptitude. Maybe it's about other people's biases. So it's sort of, it's a conundrum, because you can imagine that if you're getting feedback, and it's true, that you shouldn't be in this field, then maybe that's a good reason to leave. But if you're getting feedback that's based on bias that makes you leave the field, then that may not necessarily be the case. So I think a lot of it has to do with this idea that we want to change the nature in which people sort of act towards others, so that the kind of feedback they're getting with from others, is something that they can look at as being valid.
And I think, to the extent to which you belong to an organization where you feel, and again, organizations have lots of work to do in this domain. But if you feel like that organization is putting a good faith effort into building infrastructures that are going to mitigate the kinds of biases that could impact your behavior, your expression, your performance, then you can feel a little bit more comfortable that you can be yourself in that organization, that the feedback you get is about you and not about other people's thoughts and ideas about you.
And then that's, I think, a situation that people want to be in, right, it's a way in which you can start to develop your own sense of self-efficacy, and build a career. So I think, you know, to get to this, like the implicit biases, it impacts how other people treat you. But it can also sort of get in your own head and make you start to interpret behavior that you're seeing from other people in ways that may not necessarily be reflective of what's actually going on. And that can make you make the snakes or make you make decisions, let's just put it that way, in terms of your career trajectory, they're gonna have implications that may not necessarily may not necessarily be reflective of what your own aptitude is, what your own ability is.
Rex Wilde
And if I can just jump in, you know, when thinking about my own experience, in terms of career and how that has changed based on how my gender is perceived, I am someone who used to be on testosterone, who used to have a beard, and at that time was always being perceived as a man. And it was really interesting to see the ways in which me showing up in a corporate space changed significantly, in terms of how I was paid attention to how my ideas were taking more taken more seriously, and how I was in general, less questioned. One specific example of this is when I would bring an idea to—to the table in a meeting, someone would always say, ‘Oh, Rex had a great idea, let's listen to them,’ and would share this idea, whereas I have noticed prior to that, and now where I am more often perceived as a woman, that when I bring an idea to the table, it is more likely or it happens more frequently, that someone will say, will listen to an idea that I have, and then express it as if it is actually their own idea and not give me credit for the original idea.
And so it's interesting to have seen that shift happen, as my gender is perceived differently in different environments. Now, the other thing that I want to say in terms of career trajectory, especially around trans folks, is we see, you know, especially trans women of color, having the most amount of barriers in the trans community of folks who are getting into workplaces and being able to create wealth, and have long term career trajectories. And one of the nuances within that is that there's a history of trans women of color, especially being forced or choosing to participate in sex work as a career because of the potential that it gives around economic opportunity, because of the gatekeeping that happens specifically against trans women of color, when trying to find careers and jobs and corporate environment. And so in looking at this history, and the history that we've seen around trans folks, and especially trans women of color in sex work, one of the things that we are seeing now is how that can also impact someone's ability to apply for and be chosen for a job once they choose to transition careers from sex work into a new opportunity.
And so the other thing about folks who participate in sex work is the higher likelihood of things like incarceration. And so if they have been incarcerated, and there aren't tools, such as folks who are banning the box now, where they don't have to say if they had been convicted of a felony, things like that, when it does have to be disclosed that they, you know, there is a felony on their record, for example, which may or may not be legitimate, based on whatever that experience was.
That is something that is also impacting folks ability just to get a job in general. And so what research is showing is just this huge economic disparity around trans folks and various forms of discrimination, both based on gender, gender, but also from intersectional perspectives that are causing barriers for folks to even just get their foot in the dor in the first place. And so I think there's so much more to be said around the nuances of how that plays out in the trans and in the queer community. But just to give a few examples and to name that
April Siese
And we are at time for the panel itself. We're gonna stop recording and get into our Q&A section. We already have some