Is It Really a Good Idea to Ask Students to Take the IIT Test?

Alexa and Yoel discuss the much trodden topic of implicit bias from a less trodden perspective: that of the general public. Offering insight into the public's views is a paper by Jeffrey Yen, Kevin Durrheim, and Romin Tafarodi, which explores public thinking about the implicit association test (IAT) through an examination of the New York Times comments section. These comments demonstrate varying reactions to the idea that negative associations with some identities - racial and otherwise - can bubble beneath the surface of our explicit attitudes. Some dismiss the IAT as "academic abstraction," while others see their scores as an opportunity for confession, or even absolution. Still others embrace the role of troll, a topic foreshadowed by our discussion of the proposed overhauling of New College of Florida.

Links:

• Two Psychologists Four Beers on Untappd
• 'I'm happy to own my implicit biases': Public encounters with the implicit association test - PubMed
• The Bias of Individuals (in Crowds): Why Implicit Bias Is Probably a Noisily Measured Individual-Level Construct - Paul Connor, Ellen R. K. Evers, 2020
• Project Implicit
• Opinion | DeSantis Allies Plot the Hostile Takeover of a Liberal College - The New York Times
• Pascal Comelade & Les Limiñanas - T.B. JerK +++ - YouTube