At the heart of the book Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People is a method called the Implicit Association Test (IAT) which was designed by Tony Greenwald to detect the hidden contents of the mind. Its original application was to explore the group-based preferences, stereotype, and identities that may not be accessible to conscious awareness. Since then, it has been used widely to study preferences, beliefs, and identity, and found applications in domains of health, education, business, government, the law and law enforcement. The test is currently available at 39 country sites, in 25 languages.
Tony and Mahzarin, with their colleague Brian Nosek, have been co-developers of the IAT, a method that transformed them and their research through the discoveries it permitted. In this book, evidence from their laboratories, and from the over 14 million completed tests at their website is made available to the general reader. The IAT technique, described in depth in Chapter 3 of the book has been available since 1998 at a website devoted to public education and research. Stand-alone tests are also available in the e-book version of Blindspot.
These demonstration tests are available at Harvard’s Project Implicit.
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Race (‘Black – White’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to distinguish faces of European and African origin. It indicates that most Americans have an automatic preference for white over black. | |
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Weapons (‘Weapons – Harmless Objects’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to recognize White and Black faces, and images of weapons or harmless objects. | |
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Weight (‘Fat – Thin’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to distinguish faces of people who are obese and people who are thin. It often reveals an automatic preference for thin people relative to fat people. | |
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Age (‘Young – Old’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to distinguish old from young faces. This test often indicates that Americans have automatic preference for young over old. | |
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Presidents (‘Presidential Popularity’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to recognize photos of Barack Obama and one or more previous presidents. | |
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Arab-Muslim (‘Arab Muslim – Other People’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to distinguish names that are likely to belong to Arab-Muslims versus people of other nationalities or religions. | |
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Gender – Science. This IAT often reveals a relative link between liberal arts and females and between science and males. | |
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Sexuality (‘Gay – Straight’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to distinguish words and symbols representing gay and straight people. It often reveals an automatic preference for straight relative to gay people. | |
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Skin-tone (‘Light Skin – Dark Skin’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to recognize light and dark-skinned faces. It often reveals an automatic preference for light-skin relative to dark-skin. | |
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Gender – Career. This IAT often reveals a relative link between family and females and between career and males. | |
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Native American (‘Native – White American’ IAT). This IAT requires the ability to recognize White and Native American faces in either classic or modern dress, and the names of places that are either American or Foreign in origin. |