Definition and Meaning
Every person may have prejudices during their life – both negative and positive. These biases affect how people see the world, and many of them are conscious or explicit, but many unconscious or hidden biases affect our thoughts, decisions, and actions, while individuals are not aware of it. Prejudice refers to ideas and opinions that arise and strengthen throughout a person’s life through interactions with family and other people, as well as under the influence of the media, cultural phenomena, and historical concepts (Fiarman, 2016). Even everyday language and images prevalent in specific communities in which people live are carriers of prejudice.
In this regard, identifying and then overcoming unconscious biases is by no means an easy task. In other words, unconscious bias is feelings that individuals unwittingly experience and that influence our judgments about individuals or their groups in different areas of life, as opposed to a balanced, rational approach. Bias is often characterized as stereotypes about people based on the group to which they belong or based on invariable physical characteristics, such as gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation (Fiarman, 2016). Such a trait in human nature has harmful consequences in the real world since a person may not be aware of the fact that they have prejudices and biases in themselves.
Where Unconscious Biases Are Present
Unconscious biases can be found in many spheres and aspects of life. For example, they more often shape negative workplace behavior than open, conscious attitudes (Noon, 2018). It makes it easier to predict discriminatory hiring decisions, lack of trust in people outside the group, and hostile body language toward people outside the group. This happens even in cases where they are consciously tuned in to impartial communication.
The results of various studies show the presence of all different implicit stereotypes present in the workplace. It can be the dependence of salaries from gender and even hair color, bodyweight, the chances of being hired due to appearance, unusual names, and many other examples (Grogan, 2019; Madsen & Andrade, 2018).
The workplace is not the only sphere wherein implicit biases are present. The attention of the media to the phenomenon called AI bias has noticeably sharpened. In the same way that bias is manifested in humans, artificial intelligence can be biased at many different levels. Artificial intelligence bias tends to reflect the bias of the people who create it (Lee, 2018). Essentially, an algorithm is a sequence of instructions to solve a specific problem.
Artificial intelligence designers can introduce bias by setting some parameters and instructions when creating a particular algorithm. For example, if developers choose income level as a parameter in their algorithm, this could well lead to an outcome that makes racial bias (albeit unintentional) that could harm a particular minority group. Coded Bias (2020) is a documentary film that explores this topic. When MIT Media Lab researcher Joy Buolamwini discovered that an AI system for facial recognition could be biased against dark-skinned people and women, he began to study algorithms that violate human rights. Buolamvini concluded that AI is not neutral, and its distribution needs legislative and public control.
There are plenty of examples of implicit bias implementation in the criminal justice system. For instance, legal systems at both the national and international levels are firmly entrenched in unequal treatment of women. Some of the barriers to women’s access to justice are not due to gender but rather to the fact that women belong to marginalized groups of the population. They are particularly vulnerable to discrimination and most often do not have information about their rights and available remedies (Hetey & Eberhardt, 2018).
The justice system reflects the inherent imbalance of power in society, strengthening the privileges and defending the interests of an influential class whose particular position is based on wealth, ethnicity, race, religion, or gender. The law does not protect women who do not have equal rights and privileges with men to the same extent as men; however, several factors exclusively affect women. Moreover, of course, the criminal system is subject to the institutionalized, systemic racism that has permeated many justice structures. Hidden stereotypes in this regard lead to discriminatory or non-racial legal frameworks.
Impact on World Today
Harmful stereotypes contribute to inequality, even though they can be both hostile (for example, that women are unreasonable) and seemingly harmless (for example, women are called upon to bring up children). Complex implicit biases can have a disproportionately negative impact on specific groups of people, such as minority and indigenous people, people with disabilities, people with low economic status, migrants, and many others.
Unconscious biases reproduce and reinforce the existing inequality and social gaps between people, allowing privileged groups to remain in their places and denying opportunities and rights to discriminated groups. The formation of implicit stereotypes implies the practice of assigning specific properties, qualities, or roles to individuals only based on their belonging to a social group. In the first place, justice is evident when it leads to the violation or violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
References
Coded Bias. (2020). Netflix. Web.
Fiarman, S. E. (2016). Unconscious bias: When good intentions aren’t enough. Educational Leadership, 74(3), 10-15.
Grogan, K. E. (2019). How the entire scientific community can confront gender bias in the workplace. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 3(1), 3-6.
Hetey, R. C., & Eberhardt, J. L. (2018). The numbers don’t speak for themselves: Racial disparities and the persistence of inequality in the criminal justice system. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 27(3), 183-187.
Lee, N. T. (2018). Detecting racial bias in algorithms and machine learning. Journal of Information, Communication, and Ethics in Society, 16(3): 252-260. Web.
Madsen, S. R., & Andrade, M. S. (2018). Unconscious gender bias: Implications for women’s leadership development. Journal of Leadership Studies, 12(1), 62-67.
Noon, M. (2018). Pointless diversity training: Unconscious bias, new racism, and agency. Work, employment and society, 32(1), 198-209.