Read Online Biased Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See Think and Do edition by Jennifer L Eberhardt Health Fitness Dieting eBooks

By Tanya Richards on Thursday, May 30, 2019

Read Online Biased Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See Think and Do edition by Jennifer L Eberhardt Health Fitness Dieting eBooks





Product details

  • File Size 6030 KB
  • Print Length 350 pages
  • Publisher Viking (March 26, 2019)
  • Publication Date March 26, 2019
  • Language English
  • ASIN B07DH89ZDY




Biased Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See Think and Do edition by Jennifer L Eberhardt Health Fitness Dieting eBooks Reviews


  • A book that will speak to your head, heart, and soul, written by Macarthur Genius Grant winner and Stanford psychology professor Jennifer Eberhardt. I don't think I will ever forget some of the stories she shared. And, despite being a researcher in this field, there are studies she describes which are either new to me or resonating in new ways through her explanations. Professor Eberhardt is a masterful writer and teacher, who somehow walks the tightrope of being both scientific and personal in her work. I feel very lucky to have seen an advance galley of this book and highly recommend this book.
  • Human psychology is both wonderful and confounding. Psychology was my first love in the social sciences. It was my undergraduate focus and the discipline in which I conducted my first professional-quality research. It still enraptures me today, and I can’t describe my excitement to finally be teaching psychology for the first time this fall. At the same time, studying the human mind at this level can be a sobering, morale-squashing endeavor. But it is never hopeless. Psychology will not always give you the answers, but as a science it can guide you in the right direction, slowly but surely. That makes psychology hopeful, even when surveying the darkest corners of the human condition.

    Jennifer L. Eberhardt, PhD captures this tension exquisitely in her new book (releasing tomorrow, March 26), Biased. She takes on the subject of bias in the context of police shootings and other instances of inherent bias in today’s culture. This means that the primary focus is on racial bias and stereotypes, and for good reason Eberhardt also has personal experience that speaks volumes on this subject. However, Eberhardt does not limit her study to racial bias but also offers examples and insight on gender bias as well. It is a comprehensive view of cognitive bias with a distinct focus.

    Eberhardt uses history in order to both portray racial bias and speak on the development of the field of cognitive bias research in the social sciences. She speaks in depth on Social Darwinism and other theories that feed on cognitive bias (subjects that need more direct discussion in our current era), and in order to situate the subject in its historical context she discusses the social scientist Walter Lippman at length. Lippman (who displayed a bit of bias himself throughout his career) was the first to apply the idea of “stereotyping” in the social sciences. Eberhardt quotes Lippman in order to help readers grasp the power of stereotypes

    “There is economy in stereotyping”, he wrote. “For the attempt to see all things freshly and in detail, rather than as types and generalities, is exhausting…. We are not equipped to deal with so much subtlety…. [W]e have to reconstruct it on a simpler model before we can manage with it.”
    We stereotype because we’re human and we cannot process data well. It’s simply easier to put things and people into “types and generalities” than it is to process everything separately. And, guess what, a lot of times we are right. But that’s what lulls us into complacency and makes us think our stereotypes are reliable. They are not. They are misleading, dangerous, and destructive. They lead us into bias.

    Racial biases seep into every aspect of our lives without our awareness. Eberhardt makes this clear in her original research and relays others’ as well. The following passage contains the most shocking (for me) revelation

    Researchers Max Weisbuch, Kristin Pauker, and Nalini Ambady chose eleven popular television shows that have positive representations of black characters — including CSI and Grey’s Anatomy, where black characters are doctors, police officers, and scientists. The researchers showed study participants ten-second clips of a variety of white characters interacting with the same black character, but with the sound muted and the black characters edited out of the frame. Participants who were unfamiliar with the shows were asked to watch a number of these clips and to rate how much each unseen character was liked and was being treated positively by the white characters on the screen. Sometimes the unseen character was black, and sometimes the unseen character was white. A consistent pattern emerged when the researchers pooled the ratings participants perceived the unseen black characters in these popular shows to be less liked and treated less positively by the other characters than the unseen white characters. The black characters were surrounded by a cast of white characters who — through their subtle facial expressions and body movements — communicated less regard for them. And the television viewers were affected by this The more negative the nonverbal actions directed at the unseen black characters, the more antiblack bias the study participants revealed on an implicit association test following the showing. That is, there was evidence for a type of “bias contagion.” The researchers found this to be the case even though the study participants were unable to identify any consistent pattern in treatment of the white and black characters when asked to do so directly.
    So where is the hope? Eberhardt devotes much of the book to this question. There are pathways out of bias, although none of them are sure. But there is most definitely hope. Her explorations of tech companies NextDoor and Airbnb share the problems that these giants encountered with respect to stereotyping and bias, but they also provide the solutions that NextDoor and Airbnb employed to successfully combat these issues. I won’t spoil the details of these success stories, but know that they provide hope.

    It also seems that exposure and discussion, in the right context, can cure some bias. This does not mean that bias will eventually go away as our world becomes more cosmopolitan. It does not mean we can sit back and wait it out. It means we need to work to provide the environment for such exposure and discussion to occur.

    It also means we need to be aware of the bias within ourselves and not think someone is attacking us when it is pointed out, directly or indirectly. I wanted to find a reason to reject the study about TV shows and racial bias, but I found that I couldn’t. Why did it bother me so much? Because if actors in TV shows can display racial bias without even thinking about it, then I could too. Anti-black bias isn’t even contained to white people either (a fact that becomes clear throughout Biased). It is something deeply ingrained in our culture, in our bones, in our unconscious thoughts. Awareness is the first step to dealing with it. Which is why you need to read this book. It haven’t seen or heard of a more coherent and complete discussion of bias. It could be the next classic book in modern cognitive and social psychology.

    I received this book as an eARC courtesy of Viking and NetGalley, but my opinions are my own.
  • Presentation was clear and compelling about the topic of implicit bias. This is a topic of particular importance to our current diverse society, enhancing our awareness of unconscious bias regarding gender and race and other differences. This was an important scholarly work but easily understood .
  • Jennifer Eberhardt is a genius!!! The way she used science to explain the relationship blacks & whites have was awe inspiring. I have never seen anyone break down where the feelings come from that black people feel & why everyone discounts them like she did. This one is going on the coffee table.
  • Over the past several months I've read a few books on racism.

    From a Christian perspective
    "The Gospel and Racial Reconciliation" Russell Moore and Andrew T. Walker
    "One Blood Parting words to the church on race" John. M. Perkins
    "From Every People and Nation A Biblical Theology of Race" J. Daniel Hays

    From a non-Christian perspective
    "Stamped from the Beginning" Ibram X. Kendi
    "White Fragility" by Robin DeAngelo
    "Biased Uncovering Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What we See, Think, and Do" Jennifer L. Eberhardt

    I really really enjoyed "Biased." If someone (white) came to me and asked where he should start reading on the issue of race, I would start him with "Biased."

    No one likes to be called a racist...so might I interest you in a little bit of biased? Guess what, you are prone to think better of people who look like you. Guess what, everyone else is too. This book does a great job of exposing deep-seated bias without coming across as demonizing people as being closeted Klan members.

    If you are at all interested or wondering about the race discussion in America, this is where I think you should start.
  • Let me save you some time and money. "All white people are racist and all black people are innocent and discriminated against any time they are arrested, pulled over or searched." There's the gist of the book. You're welcome.
    I was very disappointed to read the same stuff over again, it's never the black person's fault. Why do publishers keep publishing the same lies.
    I'm so glad I didn't pay for it.
    You might want to check the library to see if this book is for you, it's in the fiction section.