Can Anti-bias Training Affect Diverging Public Attitudes on Racialized Topics?

• In Event: Understanding the Determinants of White Americans' Racial Attitudes

Abstract

Longstanding evidence suggests that Black Americans receive unequal treatment in the criminal justice system. One explanation for this disparity posits that juries may be allowing racial biases to influence their decisions. To combat this potential, some courts have begun to instruct jurors to consider biases they may have and to counteract those biases when deliberating. Yet little work has formally studied the efficacy of these efforts, and results from corporate anti-bias efforts suggest that such messages have small effects on the biases people hold.

The current study examines both whether juror anti-bias instructions reduce bias and whether they can encourage respondents to consider individual cases without relying on their biases. To accomplish this, we conducted a preregistered survey experiment on a broad national sample of Americans (N~2000) where individuals were exposed to jury instructions before they were asked to evaluate statements about a fictitious officer-involved shooting. After answering a series of questions about racial beliefs, respondents were randomly assigned to one of three sets of jury instructions, ranging from ones that did not mention racial biases to ones that highlighted not only the existence of biases, but also encouraged an active suppression of those biases. Individuals then evaluated the scenario and answered questions about racial policy attitudes. We hypothesized that individuals shown videos that paired discussions of racial bias with strategies for recognizing and suppressing those biases might not change their levels of bias, but would answer subsequent questions in ways that mitigated some of the effects of racial beliefs (Fazio, 1990). We find support both for skepticism about the effects of anti-bias training on bias levels and for optimism about training’s ability to enable jurors to reach less prejudicial conclusions. We discuss the implications both for courtrooms and for shaping public opinion on racialized issues more generally.

Authors

• Brianna Zichettella, University of Michigan

• Josh Pasek, University of Michigan

• Hakeem Jerome Jefferson, Stanford University

• Fabian Guy Neuner, Arizona State University