22 Biases: Can I get rid of them?

People will often ask – Can I get rid of my biases? No, you can’t! It’s impossible for anyone to truly eliminate their cognitive or unconscious biases – it’s just how the human brain works. Research has shown that we all hold biases – even people who may consider themselves objective researchers are not free from bias (Staats et. al. 2015). While we may not be able to completely eliminate our biases, we can all take steps to address and minimize the impacts of our biases in our decision-making.

The first step is to understand how cognitive biases are showing up in your decision-making. The Implicit Association Test designed by researchers at the University of Washington, University of Virginia, Harvard University, and Yale University, is a useful tool to identify some of your biases. You could consider asking members of your team to complete the IAT as well to better understand the biases within your research team. The outcome of these tests, presented in the abstract, can serve as a discussion tool for building awareness of these biases and provide direction about the assumptions the team might be holding about research practices or the topic of research, depending on the scope and area of focus for the group.

Click on the link and take a test:

 https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/user/demo.canada/ca.static/takeatest.html 

Mitigating biases

Once we understand how our cognitive biases show up in decision-making, we can use strategies to hold ourselves accountable and limit the impacts of our biases. In the “Unconscious bias training module” module provided by the Canada Research Chairs Program, we learn that mitigating biases requires some effort to disrupt these assumptions, which can include active reflection and practicing inclusive behaviours. The impact of these actions can benefit the members of the research team and the culture within which you work together.

Here are some of the ways to mitigate bias:

• Stereotype Replacement – Actively replace a stereotype you hold with accurate information
• Positive Counterstereotype Imaging – Actively picture someone (especially someone you know) who challenges the stereotype role
• Perspective Taking – Actively consider how someone in a stereotyped group (especially if it is within your discipline or field of study) might understand or approach to a specific topic, and/or set of research questions, or even methods used in the research project
• Individuation – Actively use specific applicant information to interrupt traditional stereotypes and assumptions when making decisions or assessing applicants’ quality, relevance, and/or competence.