Rooted in Research: Implicit Bias

Key Takeaway: Implicit bias is well-documented. Ways to combat it are less clear.

The Findings

• Implicit biases are unintentional preferences that affect the decisions we make. We are not aware of these biases until we learn about them and reflect.

• These biases can be in many categories, such as age and gender, but race and ethnicity are the implicit biases talked about most. Implicit bias is one way that racial disparities in the criminal justice system are created, but it’s hard to know what proportion of disparities can be attributed to them.

• Implicit bias trainings have mixed results in terms of the ultimate goal of reducing disparities – in some cases increasing disparities.

Why It Matters (what’s the bottom line?)

• Better Public Safety: Racial disparities de-legitimize the public safety system and mean that individuals are not always getting the right sentence.

• Financial Impact: Under-sentencing more dangerous offenders costs money in additional crimes committed, and over-sentencing less dangerous offenders costs money in terms of unnecessary additional justice system costs.

• Policy Implication:

  • If you pursue a training for Implicit Bias, choose one that provides specific evidence that it reduces racial disparities.

  • Use data to track ways implicit bias might show up in your agency.

 Need More?

📄 Full Study: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/308926636_A_Meta-Analysis_of_Procedures_to_Change_Implicit_Measures

Data in Practice: Minimizing Implicit Bias in Your Agency

•  Implicit bias, unlike systemic bias, happens on an individual level. So this would require individual-level data on disparities in your agency.

• Consider some of the main outcomes. In a police agency, this might be % of interactions that result in an arrest. In community corrections, this might be % clients that get jail sanctions or that get revoked to prison. In a DA’s office, this might be the % of referred cases that result in a charge.

• Importantly, data on a single employee showing large disparities doesn’t necessarily mean they are the biggest offender of implicit bias. I recommend doing a blind review of the cases of the 10-20% of employees with the largest disparities (if you have a small office, you’ll need to do a larger % to get a good sample).

Work in motion: We’re looking for a site partner for an incentives study!

When I went to American Society of Criminology conference in San Francisco last November, one of the sessions I thought was most interesting focused on the current cutting edge research on incentives.

I was intrigued because in my spare time I’ve been learning about how incentives can have the most impact, using neuroscience and behavioral economics principles - and let me just say, I have many ideas for leveraging small adjustments in the way we use incentives to cultivate big improvements in client success.

I’m specifically thinking of a small-to-medium sized community corrections agency that is already using incentives. But I’d love to talk to anyone who is interested, even if that doesn’t describe your agency. Book a time here: calendly.com/annleymon