I’ve written quite a bit about bias in this blog. It is an important topic to me because I believe that people in HR and industrial psychology can be gatekeepers to a more fair society while improving organizational performance. Of course, bias in employment is merely an extension of what happens in the greater society. One of the assumptions about bias is that it is fairly stable so we have to almost trick people into being fair.
However, this study has some better news. Their analysis indicates that over a 20 year period bias against skin color and sexual orientation have been reduced. However, bias against weight has increased. Attitudes towards age and disability have stayed the same. Strangely, gender bias is not addressed.
The study raises many interesting questions about whether these changes are being experienced across demographic groups or only primarily within specific ones. However, it does provide some questions for HR practices, such as:
- What steps can we take to reduce bias in hiring based on weight? Phone interviews instead of live ones?
- Do we need to change our anti-discrimination training to focus more on weight and less on other issues?
The data does seem to point to those characteristics that we perceive as choices (being overweight) as having stronger biases than those that we have always perceived as innate (skin color) and those that the culture is now thinking of as such (sexual orientation).
Each organization can see where its implicit bias “blind spots” are by analyzing its hiring and promotional data. I understand that this can lead to some unkind truths. But, it will also allow for focus on areas where bias can be reduced.