World History: 1500 - 2001

Caro

Saturday, February 07, 2009

EXTRA CREDIT OPTION

Are you bias?

We have been talking about race in class. What is the psychology of racism? Are only some people racist? Are we ALL racist in some way? Visit the below links and participate in the demonstrations. Post your findings here! The deadline is Sunday at Midnight!

https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/

http://backhand.uchicago.edu/Center/ShooterEffect/

15 comments:

Crystal said...

"Little to no automatic preference between black and white people"

"Slight automatic association of European American with American and Asian American with Foreign compared to Asian American with American and European American with Foreign."

The IAT tests were very stumbling. Throughout, I felt like my fingers were moving on their own. I kept clicking the wrong button many times because my fingers had only gotten used to the"association" that they were supposed to be clicking for.

That shooter effect game was real stumbling too. My reaction is too slow for the results to mean anything.

Anyway: I think that everyone has some level of racism in them. Everyone has a bias because of their environment/culture that has shaped them growing up. But by no means does it force a person to accept or act on it.

Just my two cents.
Crystal Lor
Period 1

Anonymous said...

IAT tests:
"little or no association between Asian American and European American with American and Foreign."

"slight automatic preference for Straight People compared to Gay People."

and then i got halfway through the disability one before giving up because i kept hitting the wrong buttons. i honestly think that i got weird results because i got about half of them wrong every time. also, i think the results were stumbling. i don't really know what that means but i want to sound genuinely interested in this stuff like crystal does.

by the way, now i feel bad because apparently i prefer one kind of thing to another. thanks a bundle. (sarcasm)


shooter game:
Your Score: 25
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:579.64ms
Black Unarmed:657.88ms
White Armed:611.88ms
White Unarmed:624.44ms

i was kinda slow. i did well at the beginning, but towards the middle i shot practically everyone, i guess i was paranoid. once i realized i had a negative score i started paying attention again. while i was doing it i noticed that my eyes usually went directly to the person's hand, and the thing they were holding always seemed to look like a gun to me. i don't know if that had anything to do with my results, and i don't know if i looked at their skin color too without noticing it, i just thought it seemed hard to quickly decide if it was a gun or not.

also, in one of the pictures, the people are standing right in front of a bus or something, and i thought it was pretty funny.

basically, i think racism is kind of like a comfort zone. somehow people relate better or feel better around people that they think they can relate to or something like that.

sorry for not capitalizing anything, that's just how i roll.

Sarah Spangler
Period 1

Unknown said...

"Moderate automatic preference for Abled Persons compared to Disabled Persons."

"Little or no association between Male and Female with Career and Family."

The IAT was extremely frustrating. Just as you get used to the order in which the categories are presented, they would change. Sometimes, you end up responding to an old category’s position. However, it was interesting experience because consciously, I would think one thing, but then the results would sometimes show a different thing.

Your Score: 225
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:702.32ms
Black Unarmed:799.52ms
White Armed:660.24ms
White Unarmed:939.8ms

This game requires a lot of focus. If you slack for a moment, your responses become too slow. At first, when I saw the people with the wallets, I thought that they were stealing the wallet, so I shot them. It wasn’t until later that I realized those were the good guys.

I believe that racism exists in everybody. It is a shield that some use to protect themselves from the unknown and it is also caused by ignorance. Racism exists in everybody because there is no universal defintion that we all use, each person has a different view on the definition. One person could view their actions as not racist, while another person could interpret that same person's actions as racist.

Jessica Tran
1st period

Anonymous said...

"Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between African American and European American."

Man, that test was kind of intersting and weird. I messed up on a few though.

People are racist for their own personal reasons. I think it depends what kind of personality you have, what your environment or surroundings are like, and maybe past experiences too.

Here are the results from the shooting game:

Game Over
Your Score: 180
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:871.16ms
Black Unarmed:1005.96ms
White Armed:949.4ms
White Unarmed:962.64ms

That game was so surprising. I had trouble. I shot a few people in the beginning, but I got used to it after a while.

Lisa W.
Period 3.

Anonymous said...

IAT tests

"... slight automatic preference for European American compared to African American."

"... little or no association between European American and Asian American with American and Foreign."

"... little to no automatic preference between Gay People and Straight People."

Well that just confused my brain. The moment I thought I understood what button to click it would change and confuse me again. Then again I do think the results are pretty accurate.

We are all racist on some level but I do believe the culture we grow up in has an affect on it as well. I have several friends who are Asian, some that are gay too, for example. I'm not going to be racist against my friends, that doesn't really make sense.
Black people on the other hand, well we just don't have a whole lot of them up here in Oregon to be honest. The fact that I don't interact with them on a daily basis has an impact I believe.

Shooter Game

Your Score: 365
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:573.84ms
Black Unarmed:742.48ms
White Armed:677.12ms
White Unarmed:717.28ms

Once again I got confused by what buttons to push, at least this time they didn't change on me this time. It ended up being easier for me once I got into a rhythm and figured out which items were cellphones and which were guns since that caught me a couple times. Thank goodness for video games giving me a decent reaction time and ability to quickly scan the image.

Being racist is a natural thing. We want to be around people we enjoy, ones that are similar to ourselves. So since people are generally going to be attracted to people similar to ourselves it is only natural that we are slightly bias to people of our own race or culture, or share our ideas. When someone walks into a room a person's brain will instantly categorize them as someone to avoid or possible talk to even if we don't realize it.

Hope my ramblings make sense and sorry if I spelled something wrong.

Roxanne Raye
Period 1

Anonymous said...

Very "eye opening"

"a slight association of Native Am. with Foreign and White Am. with American compared to White Am. with Foreign and Native Am. with American."

-The majority scored similarly to me, probably because we don't interact with many Native American related things, and if we do, then

"no difference in your automatic preferences for White people vs. Black people"

- This was my favorite test. It was difficult recognizing faces between races. The buttons were difficult to adjust to, especially when the categories changed sides, but that is why they asked if your results also depended on which hand you were most used to.

"no difference in your automatic preferences for John McCain or Barack Obama"

"a moderate association of Male with Science and Female with Liberal Arts compared to Female with Science and Male with Liberal Arts."

-Males have usually been associated with both Sciences and Liberal Arts, but I guess recently females are more associated to the Arts. I always felt that males were better at both because there isn't much information on females in those fields compared to males.

Here are my Shooter scores:

Your Score: 335
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:598.92ms
Black Unarmed:580.68ms
White Armed:576.68ms
White Unarmed:611.52ms

Hmmm...According to the my reaction times and others that have posted, I am a little quicker overall. There should be a test for games relating to boys and girls.

These tests told me things about myself I never thought about before.

Justin Kim
Block 4

luangrath said...

"Strong automatic preference for John McCain over Barack Obama"

"Strong automatic preference for white people over black people"


No, that doesn't sound racist at all..
Dr Caro?!?!!?!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Nick Roché said...
well first of all here are my shooter scores:
Your Score: 525
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:658.8ms
Black Unarmed:790.08ms
White Armed:643.08ms
White Unarmed:688.52ms
After the first ten shooters/phone holders i got used to the buttons and found out that most of the items were held in the right hand, so i only looked there not at the face.
In the IAT test i did the opposite i looked at the face nothing else.
My good hang i coordination and reaction time helped me get good scores...

luangrath said...

Oh wait I'm not even in your class anymore. You should give me extra credit...but then transfer those points to Harris or Townzen's class.

Actually, I should just get a grade stimulus package.
780 billion points! Except it comes with a "Buy THS" clause...

Mr. Caro said...

Wow! Outstanding insights peoples! I am really impressed by some of the comments!

Ulysses see me in the AM for the Credit Transfer Form. It will have to be filled out in triplicate, stamped, stapled, faxed, certified, stepped on, slightly burned, and suffer a coffee stain. I need it ASAP. Let's make this happen.

luangrath said...

But President Caro, the "Buy THS" clause in the stimulus package needs to be softened so we can get approval from the Science dept! We also need to cut wasteful point spending in order to satisfy the frugal English dept!


Ugh. Bipartisanship/Multipartisanship is fo suckas..
We need a president who DOESN'T reach across the aisle OR listen to the United Nations, er, I mean the students at Tigard High. Why haven't we elected a pres like that?! I'm sure it would work out fine...

Mr. Caro said...

Hmm, these issues will have be dealt with by the "Points Transfer Committee" -- they will meet and report back to the district in October of 2012.

Rachel Bond said...

shooter game:

Game Over
Your Score: -175
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:743.48ms
Black Unarmed:1016.44ms
White Armed:744.84ms
White Unarmed:948.8ms

I didnt know what to do at first, but then I got the hang of it. Sometimes I would completely mix up the buttons, and press the key for "shoot" when I meant to press the key for "dont shoot." If I took it again, it would probably be more accurate. Some of my reactions for this one were slow, so I lost quite a few points.

J 'hugh said...

Ummm... here are my results-

Game Over
Your Score: -1435
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:1090.04ms
Black Unarmed:722.12ms
White Armed:693.92ms
White Unarmed:784.4ms
I don't really know what that means, but that test was hard. I was really slow.

Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between European American and African American.


Your data suggest little to no automatic preference between Straight People and Gay People.

So I am not racist. I think that everyone is a little racist, becasue of the news/media things. But I also think it is important to rememember that we are all people. Even if we grow up in enviorment with somewhat or very racist views doesn't mean we have to accept them. I, in fact, think we shouldn't.

Julie Mayhugh
Period 3

Anonymous said...

Game Over
Your Score: 625
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:621.96ms
Black Unarmed:704.88ms
White Armed:621.8ms
White Unarmed:664.12ms

Shaken not Stirred