A recent study, published by the Yale Child Study Center, investigating early educators’ implicit biases regarding gender and race, highlighted how racial bias relates to behavior expectations and preschool expulsions/suspensions.
Implicit bias refers to the automatic and unconscious stereotypes that drive people to behave and make decisions in certain ways.
This study examined a teacher’s potential implicit bias as one viable explanation for the disparities in preschool expulsions — specifically the documented disproportionate expulsion of African-American boys.
A 2012 report, from the American Psychological Association’s Task Force on Preventing Discrimination and Promoting Diversity, found that biases – including implicit biases – are pervasive across individuals and institutions, stating, “Although the behaviors of children may impact adult decision-making processes, implicit biases about sex and race may influence how those behaviors are perceived and how they are addressed, creating a vicious cycle over time exacerbating inequalities.”
In the study, consisting of preschool teachers and early childhood student teachers who had been recruited at a large annual conference of education professionals, 132 participants performed two tasks:
Eye tracking study: participants watched a video of preschoolers and their eye gazes were tracked. They were first primed to expect challenging behaviors, although none were present. The videos, which were balanced by sex and race, showed children engaging in typical activities.
Vignette study: participants read a standardized vignette of a preschooler with challenging behavior and were randomized to receive the vignette with a child’s name implying the student to be either a African-American or Caucasian, boy or girl. They were also randomized to receive the vignette with, or without, background information on the child’s family environment.
The findings revealed that when expecting challenging behaviors, teachers gazed longer at black children — especially boys. Findings also suggested that implicit biases may differ depending on the teacher’s race.
Providing family background information resulted in lowered severity ratings when the teacher’s and child’s race matched, but resulted in increased severity ratings when their race did not match. No differences were found regarding recommendations for suspension or expulsion, except that African-American teachers tended to recommended longer periods of disciplinary exclusion (regardless of child gender/race).
The tendencies to view child behaviors differently based on race may be a manifestation of our society’s generalized implicit biases regarding race and criminal/delinquent behavior.
This study highlights how a teacher’s implicit biases has the potential to contribute to the well-documented racial disparities in school readiness and subsequent educational achievement and opportunities.
But, as noted in the study, implicit biases may be reduced through interventions designed to either address biases directly or to increase teachers’ empathy for children.
It was recommended that a serious consideration should be given to evidence-based, bias-reducing interventions. These interventions could serve as a core component of pre-service and ongoing in-service early childhood teacher training, as well as improved home to school collaboration and parental involvement.
The study concluded that further research was in order, exploring the potential effects of better home-preschool connections and the impact of an educator’s emotional connection to the families they serve.
What can we, as citizens and parents, do with this information on teacher’s bias?
This particular study highlights the biases of early childhood educators, but we as citizens can use this information as motivation to be part of the solution by acknowledging, reflecting and taking action addressing our own implicit biases.
Take an implicit bias test HERE.
Further reading:
Understanding Implicit Bias
Understanding Implicit Bias | American Federation of Teachers
4 ways you might display hidden bias every day
Across America, whites are biased and they don’t even know it
Check Your Blind Spot: Understanding Implicit Bias
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