Unlearning bias works through vigilant, repeatable acts of catching automatic judgments
Evidence
The Prejudice Lab had helped train her to catch it, though, and she could catch it again. Her commitment to do so demonstrates the vigilance at the core of sustained attention: … Afterwards, I kept watching for that flutter, like a person with a net in hand waiting for a dragonfly. And I caught it, many times. Maybe this is the beginning of how my own prejudice ends. Watching for it. Catching it and holding it up to the light. Releasing it. Watching for it again. — Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing, 400
Categorization
- DEFINE: Concretizes the author’s definition of attention as an effortful, repeatable return rather than a passive holding — the ‘strain of attention’ Nordell’s net metaphor embodies.
- XREF: connects to: Bird augury works as a randomization device countering cognitive and copying biases — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 347; Redirecting attention to a biasing cue reduces or reverses the implicit effect it produces. — Anthony G. Greenwald and Mahzarin R. Banaji, Implicit Social Cognition: Attitudes,…, 241; Bias awareness alone does not change behavior and can backfire (+12 more)
- yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Bird augury works as a randomization device countering cognitive and copying biases — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 347; Redirecting attention to a biasing cue reduces or reverses the implicit effect it produces. — Anthony G. Greenwald and Mahzarin R. Banaji, Implicit Social Cognition: Attitudes,…, 241; Bias awareness alone does not change behavior and can backfire (+12 more)
Broader Connections
- Implicit bias operates below awareness and resists admission even when perceived
#complicates(0.75) — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 666