Reality check on racism

[bpp3]

For yucks, I tried the Japanese version of the test (click on flag at bottom), and scored a moderate preference for Japan over America. Well, ok, I guess it is lucky for me that I live here then... But I do think the order in which they present the training scenarios makes a big difference. (Also their unfortunate use of GWB to represent America, whom I consider to do no such thing... For Japan it was Koizumi, who while a relatively more likable guy, is no longer Prime Minister. I think my reactions would have been more negative were the current PM depicted.)

I also noticed a couple differences from the English version of the questionnaire:
1) For religion, the Japanese version has no option for "none," which I believe the English version did. The nearest option is "other."
2) For race, the options consist of Japanese, half-Japanese (3 varieties), and Other.

Somehow it seems the construction of the test itself seems to reveal something about the biases of the testers... or else about their notions of how their subjects should be expected to organize the world.

[ladelfina]

Yeesh. That's Harvard for you in a nutshell. Is it any wonder they managed to grind out an MBA for Bush? They are the absolute KINGS of self-justification and of the foregone conclusion. I worked with them for awhile so I know something whereof I speak.

bpp3.. being female I got mostly female gay images: two brides together plus rest-room-lady figures holding hands. I vaguely remember minor cameo appearances by 2 rest-room-guy figures, but distinctly do not recall two "grooms". I probably would have scored higher had not all of my mistakes come from thinking I saw a groom rather than a bride.. I was focused more on the heads/faces than the garb, but at that tiny size m/f features were less apparent.

Not sure how it helps them to weigh the test in this way, if it is weighted, since heteros (esp. men?) likely have differing inherent aversion levels to male homosexuality vs. female homosexuality.

Asking all your stats including gender came before the image/word test, as did the self-evaluation of "warmth towards" noted in my prev. post.

Also.. bpp3, that's wild about the photos (Bush=America? Koizumi=Japan?) Surprising they couldn't come up with less loaded pix.

CFB: right. It's hard to see how much the test measures mental flexibility/inflexibility versus true heartfelt tolerance/bigotry. One might say the latter flows from the former, but in that case why use "charged" words or images in the first place? Would anything random suffice instead?

I'm not even sure why they have you switch sides gay/straight. Do they factor in the aspect that, after n questions of a certain type, people are programmed to respond a certain way and then need to switch actions given the same stimuli? One would think the first response set, then, should be more reliable than the second. Or they should make the "sides" random as well.

Seems like a pretty badly-constructed survey and now I'm asking myself why I even bothered to write about it.. oh well. I think in hindsight there is more food for thought about how to construct a functioning survey and less about racism/sexism and so on.

[bright eyed]

i found that saying out loud - "good" "bad" "gay" "straight" helped me focus - and thus evened out my timing between the two sides - since i came up nearly even on all the tests...although i think they could be contributing to the trauma as you say out loud "good" "bad" with the affiliated issues!

[calmloki]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bright eyed i found that saying out loud - "good" "bad" "gay" "straight" helped me focus - and thus evened out my timing between the two sides - since i came up nearly even on all the tests...although i think they could be contributing to the trauma as you say out loud "good" "bad" with the affiliated issues!

Well, is the point to achieve the desired rating ("helped me focus") or to see what the inate prejudices are? Quite sure that going slowly would have given me a more desirous result, and I don't feel i'm as racist as the test scored me, but isn't that the point? The person who just doesn't get it probably IS prejudiced. I recognize that I'm not color blind though I try to compensate, so a racist result wasn't unexpected. Gaming the test, while interesting in itself, wasn't the point for me. And, uhm, just 'cause GWB slid out of Harvard doesn't mean the school is producing a high percentage of dolts. Might even think that they produce a higher level canny folk than most other schools. But that's just my prejudice.

Did NOT matriculate from Harvard