Time Spent with Media and Racial Bias
Implicit biases are an individual's unconsciously formed ideas about others that can determine the way one behaves in today's society. The reactions occur in a positive or negative manner. These biases may be based on what type of news sources people watch and what the news source is reporting. Depending on what type of news source one watched, the participants would have a higher preference towards European Americans compared to African Americans the Implicit Association Test (IAT) race test. The study was done at Westfield State University with 38 participants. Participants were required to fill out a survey on background information, such as their political affiliation and racial identity. Then the participants took the IAT test. A linear regression along with correlations were run to analyze the data. There was no correlation between news source and IAT score. There was also no significant correlation found between time spent engaging with media and IAT score. A significant positive correlation was found between age and IAT score. In the future study looking into the correlation on age and IAT score may be run to see what implicit biases other age groups may have and have a more diverse population.