The Hidden Game of Bias: How Prejudice Goes Viral Without Saying a Word
In the interest of providing multiple means of engaging with this blog, below is the podcast style conversation, using our AI friends Johnny and Joanne. This is a little deeper as it was taken from all my notes on the study. I have also done a voice over of the original blog, or below is the usual written format.
Think of bias like a virus that can spread without symptoms. Recent research has uncovered something fascinating: you don't need to hear stereotypes to adopt them. Simply watching how others behave can transmit their biases to you, even when they're trying not to be biased. Let's dive into how researchers proved this.
This explainer comes from the paper Transmission of societal stereotypes to individual-level prejudice through instrumental learning, Schultner et al., 2024
The Foundation: How Bias Takes Root
In the first four studies, the researchers explored how explicit stereotypes become internalised through what they call "instrumental learning" - learning through direct experience rather than being told what to think.
Participants played what seemed like a simple game: choose between partners from two groups to earn points. Before playing, they were given descriptions painting one group positively (wealthy, low crime rates, trustworthy) and another negatively (poor, high crime, untrustworthy). Here's the clever bit - while participants were told these stereotypes, the actual sharing rates between groups were identical.
The results were striking. Despite equal sharing rates, participants consistently:
Preferred partners from the "positive" group
Believed they saw differences in sharing rates that didn't exist
Maintained these preferences even when told the stereotypes were unreliable
Even removing wealth cues (due to this being a financial sharing game) from the stereotype descriptions didn't eliminate the bias.
The Transmission: How Bias Spreads Without Words
Here's where it gets really interesting. In Study 5, new participants watched others play the game. These observers never saw the original stereotype descriptions. They simply watched someone else (the "demonstrator") make choices and receive feedback.
The kicker? The observers developed the same biases as their demonstrators. It's like catching someone else's prejudice just by watching them play.
The Resilience: Why Good Intentions Aren't Enough
Studies 6 and 7 added a twist. Participants were explicitly told the stereotypes were unreliable and should be ignored. They even had to pass a quiz proving they understood this instruction.
The result? Even with explicit instructions to ignore stereotypes and conscious effort to be unbiased, participants still:
Showed preferences for the positively stereotyped group
Misperceived sharing rates to match their biases
Transmitted these biases to others through their behaviour
The Final Proof: Bias Goes Viral
Study 8 brought it all together. New observers watched the choices of participants from Study 7 - remember, these were the people explicitly trying not to be biased. Yet even their attempted unbiased behaviour transmitted bias to observers.
Think about that for a moment. Even when people actively try to suppress their biases, their behaviour still communicates prejudice to others who watch them.
Why This Matters in the Workplace
This research has profound implications for how we think about workplace bias:
1. The Observer Effect
Your managers or peers might be inadvertently teaching bias through their actions, even while preaching inclusion. Every time they:
Choose who to call on in meetings
Decide who gets challenging assignments
Select team members for projects
They're potentially transmitting their implicit biases to others.
2. The Limitations of Traditional Training
Simply telling people "don't be biased" or "ignore stereotypes" isn't effective because:
Bias operates through instrumental learning, not just conscious thought
People can transmit bias even while trying to be unbiased
Observers pick up bias from behaviour, not just explicit statements
3. The Viral Nature of Workplace Culture
Just as a virus can spread through a population, bias can cascade through an organisation through:
New employees observing experienced staff
Junior staff mimicking senior leaders' decisions
Teams adopting unspoken preferences in hiring and promotion
Moving Forward: A New Approach
Understanding bias as a transmissible phenomenon suggests we need to:
Focus on systemic changes that create equity, knowing there is inequality
Measure outcomes rather than intentions
Pay attention to behavioural patterns, not just explicit policies
Fight instrumental learning with instrumental learning. Amplify counter stereotypes such as males on paternity leave.
Perhaps most importantly, we need to recognise that good intentions aren't enough. Like a virus, bias doesn't care if you believe in it or not - it spreads through behaviour, not belief.
The challenge isn't just to change minds, but to change the very mechanisms through which bias reproduces itself in our organisations. That means looking beyond traditional training to create systems and structures that interrupt the transmission of bias, even when we can't see it happening.
After all, you can't fight what you can't see - but now we know where to look.
Schultner, D. T., Stillerman, B. S., Lindström, B. R., Hackel, L. M., Hagen, D. R., Jostmann, N. B., & Amodio, D. M. (2024). Transmission of societal stereotypes to individual-level prejudice through instrumental learning. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 121(45). https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2414518121