A document accompanying the Justice Department memo says that “even the most well-intentioned people experience some degree of implicit bias, the unconscious and often subtle associations we make between groups of people and stereotypes about those groups.”
“Implicit bias is, to some extent, a part of human nature and is not limited to law enforcement officers or attorneys. As the research shows, bias starts with our automatic tendency to categorize individuals: we employ mental shortcuts to make sense of the world and this process can involve categorizing people we do not know according to group membership. We then attribute to these individuals the stereotypes associated with their group. This does not require animus; it requires only knowledge of the stereotype,” it says.
However, individuals can reduce their implicit biases or mitigate their effects in part simply by acknowledging they exist, it says. Further, such biases “can be reduced through positive contact with stereotyped groups and through counter-stereotyping.”
“The implicit bias trainings will examine the unconscious and unintentional mental shortcuts that human can develop about a wide range of social and demographic groups. Among others, the training will consider issues of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as socioeconomic and professional status,” it says.
