Awareness Reduces Racial Bias

Devin G. Pope (), Joseph Price () and Justin Wolfers
Additional contact information
Devin G. Pope: University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637; National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
Joseph Price: National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138; Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah 84602

Management Science, 2018, vol. 64, issue 11, 4988-4995

Abstract: Can raising awareness of racial bias subsequently reduce that bias? We address this question by exploiting the widespread media attention highlighting racial bias among professional basketball referees that occurred in May 2007 following the release of an academic study. Using new data, we confirm that racial bias persisted in the years after the study’s original sample but prior to the media coverage. Subsequent to the media coverage, though, the bias disappeared. Several potential mechanisms may have produced this result, including voluntary behavior changes by individual referees, adjustments by players to new information, and changes in referee behavior due to institutional pressure. These results suggest a new kind of Hawthorne effect in which greater scrutiny of even subtle forms of bias can bring about meaningful change.

Keywords: behavioral economics; racial discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (26)

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https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2017.2901 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Awareness Reduces Racial Bias (2014)
Working Paper: Awareness Reduces Racial Bias (2014)
Working Paper: Awareness Reduces Racial Bias (2014)
Working Paper: Awareness Reduces Racial Bias (2013)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:64:y:2018:i:11:p:4988-4995

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