Presentation Type
Poster
Department
Psychology
Location
Walker Conference Center B
Description
We investigated whether racial bias and sadism levels affected participants' willingness to harm an innocent person. Participants completed a personality assessment mixed with ten sadism questions to reduce suspiciousness of what we were really measuring and competed with a fictional opponent, unbeknownst to the participant and randomly assigned to be black or white in a series of reaction time tests, followed by a punishment time, placing a hand in ice water for a number of seconds, decided by the winner of that round. There were four rounds in which the fictional opponent won the first round and assigned a punishment time of zero seconds, and the participant won rounds two, three, and four. The punishment times given by the participants were recorded and measured as the willingness to harm an innocent person. Participants facing a black opponent gave significantly higher punishment times than those who faced a white opponent. These results indicate that racial bias is still prevalent and can cause harm to those around us.
Creative Commons License
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Included in
The Effect of Sadism and Racism Levels on a Person's Willingness to Harm an Innocent Victem
Walker Conference Center B
We investigated whether racial bias and sadism levels affected participants' willingness to harm an innocent person. Participants completed a personality assessment mixed with ten sadism questions to reduce suspiciousness of what we were really measuring and competed with a fictional opponent, unbeknownst to the participant and randomly assigned to be black or white in a series of reaction time tests, followed by a punishment time, placing a hand in ice water for a number of seconds, decided by the winner of that round. There were four rounds in which the fictional opponent won the first round and assigned a punishment time of zero seconds, and the participant won rounds two, three, and four. The punishment times given by the participants were recorded and measured as the willingness to harm an innocent person. Participants facing a black opponent gave significantly higher punishment times than those who faced a white opponent. These results indicate that racial bias is still prevalent and can cause harm to those around us.
Comments
This poster was presented as part of the Research Methods course (PSYC 2063) taught by Dr. Allyson Phillips.