The Reliability of Child-Friendly Race-Attitude Implicit Association Tests

Abstract

Implicit attitudes are evaluations that are made automatically, unconsciously, unintentionally, or without conscious and deliberative processing (Nosek et al., 2007; Gawronski and De Houwer, 2014). For the last two decades implicit measures have been developed and used to assess people’s attitudes and social cognition, with the most widely used measure being the Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald et al., 2003). This measure has been used extensively to assess racial biases and a number of studies have examined the reliability of the IAT when administered to adults (Cunningham et al., 2001; Gawronski, 2002; Greenwald et al., 2003; Nosek et al., 2005; Nosek and Smyth, 2007; Bar-Anan and Nosek, 2014). In recent years, the IAT has also been modified for use with children. Despite the potential of this measure to provide insight into the early emergence of implicit racial attitudes, little is known about the psychometric properties of these modified child-friendly IATs (Child-IATs). In the current research we examined the internal consistency of race-attitude Child-IATs when either reduced (Study 1) or traditional-length (Study 2) versions were administered to children (Studies 1 and 2) and adults (Study 2). We also examined the test–retest reliability of this measure with both child and adult participants (Study 2). We found that these measures demonstrate an internal consistency comparable to what has been seen in previous research with adults. In addition, the internal consistency of traditional-length Child-IATs completed in succession depended on the order in which they were completed; the first Child-IAT demonstrated higher internal consistency than the second for both children and adults (Study 2). Finally, we provide the first evidence that the test–retest reliability of the Child-IAT is comparable to what has been found previously with adults (Study 2). The implications of these findings for future research examining children’s implicit social cognition are discussed.

Examining Children's Implicit Racial Attitudes Using Exemplar and Category‐Based Measures

“…The order of the critical blocks and keys associated with the critical pairings were counterbalanced between participants. For our sample, α = .78, which is comparable to what has been found previously with children and adults (Williams & Steele, ). The implicit measures were completed in this order to prevent carryover effects of racial categorization (Degner & Wentura, ; Olson & Fazio, ).…”

An Exploration of the Differential Effects of Parents' Authoritarianism Dimensions on Pre-school Children's Epistemic, Existential, and Relational Needs

“…It has to be remarked that the IAT has been successfully used in several previous studies with preschool-aged children in relation to a wide-range of attitude objects (e.g., racial attitudes, gender attitudes, attitudes toward flowers and insects, attitudes toward minimal groups; e.g., Baron and Banaji, 2006; Cvencek et al, 2011; Dunham et al, 2011; see also Williams and Steele, 2016) suggesting that the IAT can actually measure significant aspects of children's implicit social cognition.…”

Implicit Bias Within Public Reporting: A Virtual Reality Experiment Examining “Suspicious” Activity

“…The IAT has been used in a variety of contexts (Andrews et al, 2010; Gattol et al, 2011; Williams & Steele, 2016) including to specifically measure biases against Arabs and/or Muslims (Agerström & Rooth’s, 2009; Park et al, 2007; Saleem & Anderson, 2013). For instance, Park et al (2007) found subjects demonstrated a preference for White over Arab-Muslim names, with open-ended questions indicating an association with terrorism and other violent characteristics.…”