These competing hypotheses lead to different recom-
mendations about how to effectively combat discrimina-
tion in businesses, universities, the military and other
organizations. If the dispersed discrimination account
is correct, then arguably everyone in a given organiza-
tion should undergo training to reduce implicit bias. If
the concentrated discrimination account is true, then
this type of training is unlikely to reduce discrimination
in the organization, and policies should target explicit
bias in a relatively small number of bad actors. A new
study published by social psychologists Mitchell Camp-
bell and Markus Brauer, both then at the University of
Wisconsin–Madison, tested these hypotheses through a
series of survey studies and field experiments involving
16,600 students at the university. The results over-
whelmingly supported the concentrated discrimination
account, challenging the view that the main problem is
implicit bias.
In the survey studies, the students answered questions
to measure their views on campus culture and their per-
ception of peers’ engagement in discriminatory conduct.
The field experiments took place on campus. In each, the
researchers observed students in a staged situation inter-
acting with a confederate (an actor following a script)
who was easily identifiable as belonging or not belong-
ing to a marginalized group. The question was whether
the students, who were unaware they were being ob-
served, spontaneously behaved in a positive manner
toward the confederate. For example, in the “door hold-
ing” experiment, a white or Black confederate followed
students as they entered a campus building. The “focal”
behavior, which both the confederate and an onlooking
researcher recorded, was holding the door. Other focal
behaviors examined were providing directions, helping
to pick up dropped note cards and choosing a seat on a
bus. In an additional set of field experiments, research-
ers responded to job ads, sending the contact person for
each job two résumés and cover letters: one with a pro-
totypically white name (for example, Cody Miller) and
the other with a name more typical for a particular mar-
ginalized group (for example, DeShawn Washington for
a Black candidate). The focal behaviors were the contact
person responding at all, requesting more information
or inviting the applicant for an interview.
Campbell and Brauer reasoned that if the dispersed
discrimination account was correct, marginalized stu-
dents would report having generally negative attitudes
about campus and peers, and much smaller percentages
of students would exhibit the positive focal behaviors
(holding the door, providing directions, and so on) when
interacting with a marginalized confederate. In contrast,
they reasoned that if the concentrated discrimination
account was correct, the results would be the opposite:
marginalized students would report generally positive
attitudes about campus climate and peers in the surveys,
and there would be small differences in the percentages
of students exhibiting the focal behaviors toward the two
types of confederates.
The survey results supported the concentrated dis-
crimination account. In one survey, white students were
more positive about campus climate than students of col-
or were. Students of color were still generally positive in
A
mericans are becoming more tolerant of people of different races,
ethnicities and sexual orientations, recent research indicates. Yet
discrimination toward people in marginalized groups persists at
disturbingly high levels. Scientists have proposed two hypotheses
to explain this apparent paradox. The dispersed discrimination
account holds that, because of implicit biases, most people—even
those who hold strong egalitarian beliefs—regularly engage in
subtle but still harmful acts of discrimination, albeit with little or
no awareness. The concentrated discrimination account counters
that a numerical minority of “bad actors”—highly and explicitly biased people—are
responsible for most discriminatory acts.
David Z. Hambrick is a professor in the department of
psychology at Michigan State University. His research
focuses on individual differences in cognition and the
development of expertise.
