Revealing Stereotypes: Evidence from Immigrants in Schools
Alberto Alesina, Michela Carlana, Eliana La Ferrara, Paolo Pinotti
American Economic Review · 2024 · Volume 114 · Issue 7
Abstract
We study how people change their behavior after being made aware of bias. Teachers in Italian schools give lower grades to immigrant students relative to natives of comparable ability. In two experiments, we reveal to teachers their own stereotypes, measured by an Implicit Association Test (IAT). In the first, we find that learning one's IAT before assigning grades reduces the native-immigrant grade gap. In the second, IAT disclosure and generic debiasing have similar average effects, but there is heterogeneity: teachers with stronger negative stereotypes do not respond to generic debiasing but change their behavior when informed about their own IAT.
Keywords
Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making, Education and Inequality, Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants, Non-labor Discrimination, Public Sector Labor Markets
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