Make It A Habit: Try To Recognize and Reduce Your Bias

We all have biases — being human means being biased. If we’re not careful, though, our biases can amplify our divides by making us filter events and behaviors through an us vs. them lens. Our biased views can lead us to have excessive contempt and disdain for people on the “other side.” And this can cause them to do the same to us. 

Here are some tips for reducing bias:

1. Understand we all have blind spots. When we see this as a natural thing and not something we can avoid, it helps us see our own biases more clearly and be more understanding of others’ biases.
2. Seek out other perspectives. One of the ways to reduce bias is by seeking out other thoughts on important or controversial topics. Sometimes we’ll learn our initial view was missing context. At the very least, we’ll have a better understanding of why others think what they do.
3. Avoid reacting immediately. Our biases are more likely to be a problem when we react quickly. And sometimes when we react immediately, we’ll feel a need to defend what we’ve said, even if we know it was biased or wrong. When we take our time and look into a situation, we’ll avoid these missteps and avoid unnecessarily adding to our divides. 

For more on removing bias, check out this post by Ad Fontes Media, an organization that analyzes media bias. They say: “To be human is to be biased toward something or another — we all come into each situation with our own different thoughts, perspectives, and life experiences… The fact that we…each have some bias doesn’t mean that we can’t try to mitigate and reduce bias.”