Publications

13 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

The Color of Private Equity: Quantifying the Bias Black Investors Face

Black venture capital and growth investors have a much harder time getting funding than white investors, because—despite efforts to bring more racial diversity to financial services—private equity’s gatekeepers remain mostly white,... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds; Financial Services

January 2013
Article

Not Just for Stereotyping Anymore: Racial Essentialism Reduces Domain-General Creativity

By: Carmit Tadmor, Melody Chao, Ying-yi Hong and Jeff Polzer

Individuals who believe that racial groups have fixed underlying essences use stereotypes more than do individuals who believe that racial categories are arbitrary and malleable social-political constructions. Would this essentialist mind-set also lead to less... View Details

Keywords: Prejudice and Bias; Creativity; Race

October 2024
Article

Racial Inequality in Organizations: A Systems Psychodynamic Perspective

By: Sanaz Mobasseri, William A. Kahn and Robin J. Ely

This paper uses systems psychodynamic concepts to develop theory about the persistence of racial inequality in U.S. organizations and to inform an approach for disrupting it. We treat White men as the dominant group and Black people as the archetypal subordinate group... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Race; Prejudice and Bias; Organizational Culture; Gender; Power and Influence; Employees; Attitudes

Purchase

18 Oct 2022
Research & Ideas

When Bias Creeps into AI, Managers Can Stop It by Asking the Right Questions

Most companies rely on artificial intelligence-based algorithms to make a wide variety of business decisions—from pinpointing the products customers prefer to determining which resumes should go to hiring managers. The problem for companies trying to advance View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

16 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

Why Technology Alone Can't Solve AI's Bias Problem

other strategies to achieve a better solution in the end.” You Might Also Like: When Bias Creeps into AI, Managers Can Stop It by Asking the Right Questions White Airbnb Hosts Earn More. Can AI Shrink the View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Technology

21 Feb 2023
Research & Ideas

What's Missing from the Racial Equity Dialogue?

highlight key considerations that aren’t at the forefront of today’s dialogue about racial discrimination and injustice. Here’s what they said: Broderick Turner: Anti-Black racism affects White people We do not connect the dots on how... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

July–August 2013
Article

The Costs of Racial 'Color Blindness'

By: Michael I. Norton and Evan P. Apfelbaum

The article looks at research on people's attitudes and behaviors with respect to noticing and referring to a person's race. It explains the 2013 study, in which participants played a "Guess Who?" style game of asking yes-or-no questions about a group of faces... View Details

Keywords: Prejudice and Bias; Behavior; Race; Attitudes

25 Jan 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Racial Discrimination in the Sharing Economy: Evidence from a Field Experiment

Keywords: by Benjamin G. Edelman, Michael Luca & Daniel Svirsky; Tourism; Travel; Technology

1993
Chapter

Mentoring and Irrationality: The Role of Racial Taboos

By: D. A. Thomas

Keywords: Training; Prejudice and Bias; Race; Perception

Forthcoming
Article

Racial Discrimination and the Social Contract: Evidence from U.S. Army Enlistment During WWII

By: Nancy Qian and Marco Tabellini

This paper documents that the Pearl Harbor attack triggered a sharp increase in volunteer enlistment rates of American men, the magnitude of the increase was smaller for Black men than for white men and the Black-white gap was larger in counties with higher levels of... View Details

Keywords: State Capacity; Institutions; War; History; Race; Prejudice and Bias; Government Administration

12 Oct 2022
Research & Ideas

When Design Enables Discrimination: Learning from Anti-Asian Bias on Airbnb

society, it’s not my problem.’ It is your problem as a leader. You need to take steps to make sure you're contributing to solutions rather than to problems.” You Might Also Like: How Racial Bias Taints... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds; Technology; Travel

17 May 2018
Sharpening Your Skills

You Probably Have a Bias for Making Bad Decisions. Here's Why.

entrepreneurs, even when the content of the pitches is identical. And handsome men fare best of all. Why Employers Favor Men Why are women discriminated against in hiring decisions? The answer is more subtle than expected. Simple Ways to Take Gender View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

11 Oct 2022
Research & Ideas

Shrinking the Racial Wealth Gap, One Mortgage at a Time

automated, where there are lots of basic numbers that are going to determine the decision,” Sunderam says. “With something like small business lending, it's much less automated and much more bespoke, it's natural to think that these effects might be even bigger.” You... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Financial Services

2023
Working Paper

The Limits of Algorithmic Measures of Race in Studies of Outcome Disparities

By: David S. Scharfstein and Sergey Chernenko

We show that the use of algorithms to predict race has significant limitations in measuring and understanding the sources of racial disparities in finance, economics, and other contexts. First, we derive theoretically the direction and magnitude of measurement bias in... View Details

Keywords: Racial Disparity; Paycheck Protection Program; Measurement Error; AI and Machine Learning; Race; Measurement and Metrics; Equality and Inequality; Prejudice and Bias; Forecasting and Prediction; Outcome or Result

SSRN

February 2006
Article

Mixed Motives and Racial Bias: The Impact of Legitimate and Illegitimate Criteria on Decision-making.

By: Michael I. Norton, Samuel R. Sommers, Joseph A. Vandello and John M. Darley

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Prejudice and Bias; Decision Making

February 2023
Teaching Note

Colette Phillips and GetKonnected: Creating Inclusive Ecosystems

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Ai-Ling Jamila Malone

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 323-035. View Details