Culture
A 10-Minute, Face-to-Face Conversation Can Reduce Bigotry
A new study finds that even brief empathetic encounters can combat stereotypes.
The prejudices we carry against people we perceive as different have been so ingrained in us since childhood that we often don’t even know they exist. Such negative views can lead to explicit or subtle discrimination on the basis of things like race, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, and religion. And even if we identify and renounce our biases, they’re incredibly difficult to completely uproot.
But a ten-minute, face-to-face conversation can change views dramatically, a new study in Science finds—especially when someone is encouraged to empathize with the perspective of an individual from a group he or she is prejudiced against.