Hello all.
It’s always a good day when I get a new book, and this is one that I’ve been waiting for. Available TODAY is the latest psychology offering from InterVarsity Press. The Unbiased Self is written by Dr. Erin Devers, a social psychologist who teaches at Indiana Wesleyan University. Professor Devers has a doctorate from Indiana University, and publishes research primarily in the psychology of education, using the tools of social psychology to improve student learning. In The Unbiased Self, the author’s goal is to present an accessible introduction to a topic within social psychology relating to the many ways that we are biased in our thinking, and offering suggestions for how we might become less biased. This book is written from an explicitly Christian perspective, and includes Christian-specific applications such as reducing bias in how we love our neighbor, and reducing bias in the church.
How well did Dr. Devers succeed at her goal? Should you immediately click on one of the links above and get a copy? My review will be presented in three parts: The Good, The Bad, and The Amiable Professional Disagreements.
The Good
The author does an excellent job of introducing the reader to the idea of cognitive bias (short version: we tend to “spin” our interpretations of events, other people, and ourselves in ways that make the self look good). Social psychologists have spent decades looking into the many ways in which this egocentric tendency influences our lives, and Devers cites great academic sources in support of her claims. One minor thing: these citations are given to us in the form of footnotes, rather than endnotes. Thank you! Here’s a tip everyone: if you’re going to write a book, don’t make me paw through the end pages to make sure that you relied on actual research rather than some dude’s blog.
Since these biases are bound up with the desire to maintain high levels of self-esteem, Devers argues that a more secure self-concept will reduce the desire to falsely bolster the self. This claim is in line with research on secure versus fragile self-esteem, and I was also put in mind of certain similar ideas put forward by theologian Kevin Vanhoozer on “status anxiety.” If my sense of self is grounded in the reality that I am a beloved child of God, a sinner saved by grace, then that is an identity that does not shift with my daily successes or failures. And the double-truth of this status (Bad: sinner; Good: beloved and saved) should mitigate both unrealistically positive and unrealistically negative self-assessments.
Several of the practical applications that the author presents are solidly backed up by relevant theory and research. Employing the “Thinking Fast vs Thinking Slow” two-system approach, she advocates for ways in which we can bring the power of slow thinking to bear on our automatic reactions, and how we can structure our environments and cultivate habits in such a way that our immediate “Thinking Fast” impulses are oriented toward love of God and of neighbor.
Another excellent practical tip involved urging readers to work against bias by being aware of our similarities. One source of bias is the human tendency to prefer in-groups (whatever group I belong to) over out-groups (any groups that I don’t belong to), so noticing the ways in which we share one or more in-groups is a powerful way to use this bias for good rather than evil. For example, I (a White man) might find myself in a conversation with a Black woman, and think that she is Not My People (out-group) because of the social identities that we do not share. But if I find out that this hypothetical person reads Jim Butcher novels, does Judo, follows Jesus, and has strong opinions about Doctor Who, suddenly she is My People (in-group), and we’re about to have a really fun conversation. Social psychologists have consistently found that conflict between groups is overcome by finding common ground: an identity that encompasses both of us, a common goal to be pursued, or a common enemy to be defeated. Focusing on what divides us keeps us divided.
The Bad
The topic of practical tips for overcoming bias flows into my criticisms of The Unbiased Self. One weak spot in the book involves Devers’ handling of the Implicit Association Test (IAT). The IAT is a cognitive reaction-time measure that allows researchers to examine biases in the ways that we process social information. For example, Nosek and colleagues used the IAT to show that Black and White participants showed preference for faces within their own racial groups by being (on average) 158 milliseconds faster when those faces were paired with positive words such as “friend” and “love,” and when other-race faces were paired with negative words such as “terrible” and “agony.” Devers describes a set of studies using the IAT to show that implicit bias is a real thing. However, her practical advice in this section was only that we study IAT research and familiarize ourselves with the idea of implicit bias. There was no suggestion for what to do counteract one’s implicit biases. The IAT is in fact a source of controversy in social psychological circles, as IAT scores show little connection to real-world behavior, and interventions designed to reduce implicit biases only result in changing one’s score in the laboratory tasks, not in any actual interpersonal interactions.
In addition to uncritically presenting the IAT, Devers makes the claim that we can make ourselves less biased by becoming more collectivistic. Cross-cultural researchers have a long-standing tradition of placing cultures on a collectivistic-individualistic spectrum, with more-collectivistic cultures emphasizing group membership and harmony, and more-individualistic cultures emphasizing independence and personal choice. Devers points to ways in which our culture (America is very individualistic) makes us biased in favor of self-enhancement, and proposes collectivism as an antidote. Indeed, people from collectivistic cultures do perform better at tasks such as taking others’ perspectives. However, Devers completely misses the possibility that collectivism might also introduce its own set of biases. Lin and colleagues, for example, found evidence that members of collectivistic cultures are more likely to fall for pseudoscience and misinformation. Collectivism can also incline people toward more ethnocentrism, and greater vulnerability to social influence. So Devers’ claim that collectivism equals accuracy is contradicted by research.
One final area of weakness in this project that I will discuss involves Devers’ attempt to bring together psychological and Christian ideas on the topic of bias. While she quotes scripture on occasion, there is no substantive engagement with either the theological or biblical-studies scholarly literature on the topics covered in the book. This results in a lopsided presentation that is heavy on social psychology but not strongly Christian. I got the impression that it would be possible to copy and paste about 80% of the manuscript into a general-readership psychology book for secular audiences, with no need for more than cosmetic alterations. Christians have a rich and deep tradition of intellectual inquiry into almost all of the issues that Devers discusses, and had she mined those resources the result would have been much more impressive.
The Amiable Professional Disagreements
Here comes the “inside baseball,” so those with only a passing interest in social psychology might want to skip to the end. On the other hand, noting these professional differences might clear up a few things for readers, so it might be worth your time to stick with us. Devers and I are both social psychologists. I did my dissertation on terror management theory, so Devers mentioning her enthusiasm for this theory brought a big smile to my face, and a big part of my enjoyment of her presentation of social-cognition research came from my own familiarity with these lines of inquiry.
What follows are ways in which I respectfully diverge from the author’s perspective. I will focus on two such divergences.
First, Devers does not seem to be a fan of personality psychology. Given that my doctorate is actually a combined Social and Personality Psychology PhD, it is not surprising that I am a fan of personality. Devers badmouths personality explanations for behavior as “fatalistic” and tied to a belief that traits are genetically locked-in absolutes (p. 113). She denies the validity of over a quarter-century of research on willpower as something that just “doesn’t exist” (p. 115). Instead of individual differences being important, Devers presents instead a strong situationist argument: “behavior is determined by the environment” (p. 118). The idea that behaviors are driven by situation, and that personality traits are irrelevant, can be found among some social psychologists (Philip Zimbardo being one example), but this position is an extreme throwback to a debate that we were having in the 1970s, and got over in the 1980s with the rise of empirically-rigorous and robust approaches such as the Five-Factor Model of Personality. The idea that traits are important for social functioning has also been given a substantial boost by work done in the positive psychology movement on character strengths and virtues. So while Devers is right to point to the power of the situation, she should not be so quick to dismiss the importance of personality.
Second, while she is not a fan of personality, Devers is a fan of self-esteem. It might surprise some readers, but this is actually a topic of controversy among psychologists. Mainstream psychology was never really on board with the notion that raising self-esteem is a panacea (that was more the message from self-appointed education specialists and parenting gurus), but there are psychologists (Devers being one of them) who hold to the notion that self-esteem is something that humans need. As I mentioned earlier, Devers and I are both enthusiastic about terror management theory, which does hold that self-esteem is a vital part of our reaction to awareness of our mortality. Taylor & Brown famously argued that maintaining a positive self-concept, even when it is unrealistic, is necessary for proper psychological functioning.
However, not all psychologists are pro-self-esteem. Roy Baumeister argued that raising self-esteem does very little to help people, and we should instead look at self-esteem as an outcome rather than a need to be satisfied. Self-determination theorists argue that people whose actual psychological needs (competence, autonomy, relatedness) are met do not bother themselves with the question of how much they like themselves. While I still appreciate terror management theory, the more that I read in the scholarly literature on this topic, the more I find that self-esteem is overrated as a psychological variable. Maybe Christians, instead of grounding our positive self-evaluations on our relationship to God, should focus instead on cultivating a Christlike character and living rightly, and not worry about how much we admire ourselves.
The Bottom Line
This review is longer than I had anticipated, but is actually the short version of my thoughts on this book. The truth is that I could go on for hours about this stuff (as my students well know). In summary, while The Unbiased Self has its share of imperfections, I recommend that you get this book and read it. Devers provides an excellent introduction to the topic of cognitive biases, and many of her practical tips are worth incorporating into our lives.
Christians revere the truth, because we revere the Author of truth. We should therefore strive to live truthful lives, fighting against those prideful parts of ourselves that distort our thought processes. Erin Devers’ book contains a plethora of tools that readers will find helpful in this task.
Order The Unbiased Self at InterVarsity Press, Amazon, or wherever you get your books.