Do We See What is in Front of Us?: Change Blindness, Inattentional Blindness, and Perceived Racial Identity an Examination of Racial Profiling

How does one study politically incorrect topics, things that people do not realize they are doing, or things they do not want to admit? One option is to watch people's behaviors rather than ask for their opinion. Another option is to monitor their physiological response in a relevant situation. One controversial topic is racial profiling-- looking for criminals with race or ethnicity as the primary basis for categorization. An unintended effect of directing attention to people of one category would be to miss criminal activity committed by people who do not fit the profile. Furthermore, failure to individuate persons of the same group (the perception that "they all look the alike") could prove pernicious to the proper carriage of justice. In order to test these ideas, experimental studies were conducted in an innovative way to circumvent the tendency to self-censor and provide politically correct responses. The presented research is a study of the processes underlying racial profiling-- combining social, cognitive, and biopsychology techniques and joining an interdisciplinary body of work surrounding the intersection of perceived racial identity and justice.