The computer-based Implicit Association Test (IAT), first introduced in 1998, is now used widely to measure bias that may not be consciously recognized.19 The IAT measures the time it takes subjects to match representatives of social groups (e.g., age, gender, and race) to particular attributes (e.g., good, bad, cooperative, and stubborn). The IAT operationalizes unconscious bias by hypothesizing that subjects will match a group representative to an attribute more quickly if they connect these factors in their minds, regardless of their awareness of this connection. For instance, the more strongly subjects associate pictures of white persons with good concepts and pictures of black persons with bad concepts, the more quickly they will match them, and vice versa. The computerized IAT measures the aggregate time required for these matching tasks under two conditions (pairings). A difference in average matching speed for opposite pairings (e.g., black+bad/white+good vs black+good/white+bad) determines the IAT score (Fig. 1). Subjects are typically aware that they are making these connections but unable to control them given the rapid response times and structure of the test. To understand the IAT procedure, readers can sample the test at www.implicit.harvard.edu.20
