Michela Carlana presents "Revealing Stereotypes: Evidence from Immigrants in Schools"

We study how people change their behavior after learning they are biased. Teachers in Italian schools give lower grades to immigrant students relative to natives with comparable ability. In two experiments, we reveal to teachers their own bias, measured by an Implicit Association Test (IAT). Randomizing the timing of disclosure, we find that learning one’s IAT before deciding end-of-term grades reduces the native-immigrant gap in grades. IAT disclosure and generic debiasing have similar average effects, but there is heterogeneity: teachers with more negative stereotypes do not respond to generic debiasing but change their behavior when informed about their own IAT.