How does the test work?
This test is one way to find out about your attitudes – that is the way you associate a concept (like ‘science’) with an evaluation (like ‘masculine’).
When you are under pressure you are more likely to reveal your unconscious attitudes. This is the basic idea behind the test. So you may have found the task easier and responded more quickly to words that are closely associated in your memory. For example, if you unconsciously associate men with science and women with the humanities you would be quicker sorting the words when the categories Male and Science went together and slower when Female and Science went together.
The test is called the Implicit Association Test or IAT for short.
If we had just asked you to fill out a simple questionnaire we might have got different results. This is because we can have two different types of attitudes, and both can influence our thoughts and actions. A questionnaire measures our conscious attitudes. The IAT measures our unconscious attitudes – these reflect experiences stored in our memory, often without our awareness. For example, you might regularly see examples of men, but not women, as scientists in the media or at school. Consciously, you might say “of course women are scientists too”, but unconsciously your experiences are stored as associations between men/career/science.
You may, or may not agree with your results, just treat them as just a way to start you thinking!
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