Activity 2.5 (Automaticity and Implicit Learning)

                I was quite shocked by the first IAT test that I took, which was on race preference, because I figured I would have a slight preference, but apparently I have a strong automatic preference for White people.  After completing the readings, listening to the audio excerpts from Blink, and watching the video clips on IAT, I decided to try out another test that wasn’t race related. So I did the test on alcohol preference, whether I associate with it or abstain from it. My results were that I have a moderate preference for associating abstinence with myself and alcohol. The concept in general, of implicit association, is quite fascinating to me. Several questions popped into my mind regarding these tests.  Do our brains have more response time lag because of the shifting in categorization? Does each test start off with the same pairing (white=bad or me=alcohol) and if so would it make a difference in the results if the pairings were changed (white=bad or me=abstain)? I’m assuming that it wouldn’t make a difference based off the validity and reliability of the test. However, I did find an example that Gladwell used in one of his excerpts quite fascinating. It was of the African American man who took the test dozens of times with the same results (slight preference for Whites I believe), but this one time he took it and got a different outcome (slight or moderate preference for African Americans). He attributed this shift to the fact that earlier in the day he was listening to or discussing Martin Luther King and it was in a positive light (how can you not). That one positive connection associated with African Americans remained long enough to affect his implicit associations.

                How does this affect learning? Well I think it affects it in various ways. For example, I think the majority of my students come in the class thinking “I HAVE to take this class because it’s a general education requirement or my advisor signed me up for it”. That association is already putting up mental barriers to learning the content, learning it in a way that will not only result in their success in the class but result in the ability to apply it to their lives. Another element to address, which was discussed in one of Gladwell’s excerpts, was the example of the group of African Americans that were asked to provide their demographic information (race) prior to taking the GRE and another group was asked it at the end. The first group did significantly worse than the other and when asked if the question of race identification had left any lingering apprehension the majority answered with “No”. However, the researchers believed that it did. I think that students experience these very same mental hurdles that do affect their ability to learn. For examples statements such as; “I’m so much older than most of these kids”, “I was never good at understanding science or statistics”, or even “Oh I’m going to breeze through this class”. There is a communication concept that could be incorporated here with regard to how these associations play in determining future behaviors; it’s called the self-fulfilling prophecy. Very fascinating!

                In chapter 5 James talks about the importance of not just verbal recitation (not the parroting recitation though) but also the application of the concepts being verbally recited. It’s not just what you hear, read, or watch but how you apply that to whatever you have chosen to apply it to. This connects well with, on of my favored passages, in chapter 8 on page 38 where he talks about the fifth and final practical maxim about habits; which is to “keep the faculty of effort alive in you by gratuitous exercise everyday”. Changing old habits and starting new ones is difficult and he talks about the different stages that we could discuss with our students regarding the habits they form in connection with the goals they set for the class. However it’s not just the students embarking on this habit forming journey, we as teachers should be doing so as well. Keeping our interests and passions alive by practice but also being open to learn and experience new ones.