The importance of disability representation to address implicit bias in the workplace.
Daniel W Derbyshire, Anne E Spencer, Brit Grosskopf and 1 others
PMID 37033196WHAT IT FOUND
Most business people in this UK sample showed implicit bias against disability.
Bias was not lower in large firms or among hiring managers. It was lower in women and people with poorer health. Disability representation in hiring roles was low.
Key findings
0174% of participants showed implicit bias against people with disabilities, with only 19% showing no bias.
02Working for a large company or being involved in hiring decisions did not significantly reduce implicit bias.
03Women and participants with worse overall health states had significantly lower implicit bias against people with disabilities.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The sample was small (108 people) and drawn from a specific UK region via snowball sampling, limiting generalisability. The IAT stimuli only represented visible physical disabilities, failing to capture bias against invisible disabilities or mental health conditions. Self-selection bias may have occurred, as participants interested in disability inclusion might have been more likely to join, potentially underestimating true bias levels. The study did not measure whether participants had previously undergone unconscious bias training, which could confound the results regarding firm size and hiring roles.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that hiring managers or large companies are less biased than SMEs or non-hiring staff. This study found no significant difference in implicit bias based on role or company size, suggesting that standard HR practices or corporate resources alone do not mitigate these attitudes.