Even Babies Are a Little Racist

Even Babies Are a Little Racist

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Here’s a scientific clue as to why our society’s still dealing with conflicts based on skin color – something a bunch of sociologists can tell you is a completely made up thing. Racist might be a bit strong for a being that can’t even talk. But at just 9 months old, babies showed biases in facial recognition. They aren’t born with these biases, but by that age, babies were better able to recognize faces and emotional expressions of people of their race. All of this was based on brain activity measurements, since, again 9 month olds can’t shout racist slurs, or anything like that. Five month olds did not show the same pattern, meaning they are learning this behavior somewhere.