19 Examples of Conscious and Unconscious Bias in the Workplace

We all have conscious and unconscious biases, as they are a natural function of the human brain. But it can result in us treating people unfairly based on their race, gender, sexual orientation, or other characteristics if we allow our conscious and unconscious biases to influence our judgements and behaviours.

Learning about the various types of unconscious bias and how they manifest in our daily lives is the first step towards overcoming unconscious bias in the workplace. Once you learn to recognise examples of conscious and unconscious bias, you can take action to prevent them from having a detrimental impact on the workplace and create a more diverse and inclusive environment where employees can flourish.

Before we examine the examples of conscious and unconscious bias, it’s essential to explore the difference between conscious and unconscious bias.

Our biases develop through learned behaviour due to experiences with and exposure to different groups of people. Unconscious bias, or implicit bias, refers to attitudes or stereotypes that we hold outside our conscious awareness and influence our perceptions, attitudes, and behaviour. Without us realising it, our unconscious biases can influence key decisions in the workplace and promote inequality.

Our views or prejudices that we are aware we hold are called conscious bias. With conscious bias, we can control how we let it influence us because we are self-aware enough to know we have the bias.

Due to the lack of such self-awareness, avoiding unconscious bias is more complicated, so bringing our unconscious biases into our conscious awareness is essential.

Even though our biases are meant to benefit us, they frequently work against us. Unconscious bias commonly impacts professional relationships, communication, and hiring and promotion decisions. These may result in unjust treatment at work and hinder an organisation’s efforts to build a diverse and inclusive workforce.

Let’s examine some examples of unconscious bias in the workplace now that we understand what unconscious bias (or implicit bias) is and how it differs from conscious bias. For the examples below, we will assume the bias is unconscious.

While these unconscious bias examples could also exist as conscious biases, instances of people acting on biases they are aware of is another kettle of fish and will have additional negative implications.

Here are 19 unconscious bias examples, along with some tips on how to avoid them.

1. Affect heuristic bias

Affect heuristic bias is the tendency to make decisions based on emotions instead of logic. People use a “gut instinct” to make decisions or process information quickly. Making decisions based on emotions can be efficient, but it can distort our thinking.

Affect heuristic bias can surface in contexts. In the workplace, an example might include choosing whether to work with a supplier based on an instantaneous feeling that they are trustworthy, regardless of any evidence to back this feeling up.

Like confirmation bias, it involves making decisions based on limited information, but affect heuristic bias differs in some important ways. For example, while confirmation bias involves ignoring information that contradicts our beliefs (and thus leads us to form inaccurate opinions), affect heuristic bias involves using emotions to indicate whether something is true or false.

How to avoid affect heuristic bias: As with combatting most types of unconscious bias, becoming more self-aware is vital. In the case of heuristic bias, developing your emotional awareness is especially important.

The more emotionally aware you are, the better equipped you’ll be to recognise how your emotions influence your decisions and actions. Your heightened emotional awareness will also make it easier to spot situations when you are more at risk of heuristic bias, allowing you to take steps to prevent your emotions from clouding your judgement.

2. Affinity bias

Affinity bias occurs when we gravitate towards people who are like us. There are many reasons we may relate to a person this way, for example, by sharing similar characteristics, backgrounds, values, or interests. It occurs due to our brain noting shared traits or interests and registering the data as familiar and safe.

During recruitment, affinity bias can result in interviewers offering the job to a candidate they feel is ‘like them’ more than on merits such as qualifications and experience.

Affinity bias often leads to a lack of diversity, skills gaps and reduced innovation, which make it more challenging for the organisation to remain competitive in their market.

How to avoid infinity bias: Before interviewing candidates, identify skills and experience gaps within your team. Ensure interview processes include objective scoring criteria and that the interview panel is as diverse as possible. Focus on whether there is a ‘values fit’ instead of a ‘culture fit’.

3. Ageism (or age bias)

Ageism refers to a bias towards someone due to preconceptions about their age. Ageism is commonly associated with older workers. You may be familiar with phrases such as someone being ‘Over the hill’ and ‘You can’t teach an old dog new tricks’. However, age bias is prevalent with younger workers, with comments about younger workers being ‘snowflakes’ or feeling ‘entitled’.

How to prevent age-related bias: Blind hiring practices, such as removing details on applications that indicate a person’s age, don’t prevent age-related bias at the interview stage or with an existing employee. Learn more about and educate your team on the benefits of different generations of workers and debunk some of the harmful myths surrounding workers of different ages.

And remember, quality is always better than quantity. Someone may have twice the experience in years but what about the breadth and quality of that experience? Also, consider transferable skills and enthusiasm to develop and grow into the role.

4. Anchor bias

Anchor bias is a tendency to make decisions based on the first information you receive rather than looking at the whole picture. The problem is that once we have an anchor, we tend to subconsciously seek information confirming our initial impression, which can lead to confirmation bias.

How to avoid anchoring bias: If you find yourself ‘judging a book by its cover’, list all evidence that supports your initial view and those that don’t. Then, seek out additional information.

5. Attribution bias

Attribution bias refers to finding reasons (or excuses) for peoples’ behaviours and motivations. While we often attribute our own successes to our skills and decisions and our failures to external factors outside our control, when it comes to other people, we tend to attribute their success to external factors such as luck and their failure to their intrinsic nature or lack of ability.

Attribution bias is prominent during recruitment. For example, a recruiter sees a candidate’s grades in education and makes assumptions about the individual’s skills or work ethic. It can also be highly damaging when managing performance as we tend to focus more on people’s weaknesses, failing to recognise their strengths and even minimising their successes.

How to avoid attribution bias: Attribution bias can often be avoided by solely focusing on information that is directly relevant to the role. If there are gaps in a candidate’s CV or low grades, ask about them. There could be various explanations, such as a serious illness or neurodiversity, which impacted their education. The aim is to find the best person for the role, which is not necessarily the person who performs best at an interview.

6. Authority bias

Ever felt more trusting of someone because they are in a position of authority? That’s authority bias, and it’s prevalent when dealing with police officers, doctors and people in a more senior role within your organisation.

Authority bias is one of the most common types of unconscious bias, yet it is one of the least recognised. A typical example in the workplace is new or junior staff members asking more experienced colleagues how to do things, only to find later that the instructions they were provided with were incorrect.

How to avoid authority bias: The best way to prevent authority bias is to ask questions! If you don’t understand something and have concerns about it, ask the person explaining things to you what their reasoning is—and then try to understand that reasoning.

Help your staff avoid authority bias by providing sufficient training and documented procedures and encourage them to ask questions and challenge other people within the organisation.

7. Beauty (or attraction) bias

Research shows that people considered ‘attractive’ are more likely to be offered a job, more significant opportunities to develop, and more likely to be promoted. In 2014, the Journal of Organizational Psychology published interesting research into Attractiveness Biases in the Context of Hiring Through Social Networking Sites. It can also impact where we feel someone hasn’t made enough effort or even too much, leading to assumptions about their skills and work ethic.

How to avoid beauty bias: Removing any photos from applications and ensuring an objective assessment can help prevent beauty bias. However, it could still become an issue at the interview stage or with existing employees, so don’t forget to provide to train and educate your staff.

8. Confirmation bias

We love to prove ourselves right, and we tend to look for evidence that confirms our initial opinions of someone while overlooking information that contradicts our initial assessment – selective observation. We form an idea of someone within 30 seconds of meeting them. Although first impressions can be significant other factors need to be taken into consideration. Organisations have cost themselves dearly because they have hired someone based on a first impression, only to realise that the candidate cannot do the job or is unsuitable for the role they were recruited for.

How to avoid confirmation bias: When it comes to confirmation bias, an excellent way to tackle the issue is to do your utmost to prove yourself wrong – disprove your hypothesis, including asking a colleague to challenge your decision-making. Working with an executive coach or mentor can also be a great way to challenge your thinking and help you to step back and consider your thoughts and decisions from a different perspective.

9. Conformity bias

In group settings, we tend to take cues from the people around us, allowing others to influence our decisions rather than exercise our own independent judgement. Conformity bias is often prominent in organisations where people don’t feel able to share their views openly, particularly where there is a lack of diversity or trust.

How to reduce the risk of conformity bias: Ask people to submit ideas separately. In a meeting situation, an option is to ask everyone to note their ideas on sticky notes, put them up on the wall, and work through them individually. In an interview scenario, ask all interviewers to submit their views before group discussions. Encourage debate and be respectful of everyone’s viewpoints.

10. Contrast effect bias

Contrast bias relates to comparing two or more things rather than assessing their merits individually. For example, when interviewing candidates back to back, how you view one candidate can often depend on how well the candidate performed. Whereas, if you had interviewed them in a different order, your opinion might have been entirely different. This is also common for appraisal meetings.

How to reduce contrast bias: Create a well-structured process with objective scoring criteria to ensure more consistent results for appraisal and recruitment purposes. Having a colleague, coach, or mentor to challenge your thinking can also reduce the risk of contrast bias.

11. Disability bias

Disability bias is an area that is often missing when we talk about unconscious bias. However, it is just as prevalent as other biases and often overlaps with many other biases discussed within this article. Despite organisations actively looking to take on more employees with disabilities, people with disabilities are largely misunderstood by business leaders, managers and the larger workforce.

Many assumptions are made about disabilities, which are often incorrect. This is exacerbated by a lack of education regarding disability in the workplace and people feeling uncomfortable talking about disabilities. Research by Scope shows that almost 70% of the UK public feel uncomfortable talking to people with disabilities. Research also shows that people with disabilities are reluctant to disclose their condition(s) or discuss the full extent of their challenges for fear of being considered weak or incompetent.

How to avoid disability bias: Educate your workforce at all levels on various disabilities, the challenges people living with those disabilities may face and the strengths of having them as part of your team. Train your workforce on having open and honest conversations around disability and supporting those who face challenges. Review and adapt your recruitment processes, policies and working environment to better support people living with disabilities.

12. Gender bias

Gender bias is one of the most commonly discussed and often comes from stereotypes. There are many cases sounding pregnancy discrimination, requirements to wear makeup or high heels in the workplace, and women being asked to take minutes in meetings as opposed to their male counterparts. A typical example is a male being considered more suitable for a physically demanding role.

There is a misconception that men are biased towards females in the workplace. However, we have also seen cases where women have demonstrated a gender bias towards other women.

Research has been conducted into the language used when creating job descriptions and whether the content is more likely to attract male or female candidates. As a result, more and more organisations are increasingly focused on the terminology they use in job descriptions and how they can encourage a more diverse pool of candidates.

How to prevent gender bias: Again, blind screening of applications can and is commonly used. However, it is only sufficient for a small part of the recruitment process. Provide training to staff to debunk myths around gender differences, ensuring an objective recruitment and appraisal process is crucial. Company policies around employee benefits and flexible working should also be reviewed to ensure they provide equal opportunities for everyone.

13. Halo effect

The halo effect applies when you focus on a particular feature you like or are impressed by, and you consider them more favourably as a result. Common examples include candidates educated at prestigious schools or universities or have worked for particular companies. The ‘halo effect’ results in a failure to make a balanced assessment and overlook other features that indicate they are not the right person for the role.

How to avoid the halo effect: The halo effect can be dangerously blinding when reviewing candidates. When examining applications, you’re probably looking for something that makes a candidate stand out from the rest. When you do this, also consider the candidate without that one gleaming attribute and see how their experiences, skills and personalities compare to other candidates who may not have had the same privileges or opportunities.

It may also be worth remembering that some of the most successful business people didn’t finish university, and some didn’t even finish high school.

14. Height bias (or heightism)

Height bias refers to judging a significantly shorter or tall person than the ‘socially accepted’ human height. Research has shown that tall candidates are seen as more competent. In his book, Blink, Malcolm Gladwell discusses his study, which showed that 58% of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are at least six feet tall, and 30% are six feet two inches or taller.

How to avoid height bias: The same applies here as it does to many of these biases: blind selection of candidates, training and educating staff, objective processes and policies, and debunking myths around height.

15. Horns effect

The horns effect is the direct opposite of the halo effect. It is the tendency to focus negatively on a feature or trait, clouding your judgement and overlooking other great attributes the individual has. It can also include a negative focus on a quality that has no real bearing on the individual’s role. A typical example of this is supporting a different sports team.

How to avoid the horns effect: If you have a negative ‘gut feeling’ about someone, take the time to identify the root cause of that ‘gut feeling’ – where is it coming from? Ask others to challenge your thinking. Recruitment panels can also help prevent both the horns and halo effect. You may also want to challenge other panel members when recruiting to understand the reasons for their views and preferences.

16. Name bias

Name bias is closely linked to age, gender and race bias. Research has shown that white names receive 50% more callbacks for interviews than African American names. It is also common in cases of the halo effect, where we may have had positive experiences with people with the same name and the horns effect for the opposite reason.

How to avoid name bias: Exchanging names for candidate numbers at the initial recruitment stage helps prevent name bias. Staff also need to be trained to ensure they are aware of their biases and take the appropriate action to ensure they do not influence their decision and behaviours.

17. Neurodiversity bias

Neurodiversity bias is closely linked to disability bias. Many neurodivergent conditions are considered a disability under the Equality Act 2010 and are, therefore, protected characteristics. Neurodiversity refers to those with conditions such as ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and Tourette Syndrome. Some are considered ‘learning difficulties’, and some are considered barriers to employability, often wrongly.

The Institute of Leadership and Management conducted a study on Workplace Neurodiversity: The Power of Difference, revealing that 50% of people asked said they wouldn’t employ someone with a neurodivergent condition.

How to avoid disability bias: The research shows that, as with many other areas, there is an enormous need for education regarding neurodiverse conditions, the myths surrounding them and the benefits people with such conditions can bring to the organisation. Review and adapt your recruitment processes, policies and working environment to better support people who are neurodivergent. Currently, most interview processes are heavily weighted in favour of those who are ‘neurotypical.’

18. Racial bias

Racial bias is a prejudicial view towards one or more racial groups. As with gender and disability, many larger organisations have published statements regarding their intentions to develop a more diverse workforce. These intentions are all well and good, but there needs to be a clear and effective strategy to ensure these good intentions become a reality.

How to avoid racial bias: Blind candidate selection and training will help reduce the risk, but only if people of Asian, Black, Mixed, and Other ethnic groups. Review your recruitment processes and adverts to remove unnecessary hurdles. If the advert requires a degree or similar, ask yourself why you feel it’s necessary. Experience can be just as valuable, even more so in some cases. Around 20% of Asian, Black, Mixed and Other ethnic groups go on to further education. Review the development opportunities you provide to minority groups. Review where you are placing your adverts for new opportunities. Are a diverse group of people going to see them, or is it likely readers are weighted heavily to a particular group?

19. Weight bias

The most common weight bias relates to people who are considered ‘heavy’ or overweight. Particularly damaging stereotypes are that people who are deemed overweight are lazy, lack self-discipline and are less conscientious.

How to avoid weight bias: Training helps staff understand their conscious and unconscious biases, debunk myths, and ensure people take steps to ensure that biases that remain are not influencing people’s decisions are crucial for avoiding weight bias.

In summary, although activities such as blind selection at the initial stages of recruitment can help prevent bias in the workplace, they are a sticking plaster only. They do not get to the issue’s root cause. To truly combat unconscious bias in the workplace, we need to understand and identify our own biases and take the appropriate action to challenge our perceptions and ensure they do not impact our decisions.

At Delphinium, we’ve designed our unconscious bias training to help businesses understand the root cause of unconscious bias, its impact in the workplace and how to prevent preferences from influencing decision-making. Our training sessions are particularly suitable for those in a people management role and anyone involved in recruitment.

You can find out more about our training sessions here. You can also contact us to discuss your requirements and how we can support you in developing your workforce.