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Date Posted: 17:33:46 10/09/09 Fri
Author: Bob
Subject: forum

There is a very interesting article in the October, 2009 issue of Scientific American titled "Birth of a Notion." It addresses the cognitive dissonance that a black president has caused in the minds of many and especially the birthers who found a solution: "Obama isn't really president! Because he really wasn't born in the USA!" A recent poll found that 58% of Republicans---mostly concentrated in the South---either don't believe or aren't sure Obama is a citizen.

The article states that part of the answer may lie in what's called implicit social cognition, involving deep-rooted assumptions we all carry around and even act on without realizing it. Harvard U psychologist Mahzarin Banaji is a leader in the research of implicit social cognition research and she has excavated the hidden beliefs people hold by measuring how fast they make value judgments when shown a fleeting succession of stimuli such as photographs of faces. She and an associate from San Diego State examined bias against Asians and found that volunteers linked white Americans more strongly than Asian-Americans with--America. They then had people gauge the "American-ness" of famous Asian-Americans like Connie Chung and tennis player Michael Chang versus European whites such as Hugh Grant. The study found that white Europeans are more "American" than are nonwhite Americans in most minds.

In a study done in the 2008 election campaign, it was no surprise when it was found that McCain was seen as more "American" than Obama and even British ex-prime minister Tony Blair was seen as more "American" than Obama.

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