Unconscious bias: Is it impacting your nursing care?

Abstract

FigureHave you ever walked into a patient room with a preconceived picture based on socioeconomic status or ethnicity? Have you feared taking care of someone because he or she is homeless or has opioid use disorder? Although we're caregivers and have devoted our lives to helping people, we sometimes display unintentional biases toward others. Everyone has a cultural lens through which we view the world, which can sometimes create biases. Often, the decisions we make are directly influenced by those biases, even when we espouse other beliefs. The influence occurs without our knowledge because unconscious bias is just that—unconscious—and research has revealed that we all harbor unconscious biases. What's unconscious bias? Unconscious, or implicit, bias is defined as stereotypes or cultural concepts that influence decisions and behaviors. These biases started forming when you were very young and were shaped as you matured into who you are today. Investigations of unconscious bias show that people of all backgrounds, despite claims against partialities, have unconscious preferences based on gender, race, sexual orientation, or other aspects of identity. We also classify people according to educational level, disability, sexuality, accent, social status, and job title, automatically assigning presumed traits to anyone we subconsciously put in those groups. Further research supports that our unconscious biases, and the decisions they cause us to make, may contribute to healthcare…