The Cross Race Effect - The Reason Why Racism Exists?

The Cross-Race Effect

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”
- Martin Luther King Jr.

The Cross-Race Effect Defined

When you hear an individual from another ethnicity mention something along the lines of "Well, they all look the same," you instantly think to yourself: "What a close-minded individual they are…." Classing a diverse population of ethnically different individuals under the same banner is something, unfortunately, that is heard very often in modern-day society. However, what if I told you that there is, in fact, a psychological effect that causes our minds to do this automatically? Officially referred to as the Cross-Race Effect, this little psychological shortcoming is the tendency for an individual to recognize faces that belong to their own ethnicity or race, much easier than it is to recognize the faces of people from different ethnic groups.

In social psychology, the Cross-Race Effect is often thought to be the root of many racially biased behaviors that humans tend to express throughout society. However, imagine if we remove any racially biased connotations and reflect on how we perceive individuals from differing ethnic groups versus those from our own. Would we find it easier to recognize the more minor details of those who share our same race compared to those who don't? According to the Cross-Race Effect, this is indeed the case as research shows that our minds are more primed toward recognizing the smaller nuances of those who come from similar ethnic backgrounds while being almost "blind" to those of other ethnic backgrounds. Ultimately, a psychological impulse may be driving our predisposed racial biases, but this does not mean we need to fall victim to them. Studies show that the Cross-Race Effect can be overcome through self-reflection, awareness, and exposure to diverse ethnic groups.

What is the Cross-Race Effect?

Social psychologists have linked the Cross-Race Effect to the Ingroup Advantage phenomenon. According to this phenomenon, people from an ingroup will tend to judge and think of the people from their self-defined group as being better and more fair than those from other groups. Although this can arise in multiple contexts, such as sports team supporters or celebrity fans, in this case, members of a collective race can also consider themselves an ingroup.

Another factor used to explain the Cross-Race Effect is the Perceptual Expertise Hypothesis. This hypothesis effectively states that prolonged exposure to those from similar ethnicities makes it easier for individuals to read the different emotional expressions that they display. Expressions such as smiles, droopy faces, and others that convey emotions are windows to better understanding and recognizing each other's faces. Hence, if this hypothesis is true, then the Cross-Race Effect can be effectively nullified if we consistently expose ourselves to people of different ethnic backgrounds.

Well, it may be unsurprising to hear that research has shown that contact and exposure to multiple ethnic groups reduce the Cross-Race Effect and improves the accuracy of facial recognition for outgroup members. If we take this into account, we can understand why xenophobia and racism are less pronounced in large urban cities where ethnic diversity is high and more pronounced in areas like the countryside that are more ethnically and racially homogenous. Ultimately, the Cross-Race Effect plays a large role in these areas, and it is important to consider this.

History of the Cross-Race Effect

Although the impacts of the Cross-Race Effect must have been present throughout much of human civilization, it only entered psychological research in an experiment published in 1914 by psychologist Gustave Feingold. Intending to analyze the influence of social perception within the justice system, Feingold concluded that despite the systems being equal, the tendency for people to physically generalize those from a different ethnic group would lead to an innate bias. As evidence for this, he cited numerous instances where police made false arrests on individuals due to local citizens' inability to distinguish the facial features of those from a different race.

He states that Caucasians that were uninitiated perceived Asian people to all look alike and that initiated Asians would view Caucasians in the same way! Following this mention in mainstream research, the Cross-Race Effect became the object of prolonged scrutiny from other psychologists who sought to understand why this effect arose. Taken on by social, cognitive, and other psychological fields, many have attempted to outline the underlying factors of the Cross-Race Effect due to the significant impacts it had on domains such as economics and judiciary systems. Currently, it is generally understood through concepts such as Perceptual Expertise and Ingroup Advantage.

Case Examples of the Cross-Race Effect

Case 1: One area of society where the Cross-Race Effect has clear social consequences is eyewitness identification within the justice system. Because of the implications that people from other races are less easily distinguished compared to people from an ingroup race, many eyewitness misidentifications have been made. The main issue surrounding this is when a jail sentence depends on these eyewitnesses, wherein the misidentification of a suspect can lead to several years of imprisonment, depending on the charge.

One prominent case of this is the misidentification of Cornelius Dupree. He spent over 30 years in prison due to a misidentification which may have been largely driven by the Cross-Race Effect. In 1979, a Caucasian woman was assaulted in the streets and was asked by police to identify the perpetrator. This was when a man named Cornelius Dupree was wrongfully identified, and as a result of this identification, the judge convicted Dupree and sentenced him to over 75 years in prison. However, Dupree was innocent, and he had never met that woman in his life, but somehow, he was suddenly convicted for a crime and sent to prison to live out the remainder of his life. It was only in 2010 when the case was reviewed through DNA testing that Dupree was finally exonerated. Although fortunate to have been released from prison, Dupree should never have been there in the first place. This case is one example of how the inability to properly distinguish faces from another race can bring forth significant impacts on people's lives.

Case 2: In the U.S. justice system, the jury's verdict is crucial for the final sentencing in any case. Considering this, the jury should be as objective as possible when analyzing the evidence of a case, shouldn't it? On the surface, this may seem like the correct course of action, but now that we have learned about the Cross-Race Effect and its influence on people's perceptions, there may be a chance that the jury's perceptions can also be manipulated.

This is exactly what researchers Jordan Abshire and Brian H. Bornstein were trying to unearth in a study investigating the Cross-Race Effect within a simulated murder trial. Within their experiment, the researchers would switch around the race of the eyewitnesses within the simulated murder trial of an African American defendant. The participants, acting as the jury, were played an audiotape of a trial before rating the credibility of the witnesses and rendering a verdict.

The researchers found that Caucasian participants would rate the prosecuting witnesses as more credible and the defense witnesses as less credible. The opposite effect was observed for African American participants who viewed the defendant as more credible and the prosecuting team as not. The most important finding was that, despite seeing the same simulated trial, the jury would come to a different conclusion based on their race, thus highlighting a significant flaw within the juror system. Here is another strong example of how the Cross-Race Effect can influence our justice system.

Case 3: Certainly, the Cross-Race Effect is highly prevalent within adult populations, but is this the same in child populations? Essentially, the purpose behind this question is to see whether the Cross-Race Effect is an acquired effect or is it something that is more biologically ingrained within humans.

Effectively, a study conducted in 2003 found that the Cross-Race Effect can be found among all ages, even in kindergarteners and 3rd-grade children. More specifically, researchers found that when faced with pictures of different faces, children would display higher rates of recognition when presented with a picture of someone of their own race compared to others.

In their conclusions, the researchers proposed a few explanations for these findings as they had significant implications on how our brain and cognitive systems process and integrate new information. For the Cross-Race Effect to be present in children around the age of five, it would mean that they already have a pre-established facial recognition bias. Considering this, the researchers concluded that information surrounding race must be stored rather rapidly in memory for it to be so pronounced in our facial recognition systems. On a broader scale, these findings may inform historical research on why humans are so tribal in nature, especially around elements such as race and ethnicity. Luckily, to mitigate this facial bias, if one is exposed to a diversity of different ethnic groups and faces, they will have an increased ability to recognize the smaller details and nuances, rendering the Cross-Race Effect obsolete.