Implicit bias threatens scientific objectivity
By: Malte Borggrewe
Tags: Academia, Research, Science, Gender Equality, Implicit Bias

Being a scientist requires the development and maintenance of one pivotal skill: objectivity. Yet, implicit (and explicit) bias is a fellow traveller in the in the scientific world. Once necessary for survival, everyone still carries around a fair amount of unconscious stereotypes and biases. These biases become particularly obvious regarding racial bias favouring Caucasians, and gender bias discriminating women. Besides influencing job applications (which is of course not specific for science), racial and gender biases also affect funding opportunities and experimental data. So where does implicit bias still influences science, and how can we tackle these inequalities?

The academic gender gap

In the US, 36% of doctoral recipients, and only 11% of senior faculty members are women. Furthermore, female scientists earn 18% less compared to their male colleagues. Gender bias does not stop at employments, it also influences NIH funding. The average size of NIH grants for female scientists is 25% smaller than grants for men.

These numbers are shocking and a reason for this discrepancy is not immediately apparent. One factor associated with the clear job and funding advantage of males is a bias towards male authorship and peer reviewing. The share of male editors and peer reviewers is much higher, and the number of female authors, especially first and last authors, is significantly lower compared to males. A lower number of publications will influence employability and funding possibilities. In addition, a study in the field of geoscience suggests that gender differences start at letters of recommendation for postdoctoral fellowships, which are less likely to be ‘excellent’ for women in terms of length and positive toning. Hence, biases in authorship and recommendations already drive the inequality in jobs, salary and funding.

The biggest questions is, why we did not manage to abolish this inequality yet. We live in a generation that has only recently (development of past 50 years) started to strictly condemn gender discrimination. Traditional family values are becoming obsolete and are changing drastically. However, after centuries of male regiments, we have trouble to unlearn established patterns.

Is blinding the key?

Governments have to promote gender equality in economy and family politics, and universities and funding bodies have to force objectivity into their application procedures.

For example, blind recruitment can counteract gender and race bias in applications at least in the first application rounds. Removing information about gender and race from job, conference, and grant applications could induce objectivity. Moreover, names and affiliations should be removed from submitted articles in order to counteract implicit bias of editors and peer reviewers. Anonymous applications, however, should be used with caution. A study of the Australian government suggests that blind recruitment can indeed reduce the likelihood to shortlist women and ethnic minorities. The effect of blind recruitment is influenced by country, culture and type of employment / application.

Sex bias in biomedical research

The gender gap in funding, job applications, and publications is severe, and indirectly influences the outcome of research. However, implicit and explicit bias also directly shapes results and scientific conclusions. Sex and racial bias in animal studies and clinical trials is omnipresent, which leads to dangerous generalisation of results, especially when studying drug efficacies. Most animal studies and drug trials are predominantly performed using male subjects / animals. However, since sex differences in biology exist, study results with males may not be translatable to females.

In biomedical research, the number of animals is kept as low as possible to for ethical reasons and to save money. One way of keeping numbers low is to use only one sex, which reduces variability within, and between experiments. Due to the biological nature of hormonal cycles (which creates variability), female animals are used less frequently. This disproportional use of one sex of animals is particularly acute in neuroscience with a ratio of 5.5 males to 1 female mouse in 2009.

In addition to a strong male tendency in animal research, the share of male subjects in human studies exceeds the amount of female participants as well. In past centuries, clinical studies sometimes used male subjects exclusively, especially in cardiovascular research.

This sex bias has serious consequences because significant differences between males and females exist regarding pathophysiology, and drug safety and efficacy. For example, sex hormones strongly influence neurobiology, and several diseases such as multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease are disproportionally affecting one sex: females (other diseases can affect males predominantly). Regarding therapies, this bias influences medical treatment severely, since women can exhibit different reactions to drugs. The efficacy and safety of treatments is dependent on sex, which could lead to a failure of candidate drugs in women, although they worked in early clinical studies using predominantly males. Candidate drugs could also cause severe side effects in women that have not been observed in men. These failures can be detected early, if pre-clinical and clinical studies include a group of subjects / animals that represents the population properly.

But how can we counteract these biases in biomedical research? First of all, we need to be aware, and awareness can be created by pointing out the importance of reducing biases. Studies have to investigate sex differences, which will reveal the implication of biases in research. Therefore, the NIH has taken measures to reduce sex bias in biomedical research. They provide money specifically for research focusing on sex differences in disease, and require applicants to report on how they will exclude sex bias in their research. During ethical approval of animal experiments in the Netherlands, the use of only one sex during animal experiments has to be justified. However, including males and females in studies is still not required.

Spread the word

Implicit bias still represents a major hurdle in the scientific world, both regarding gender bias in terms of careers, and sex bias in biomedical research itself. Many of the problems have been identified and acknowledged, which will help to take measures to reduce biases. However, awareness has to be created inside and outside research, so that we as individuals can start to counteract their own stereotypes. Because in the end science depends on one important factor: objectivity.