IAT Tests:

Today I took an IAT test that determined if I had a racial preference. No, not if I'm racist or not, just if I have a preference for white or black people. I ended up having a slight preference for white people (on a 1 to 5 scale, 1 being heavily preferenced towards white people, my score was a 2)  which, having grown up in a white community and being white myself I found unsurprising. I've never had any reason to hate black people at all but I know a bunch of white people and am not close friends with any African Americans. My brother though is good friends with a this one kid and he gets nicer every time i see him, so I could see that I have a slight bias. I do think though that a major part of this kind of bias is from a person's upbringing. I don't think it's in anyone's nature to treat others as lesser than themselves. This was shown a little bit in a film that I recently saw, called "I Sit Where I Want." There's this one guy who has to be one of the most close minded people I've ever met. During one part of the documentary some students visit each other's homes to get a better sense of how other people live. Anyways, this guy awkwardly stood by the door for a good 5 minutes watching the rest of the family go about their business, not talking and just staring at the family. Later in the film when he had an interview with the camera he explained how all of his close family are what he considers to be a bit racist and it was just painful watching him. So yes, I would say that upbringing plays a large part of being biased or not.