(When) do counterattitudinal exemplars shift implicit racial evaluations? Replications and extensions of Dasgupta and Greenwald (2001)

Dasgupta and Greenwald (2001) demonstrated that exposure to positive Black exemplars (e.g., Colin Powell) and negative White exemplars (e.g., Jeffrey Dahmer) can reduce implicit pro-White/anti-Black evaluations, as measured by an Implicit Association Test (IAT). Here we report seven preregistered online experiments conducted with volunteer U.S. participants (N = 6,953) that sought to replicate and probe the boundary conditions of this finding. Contrary to expectations, we found no shift in implicit racial evaluations in two close replication attempts (Exp. 1–2). Exp. 3–4 ruled out the possibility of insufficiently strong exemplar valence and subtyping as explanations for the failures to replicate. In Exp. 5, implicit racial evaluations did exhibit malleability in response to two different procedures relying on repeated evaluative pairings and evaluative statements, suggesting that they are capable of change. With insight from these studies, Exp. 6–7 were mounted with modifications to the Dasgupta and Greenwald (2001) procedure. Significant reductions in implicit pro-White/anti-Black evaluations were now observed when race, valence, and the contingency between the two were highlighted. In addition, across all experiments, the magnitude of shift in implicit racial evaluations was significantly predicted by participants’ ability to recall the Black–positive and White–negative contingencies experienced during the exemplar exposure task. Together, these data suggest that exposure to counterattitudinal exemplars can shift implicit racial evaluations toward neutrality, but such malleability strongly depends on contingency awareness. We discuss implications for social cognitive theory, theoretically informed debiasing interventions, and different paths toward resolving initial replication failures.