Study: Non-blacks silent toward racism

TORONTO, Jan. 9 (UPI) -- Psychologists at Toronto's York University said their research suggests most non-blacks do not push back against anti-black racism.

The researchers said in their study, published Friday in the journal Science, that most of the 120 non-black subjects involved in the study did not rebuke or avoid a mock racist planted in their midst, The Toronto Star reported Friday.

Kerry Kawakami, a psychologist and lead study author, said 60 percent of white subjects chose the planted racist over a black person when asked to choose a partner for a study.

"People expect in a very deliberate fashion that they'll be offended by racism, that they'll censor or avoid racists," Kawakami said. "But our (research) showed that that's not the case when they're actually placed in that situation."

Two U.S. psychologists, Eliot Smith of Indiana University and Diane Mackie of the University of California, Santa Barbara, said in an article accompanying the study that the outcome may have been the result of experiment participants being placed in the unfamiliar mindset that could alter emotional responses.

Kawakami said the failure of participants to react to the racism may have been a result of shock from hearing the statements.