Bias

Bias is a game which shows humans, and especially children, how impactful a small bias can be (massive) and what we can do to overcome that bias.

We live in a complex and sometimes confusing world. And we often don't have the tools necessary to make the world a better place.

The first thing we need is an understanding of how the world works. That's what Bias does. It shows us what happens when we create a town when we have a slight bias.

Setup Phase

Pull out the 3 starting tiles. Then add the rest of the tiles to the board one by one.

No-one wants to be "the only one" that looks like us. So when we add a new tile to the neighborhood we have to have one similar tile adjacent (not including diagonals).

When you're done adding all of the tiles to the town it usually looks something like this:

Diversity Phase

Once we know how the world works we can try to make it a better place. That's what the second phase of this game is about. We make one rule change and we can start overcome our biases and live in a more diverse world.

Every shape that isn't by at least one different shape is unhappy and must move. You can move an unhappy shape to any other place on the board. Or you can swap an unhappy with any other shape on the board.

Keep moving and swapping the unhappy shapes until all of the shapes are happy. It usually looks something like this:

Scoring

For some people playing the first two phases are fun enough. But for those who want mastery there's an optional scoring phase. We want to reward diversity so each group of shapes is worth 1 point.

In this example we would get 7 points which is something we can try to improve in a future game.

Diversity Outside of the Game

Once you play this game - how are you going to change? In what areas of your life are you surrounded by people like you?

In my life I run tech conferences and now make an effort to reach out to women speakers. It doesn't solve the very human need to simplify the world but it does make it a more diverse world which is better for everyone.

For Educators

I've included a lesson plan for educators teaching 3rd-5th grade (in the US). This will help you time block and run the exercise in your class.

Credit

Inspired by Parable of the Polygons.

All art is in the public domain.