Organizations and programs have been set up all over the globe in the hopes of urging people to end prejudice. According to a research article, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, such programs may actually increase prejudices.

Lisa Legault, Jennifer Gutsell and Michael Inzlicht, from the University of Toronto Scarborough, were interested in exploring how one's everyday environment influences people's motivation toward prejudice reduction.

The authors conducted two experiments which looked at the effect of two different types of motivational intervention - a controlled form (telling people what they should do) and a more personal form (explaining why being non-prejudiced is enjoyable and personally valuable).

In experiment one; participants were randomly assigned one of two brochures to read: an autonomy brochure or a controlling brochure. These brochures discussed a new campus initiative to reduce prejudice. A third group was offered no motivational instructions to reduce prejudice. The authors found that, ironically, those who read the controlling brochure later demonstrated more prejudice than those who had not been urged to reduce prejudice. Those who read the brochure designed to support personal motivation showed less prejudice than those in the other two groups.

In experiment two, participants were randomly assigned a questionnaire, designed to stimulate personal or controlling motivation to reduce prejudice. The authors found that those who were exposed to controlling messages regarding prejudice reduction showed significantly more prejudice than those who did not receive any controlling cues.

The authors suggest that when interventions eliminate people's freedom to value diversity on their own terms, they may actually be creating hostility toward the targets of prejudice.

According to Dr. Legault, "Controlling prejudice reduction practices are tempting because they are quick and easy to implement. They tell people how they should think and behave and stress the negative consequences of failing to think and behave in desirable ways." Legault continues, "But people need to feel that they are freely choosing to be nonprejudiced, rather than having it forced upon them."

Legault stresses the need to focus less on the requirement to reduce prejudices and start focusing more on the reasons why diversity and equality are important and beneficial to both majority and minority group members.

全世界成立了各种各样的组织和项目，旨在帮助人们摆脱偏见。心理科学协会的《心理科学》杂志将刊登一篇调查报告。报告显示，这些项目可能反而增加了人们对他人的偏见。

报告的作者Lisa Legault, Jennifer Gutsell 和 Michael Inzlicht来自斯卡布罗多伦多大学，他们非常热心于研究人的日常生活环境是怎样促使人们减少对他人的偏见的。

这三位作者进行了两个实验来观察两种截然不同的动机干预所带来的影响。一种干预采取控制参与者的形式（告诉参与者应该做什么），另一种则是更人性化的形式（工作人员解释为什么不偏见是令人愉快且对自身有价值的）。

在第一个实验中，工作人员随机分发给前两组参与者自治型和控制型两种小册子的其中一种，供他们阅读。这些小册子写的是一种学生如何减少偏见的新方法。第三组参与者没有受到减少偏见的指令。作者们发现，讽刺地是，那些读了控制型小册子的参与者后来比没有受到指令的参与者显示出了更多的偏见。而那些读了自治型小册子的参与者显示出的偏见比其他两个组都要少。

在实验二里，工作人员随机发给参与者调查问卷。这些问卷是为了刺激他们自发产生或强制产生的减少偏见的动机。作者们发现，那些接收到强制的减少偏见的信息的人比其他人显示出的偏见要多得多。

作者们暗示，外界的干预削弱了人们自由珍视多样化的能力，他们可能会对他人产生偏见和敌意。

Legault博士表示，“强制减少偏见的方法是吸引人的，因为它们奏效迅速且简便易行。它们告诉人们如何思考如何行动，强调如果不按照合适的方式去思考或行动，就会产生消极的后果。但人们需要感觉到自己在选择不偏见待人上是自由的，而不是感到这是强加给他们的。”

Legault强调我们必须把关注的焦点从如何减少偏见转到为什么多样化和平等性对各族人民来说都是重要且有益的。