There’s a fun bunch of tests over at Harvard, called Project Implicit trying to discover hidden bias, or what they call in our politically correct world, automatic preference. This project has been around for a while, but I finally at the request of a friend I took a couple. You can either do the demonstration tests where you can find out your automatic preferences between Judaism and other religions, between Arab Muslims and other people, or between George W. Bush and a random president. You can also register and do test they give you at random — where they’ll test you on anything from political attitudes to your preference between meat and vegetables.

All the tests I’ve done involve some sort of sorting that has to be done quickly. For example they’ll have you sort meat and vegetables. Then you have to sort adjectives into good and bad and then adjectives and food into the categories meat and good or vegetables and bad. Finally they’ll switch the categories around so you’ll to sort the food into meat and bad or vegetables and good.

After they’ve switched the categories, you’re thoroughly confused. But you also have given the algorithm and the psychologists behind the algorithm the crucial information needed to determine your automatic preferences.

Curious? Try it out. Each test only takes ten minutes or so.