Why are some people racist? Science provides an answer

Why are some people racist, and others tolerant? It’s a big question – and the answer is to do with our environment.

Science channel ASAPScience looked at the science of racism in a video this week, with some shocking statistics on how racism affects people’s health and employment.

But one key question was where does racism come from?

And the answer is that we’re not born with it, ASAPScience says – based on studies of adopted children.

Studies with adoptive children have shown that they quickly ‘adapt’ to the race of their adoptive parents in terms of the way they recognise faces.

ASAP Science says, ‘We learn biases from our environment. Children adopted before the age of 8 quickly come to have the same facial recognition adoptive patterns as their adoptive parents.

‘Racism isn’t something we are born with, it’s something we learn from our parents and our environment.’

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The channel says that there is a ‘cure’ for racism, though: contact with other races, with studies showing that people who spend time with other races are less likely to be prejudiced.