The impact of education about historical and current injustices, individual racism and systemic racism on anti-Indigenous racism

Abstract

Anti-Indigenous racism is a pressing issue in Canada. Education on historical and contemporary Indigenous topics is a common strategy to challenge such racism. Despite the existence of education-based programmes intended to address anti-Indigenous racism, there is limited evidence that they are effective. To this end, we report the results of two longitudinal experiments (N1 = 639, N2 = 1099) assessing the effect of education on anti-Indigenous racism. In both studies, we assessed the impact of five conditions on Indigenous-related outcomes in samples of non-Indigenous students. All experimental conditions included information on historical and current injustices toward Indigenous people. In some conditions, we added content on individual racism, systemic racism, or both individual and systemic racism. Results indicated that the experimental conditions improved Indigenous-related thoughts, feelings, knowledge and behaviours. Further, the conditions containing systemic racism content outperformed the other conditions. These studies showcase the potential of education to reduce anti-Indigenous prejudice.