Unspoken Politics

Efrén Pérez is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science of Vanderbilt University, Tennessee. His research uses psychological insights to investigate the political attitudes and behaviors of US racial and ethnic groups. Substantively, he studies implicit political cognition, group identity, and language and political thinking. Methodologically, he designs and implements experiments, especially in the realm of racial and ethnic politics. He has published articles on these topics in the American Journal of Political Science, Political Analysis, and Political Behavior. His research on implicit cognition is a recipient of the Lucius Barker Award for the best paper on race/ethnicity and politics at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association.

• 1. Implicit thoughts, explicit decisions; 2. Two ways of thinking, two types of attitudes; 3. Implicit expectations and explicit political reasoning; 4. Ghost in the associative machine; 5. Unstated: the measurement of implicit attitudes; 6. Incognito: the subconscious nature of implicit expectations; 7. In deliberation's shadow: education, (un)awareness, and implicit attitudes; 8. In black and white: race, group position, and implicit attitudes in politics; 9. Conclusion: implicit attitudes and explicit politics; Note on the studies; References.

'Unspoken Politics will be essential reading for understanding the psychological underpinnings, or implicit attitudes, of our political decisions. Pérez convincingly and systematically demonstrates the link between anti-Latino sentiment and support for exclusionary immigration policies. Unspoken Politics underscores the ever-important role of race in the political thinking of the American public.' Marisa Abrajano, University of California, San Diego