Brown V. Board Of Education: Doll Study

Brown v. Board of Education was a monumental case that sparked the entire Civil Rights Movement. In 1954, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote the majority opinion for this case, ruling that segregation was inherently unequal because the South used it to promote institutionalized racism. This case overturned Plessy v. Ferguson, a Supreme Court case in 1896 that controversially claimed that segregation was constitutional as long as it promoted “separate but equal” facilities. The first case stated that segregation was unconstitutional, while the second case ordered immediate segregation “with all deliberate speed”. The South and its courts stubbornly refused to allow desegregation initially. However, Brown v. Board of Education was still a colossal

Benjamin, Jr. and Ellen M. Crouse supported the inclusion of psychological evidence because it was monumental for both psychology and constitutional law. Prior to the doll study, the field of psychology and the American Psychological Association were unwilling to intervene in social or political matters, and both were loath to intervene in racial matters in the 1950’s. However, both scholars noted that the Clarks’ contributions were noteworthy for “blazing the trail for future contributions and future social action,” in the American Psychological Association. Both scholars noted that there were flaws in the methodology of the doll study, but their evaluation of the evidence was brief. Despite the incorrect procedural methods of the doll study, both scholars believed that the study should be applauded for encouraging the American Psychological Association to delve into social and political matters. Their article mainly focused on the positive impact of the doll study and how it supported the integration of psychology into legal matters. According to those scholars, the doll study should be viewed in the context of furthering the application of psychology, not in the context of ideal experimental

Burger noted that the Clarks had an unconscious bias that skewed results towards the conclusion of preferring white dolls, while other factors such as the dolls’ appearances and the subjects’ demographic characteristics were not taken into account. Thus, the study was not sufficient as evidence for scientific studies, let alone the non-scientific field of constitutional law. Subsequent research regarding racial preference tests would reveal that the Clarks’ results were not representative of the population. In the 1960’s and 1970’s, some studies showed African-Americans with higher black preference or with the same self-esteem as whites of the same socioeconomic class. However, some studies did show similar results to Clarks’ research, while some supporters of the doll study point out that the subjects in other racial preference tests were influenced by changes in demographics and in the Civil Rights Movement. Regardless, Berger stated that the studies “failed to find a causal relationship between racial identity and self-esteem” and blamed the “variation of test methods and the lack of controls.” Although Berger does not deny the significance of the doll study in a landmark Supreme Court case, Berger denies the study’s conclusions. Berger concluded that the doll study should be viewed for its faulty experimental