Individual admissions officers have biases, but many of these are washed out when one considers them in the aggregate (one doesn’t know ahead of time which admissions officers will be reading one’s application), though Gwern points out evidence of systemic bias on at least one dimension.
I would guess a lot of important biases don’t wash out in this way. For one thing, some biases are pretty much universal. For another, it is likely that most admissions officers, particularly in elite schools, generally belong to the elite liberal sub-culture. So if you do extracurriculars which go against that subculture, one can expect to be at a disadvantage, all things being equal.
I agree with this. But applicants are often from the elite liberal sub-culture, too, and if one restricts consideration amongst the activities that they would plausible engage in, there will be less systematic bias.
if one restricts consideration amongst the activities that they would plausible engage in, there will be less systematic bias.
That may be so, but it doesn’t really change the bottom line—you can’t trust what admissions officers say about which extracurriculars they prefer and there’s a good chance that admissions officers suffer from subconscious bias. Probably it’s worth mentioning to your advisees that they should be careful about extracurriculars like riflery.
I would guess a lot of important biases don’t wash out in this way. For one thing, some biases are pretty much universal. For another, it is likely that most admissions officers, particularly in elite schools, generally belong to the elite liberal sub-culture. So if you do extracurriculars which go against that subculture, one can expect to be at a disadvantage, all things being equal.
I agree with this. But applicants are often from the elite liberal sub-culture, too, and if one restricts consideration amongst the activities that they would plausible engage in, there will be less systematic bias.
That may be so, but it doesn’t really change the bottom line—you can’t trust what admissions officers say about which extracurriculars they prefer and there’s a good chance that admissions officers suffer from subconscious bias. Probably it’s worth mentioning to your advisees that they should be careful about extracurriculars like riflery.