The Chameleon Effect

Project Summary

Bargh and Chartrand define the chameleon effect as “nonconscious mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, facial expressions, and other behaviors of one's interaction partners, such that one's behavior passively and unintentionally changes to match that of others in one's current social environment.”

The Chameleon Effect is an initiative of the Intersectional Health Student Association (IHSA) with the goal to restructure how health professionals students conceptualize marginalized populations and disparities in health. We are using The Chameleon Effect as a metaphor for the persistent focus on singular population curricula in medical education. New programs are being developed at medical institutions across the country in order to combat health disparities and produce more culturally competent medical professionals. Unfortunately, there is a reproduction of non-inclusive disparity curricula as institutions mimic the currently established structure of singular population curricula. This initiative was developed as a platform for open dialogue and to spark conversation on the presence (or lack) of intersectionality in medicine. We aim to start our own Chameleon Effect that leads to the systemic adoption of an intersectional lens as the foundation for medical curricula.