Mentions of Prejudice in Academic Papers: A Declining Trend Amidst Ongoing DEI Growth?

Prejudice-denoting terms in academic research have recently decreased while some DEI-related terms continue to rise—what does this shift reveal?

I have previously documented the rise of terms denoting prejudice across news media, academic papers and social media.

More recently, I observed that this increase seems to have plateaued or even reverse in news media content.

In this post, I revisit mentions of prejudice in the academic literature, updating my previous longitudinal analysis of the relative frequency of prejudice-related terms across millions of academic abstracts. The most recent data indicate a slight decline in mentions of prejudice in scholarly papers over the past few years, following a peak around 2021.

However, several DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) related terms continue to grow in prominence in academic papers with no sign of abating.

I have previously hypothesized that the so-called Great Awokening may be shifting focus from aggressive denunciation (e.g., racist, sexist) towards more positively framed terms, such as fairness and inclusion, and perhaps some concepts that highlight presumed victimization/disadvantage (e.g., marginalized, underrepresented).

While it is difficult to definitively confirm this shift—given the natural ebb and flow of term popularity over time, and the risk of cherry-picking examples to fit a narrative—the trends above are worth noting. Regardless of the underlying causes, I felt it was relevant to update my analysis of academic abstracts from three years ago with the most current data.