Pipelines and Master Bedrooms: How Harmful is Harmful Language?

Harmful language guides are becoming an increasingly common tool used by academic institutions, businesses, and professional organizations such as the American Psychological Association to reduce harmful effects of language, particularly for people from marginalized groups (APA, 2023). These guides provide a list of harmful words or phrases (e.g., pipeline, master bedroom) and alternative phrase (e.g., pathway, primary bedroom) to use in their place. Although these guides are well-intentioned, there is great disagreement as to whether harmful language causes adverse outcomes (Lilienfeld, 2017; Lilienfeld, 2020; Williams, 2020a Williams, 2020b). Thus, the purpose of the current pre-registered studies was to determine (1) how people view harmful language and (2) whether exposure to harmful languages causes adverse outcomes. In Study 1, 616 participants rated 175 harmful or alternative words or phrases. Results indicated that harmful language was viewed less favorably than alternative language; however, the vast majority of harmful language was rated on the favorable side of the scale. In Study 2, 334 participants were randomly assigned to read a short story that included 25 harmful words or phrases or the same story with harmful language replaced by alternative language. After exposure to the experimental or control condition, participants completed surveys measuring their anxiety, affect, and feelings of belonging. Results indicated that there were no differences on any psychological outcomes as a result of being exposed to harmful language. The findings from both studies call into question the concept of harmful language and the utility of harmful language guides.