Infusing science, practical skills, and joy into diversity discussions!

Diverse Joy ® Podcast
& Educational Video Series

With Dr. William T. L. Cox & Dr. Amber Nelson

Diverse Joy Podcast with Dr. William T. L. Cox & Dr. Amber Nelson
Dr. Cox and Dr. Nelson in a promotion photo from an episode of season 1 of Diverse Joy

Episodes of Diverse Joy® Release the First Wednesday of Each Month

Published episodes can be found below, by following the podcast wherever you get podcasts (links for various podcasting platforms are available below) or by subscribing to @BiasHabit on YouTube for the video version.*

*The audio-only podcast features the same content as the video version, minus some additional visuals.

Follow Diverse Joy on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, Threads, and Bluesky.

Get notified about new episodes by signing up for our newsletter or by following (“subscribing to”) the show in your podcasting app or on YouTube.

Infusing Joy into Diversity Discussions

Diverse Joy is the official podcast of Inequity Agents of Change.

Cohosted by Dr. Cox and Dr. Nelson, with occasional guests, Diverse Joy is a free monthly podcast and educational video series. In each episode, the cohosts share some of the joy from their lives, discuss a diversity topic, answer audience questions, teach an evidence-based bias habit-breaking skill to help you in your efforts to reduce bias and promote inclusion and equity, and more! Their goal is educate while keeping you entertained, and most of all, to infuse joy into diversity discussions.

Diverse Joy is ranked in the top 5% of all podcasts globally, many teachers and professors use the educational videos in their classrooms, and many organizations use Diverse Joy as a monthly diversity activity. As its title implies, it focuses on infusing joy back into diversity discussions. Joy is both practical and scientifically justified as a weapon against bias.

Submit Questions and Topic Ideas for an Episode of Diverse Joy

We use audience questions in each episode of the podcast; if you have a question related to a topic in the realm of bias, diversity, equity, or inclusion, please send it our way!

If you have a relevant topic idea that you think would be a good subject for one our episodes’ main discussions, we’d love to hear it, too!

You can also just share your joy with us!

Please submit any of the above ideas using this form, and it may be featured on a future episode!

Dr. Cox and Dr. Nelson pose for a promotional photo; he is wearing a silver blazer and glasses, she is wearing a black leather jacket and glasses. They are seated at a table and their hands are resting on the table.

Season 1 of Diverse Joy was sponsored primarily by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National Institutes of Health under award number R35GM128888. The content is solely the responsibility of the speakers and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. Production is also supported by donations to our nonprofit, Inequity Agents of Change.

We Also Have Merch

If you’re interested in supporting our organization, we also have Diverse Joy merchandise available. Your purchase supports production of Diverse Joy - and helps us spread the joy!

Meet the Diverse Joy Team

The Diverse Joy theme and interstitial music was composed and performed by Jay Arner

Guests of Diverse Joy have included:

  • Sandy Eichel, a wealth management advisor and international speaker; they’ve been on to discuss “What is Professionalism Anyway?”, trans* and nonbinary identity related topics, and in our April 2025 episode, recognizing and correcting your own biases!

  • Nicki Vander Meulen, a lawyer focused on disability issues and the first-ever openly autistic person to be elected to a school board in the United States; she’s been on to discuss disability desegregation in schools, and how the Americans with Disabilities Act (the ADA) has lead to accommodations to help everyone.

  • Valeria Martinez, an immigration attorney; she was on the November 2024 episode to discuss an array of topics and history related to immigration in the United States, as well as the role of the law in mandating fairness, asylum seekers, the definition of migrants as compared to refugee.

  • Bernie Hoes, an educator; he was on earlier this year to discuss “Living Black History” and how Black identity is not a monolith.

Diverse Joy Episodes

Listen to Diverse Joy on your favorite podcasting app (or watch on YouTube) with the links in the carousel below; or use episode pages here with embedded media players for the audio or the video for each.

Episodes are listed in reverse chronological order, with our most recent episode displayed first. Once you’re on an episode page, you can navigate to the next episode (in either direction) from that page. And episodes are tagged with relevant keywords to help you find related episodes!

William Cox William Cox

S1E12: You Can't Tell Just By Looking: Breaking Assumptions About "Gaydar"

Amber shares her joy about attending Portland's Outdoor Market, and Will's joy is his koi pond waking up after winter! This episode discusses a major topic from Will's research career: the notion of "gaydar" as a legitimizing myth that perpetuates stereotyping related to lesbian/gay/bisexual (LGB) folks. Although many people have intuitions that they believe allow them to "tell" that someone is gay/lesbian, research in this area consistently shows that those intuitions most often lead to largely inaccurate conclusions in the real world. Expanding on this notion of LGB stereotyping, Amber and Will discuss many ways this type of stereotyping perpetuates harm, and also unpack the LGB community's multifaceted relationship with its stereotypes and communicating or concealing identity. This episode's bias habit-breaking skill is learning to identify and disrupt "Attentional Spotlight", which draws your attention more strongly to evidence that supports stereotypes (and away from evidence that contradicts stereotypes). Amber's joyful recommendation this episode is the thoughtful and dynamic TV show, "Home Economics", which tackles many issues related to social class and race, while still being wildly entertaining!

Read More