PREJUDICE

What Is the Psychology Behind Prejudice?

A negative assumption or prejudgment about members of a specific group

Prejudice is an assumption or an opinion about someone simply based on that person's membership in a particular group. For example, people can be prejudiced against someone else of a different ethnicity, gender, or religion.

If someone is acting on their prejudices, they are pre-judging (hence the term "prejudice") someone before even getting to know them on a deeper level. This is an irrational attitude and mindset which does no good for anyone involved.

"Prejudice" comes from the Latin prejudicium ("injustice") and praeiudicium ("prior judgment"), which referred to judicial examination before trial.

For example, a person might have a lot of preconceived ideas about someone who is Christian, Muslim, or Jewish and will allow those judgments to affect the way they view and treat those people. The same can be true for people who are Black, White, or Asian.

Common features of prejudice include:

Negative feelings

Stereotyped beliefs

A tendency to discriminate against members of a group

In society, we often see prejudices toward a group based on race, sex, religion, culture, and more.

While specific definitions of prejudice given by social scientists often differ, most agree that it involves prejudgments that are usually negative about members of a group.

Types of Prejudice

As mentioned, a prejudiced attitude can be based on a number of factors, including sex, race, age, sexual orientation, nationality, socioeconomic status, and religion. Some of the most well-known types of prejudice include the following:

Racism

Sexism

Ageism

Classism

Homophobia

Nationalism

Religious prejudice

Xenophobia

Prejudice is not the same as discrimination. Whereas prejudice refers to attitudes and beliefs in the abstract, discrimination describes actions that can arise from prejudice.

How Prejudice Negatively Affects All Parties

When people hold prejudicial attitudes toward others, they tend to view everyone who fits into a certain group as being "all the same." They paint every individual who holds particular characteristics or beliefs with a very broad brush and fail to really look at each person as a unique individual.

This has a very strong influence on how people behave and interact with those who are different from them.

At a basic level, it can stifle a prejudiced person’s ability to learn more about those who are different from themselves. As a result, it can also cause them to miss out on relationships or conversations that have the potential to be deeply fulfilling.

Those on the receiving end of prejudice are particularly impacted, though. Not only can those presuppositions and biases inflict true hurt, but it can even affect their ability to get a “fair shot” in this world.

For example, the ubiquitous prejudice against Black people has translated into higher incarceration rates, fewer job offers, and lower pay

Another blatant example is the prejudice against Muslims; the rampant anti-Muslim sentiment in the West has led many people to believe that all Muslims are violent and hateful.Why Prejudice Occurs

There’s no clear answer to why prejudice exists and the reality is that a number of factors come into play. According to psychologist Gordon Allport, prejudice and stereotypes emerge in part as a result of normal human thinking.In order to make sense of the world around us, it's important to sort information into mental categories.In other words, we often depend upon our ability to place people, ideas, and objects into different categories in order to make the world easier to understand.

We are simply inundated with too much information to sort through all of it in a logical, methodical, and rational fashion. Unfortunately, this quick categorization leads to faulty assumptions that have an impact on individuals and the world at large.

Fighting Against Prejudice

While in some cases prejudice is blatant—evolving into outright “-isms”—it can often occur without us even realizing it. Whether deeply ingrained, taught, or implicit bias, it is important to fight the prejudices we have against others.

One of the first ways to do this is to understand and accept that it happens. By being aware of your own natural tendency to be biased (and it’s something we all experience, whether consciously or not), you’ll be able to catch yourself more easily “in the act” and self-correct.