How People's Prejudices Develop

What Is Prejudice?

Prejudice is a negative preconception or attitude toward members of a certain group. Prejudices can strongly influence how people behave and interact with others, specifically those who are different from them in some regard. Prejudice is often subconscious and can affect people's behavior without them realizing it.

Common features of prejudice include negative feelings and stereotyped beliefs about members of a group, as well as a tendency to discriminate against them. In society, we often see prejudices based on characteristics like race, sex, religion, culture, and more.

When people hold prejudicial attitudes toward others of a certain group, they tend to view everyone with the defining characteristic as the same. They paint every individual with the trait with a broad brush and fail to look at each person as a unique individual. Keep reading to learn more about prejudice and how to reduce prejudice.

Types of Prejudice

There are many types of prejudice. These include, but are not limited to:

• Ageism: The belief that someone is "too old" or "too young" for a particular role or activity.
• Classism: Negative beliefs about someone based on their income. This often manifests in people looking down on others because they are "poor" or members of the working class
• Homophobia: A sense of discomfort, fear, distrust, or hatred for people who are members of the LGBTQ+ community.
• Nationalism: The belief that the interests of your nation are more important than those of other nations.
• Racism: A sense of discomfort, fear, distrust, or hatred for people toward members of a certain racial or ethnic group. Racist beliefs have impacted many societal and governmental systems, making the oppression systemic.
• Religious prejudice: Negative feelings toward someone because of their religious beliefs, practices, and/or ideologies
• Sexism: Stereotypes and/or beliefs about someone based on their sex or gender.
• Xenophobia: The fear or general dislike of people considered "foreign" or "strange," typically compared to people in their native country.

Causes of Prejudice

How is it we become prejudiced? There are a few potential causes to consider.

Stereotypes

In many cases, prejudices and stereotypes feed into one another. A stereotype is a simplified assumption about a group based on prior experiences or beliefs.

An example of a gendered stereotype is the belief that only girls can wear dresses, or only young boys can play with trucks. Examples of racial stereotypes include "Black people are good at basketball," "White people can't dance," or "Asians are good at math."

According to an article in Current Directions in Psychological Science, prejudice comes from people who aren't comfortable with ambiguity and thus make generalizations about others. These generalizations reduce the ambiguity and ease processing, but often result in harmful judgements and actions.

Categorizing

We are inundated with too much information to sort through all of it in a methodical, and rational fashion, so we often depend upon our ability to place people, ideas, and objects into categories to make the world easier to understand.

Psychologist Gordon Allport believed sorting information into mental categories is important for making sense of the world around us. "The human mind must think with the aid of categories," Allport explained in his book, The Nature of Prejudice. "Once formed, categories are the basis for normal prejudgment. We cannot possibly avoid this process. Orderly living depends upon it."

Being able to quickly categorize information allows us to interact and react quickly, but it also leads to mistakes. For example, we tend to minimize the differences among people within certain groups and exaggerate the differences between groups. This is referred to as social categorization.

Prejudgments

In one classic experiment, participants were asked to judge the height of people shown in photographs. They were told that for every woman of a particular height, there was a man of the same height. Therefore, they were not to rely on the person's sex to determine the height.

Despite being offered a $50 cash prize for whoever made the most accurate judgments, participants consistently rated the men as being a few inches taller than the women. Because of their prejudgment and existing categorical beliefs that men are taller, the participants were unable to judge the heights accurately.

Outgroup Homogeneity Bias

People tend to view members of outside groups as being more homogenous than members of their own group. This phenomenon is referred to as the outgroup homogeneity bias. This perception that all members of an outgroup are alike holds whether the group is based on race, nationality, religion, age, or another group affiliation.

Historical Events

Sometimes prejudice develops in response to historical events. An example of this is how many people developed negative beliefs against all Muslims after the attacks on September 11, 2001. This is known as Islamaphobia and still impacts Muslim Americans today.

Family, Friends, and Social Groups

A 2018 study involving children between the ages of 3 and 9 found that even the subtlest ethnic prejudice of the parents predicted whether their children would have an implicit prejudice, regardless of parenting style. This demonstrates how easily the beliefs of parental figures can influence the development of prejudice.

Another 2018 study found similar results but with friends rather than family. This one involved 1,009 teens who were either 13 or 16 years of age and found the attitude of their peers affected the participants' level of individual prejudice.

Impact of Prejudice

Prejudice exists almost everywhere and can affect people and societies in different ways.

Poorer Health

Studies have shown a relationship between those who have experienced prejudice and poorer physical health, both directly and indirectly. Examples of direct impacts are how prejudice can lead to living in a less environment with limited access to health resources. Indirect impacts include prejudice-related stress and altered health behaviors.

Other research has linked perceived prejudice with poorer mental health as well, both in terms of ethnic identity and hopelessness. Being part of a group that experiences real or perceived prejudices can impact health both physically and mentally.

Increased Discrimination

Stereotypes not only lead to misguided beliefs but can also cause discrimination. Stereotypes can impact the ability of the person being discriminated against when trying to get a job, secure housing, and more. In some cases, discrimination may result in violence.

Studies indicate that discrimination can also negatively impact health. This is because someone who is discriminated against may lack access to nicer living conditions and quality healthcare, and may experience increased stress levels.

Research has even found that discrimination can affect the health of the person's partner, increasing their risk of depression and putting greater strain on the relationship.

Reduced Multiculturalism and Segregation

According to one study, the level at which people identify with their native country impacts their level of prejudice against people wishing to immigrate to their country.

If there is a high level of prejudice against a certain immigrant group, immigration policy is likely to reflect those prejudices and make it harder for members of that group to immigrate. Prejudice and discrimination can also lead to segregation, whether it be personal or institutional.

How to Reduce Prejudice

In addition to looking at causes for prejudice, researchers have also explored different prejudice can be reduced and eventually even eliminated. Training people to have more empathy for members of other groups is one method that has shown considerable success.

Other techniques used to reduce prejudice include, but are not limited to:

• Gaining public support and awareness for anti-prejudice social norms
• Increasing contact with members of other social groups
• Making people aware of the inconsistencies in their own beliefs
• Passing laws and regulations that require fair and equal treatment for all people