Conformity And Its Effects On Society

Stereotypes are a form of prejudice everyone will once experience in their lifetime. Stereotypes are centered around an individual's race, gender, social class, religion, and age. They have been known to be elements people use to make judgments and subjectify people to one key feature. As Gordon Allport states, “ To state the matter technically, a noun abstracts from a concrete reality some one features and assembles different concrete realities only with respect to this one feature”(364). Mr.Allport’s words can be summed up to say stereotypes have been used as key fundamentals to associate one feature or aspect of a person with a group that represents it, typically in an unfavorable way.

Many individuals is faced with the decision of conforming or choosing personal desire, and it is not an easy decision. It is hard because being shunned by others for being different is not a good feeling. Choosing to conform over personal desire, often leads to loss. On the other hand, personal desire is what sets others apart and gives them joy. In the poem, “The Jackhammer Syndrome”, Al Purdy discusses the good and bad memories he has experienced. He goes through his memories of when he had fun and made mistakes, but he reflects on what he could have done better. The author of “The Jackhammer Syndrome informs against choosing the welcoming joy of conformity over the long-term gains of personal desire. Making the decision to pursue conformity over personal desire may seem easy at first, but if the choice is to conform, the joy it gives will not last. Making the decision to pursue conformity over personal desire Conformity may seem to give joy at first, but it does not last. When Al is playing pool with his brother, he wants to win badly, but losses. However when he did not care to win, Al wins! Conforming can lead to loss but personal desire has much to gain. If the choice is to conform, personal identity may be lost. In my life, I recognize several instances in which I found several similarities between Al and myself. I have made decisions that were not always good ones such as swimming across long distances with friends.

In life, there is a common ground on which most every person can relate. At one time or another, we have all been promoters of or victims of the unremitting nature of stereotypes. According to the Webster’s dictionary, a stereotype is defined as “a simplified and standardized conception or image invested with special meaning and held in common by members of a group.” Most stereotypes take on a negative form and are based on characteristics such as age, gender, race, status, and personal beliefs. Generally speaking, the greatest problem that arises with stereotypes is that they judge group of people by the characteristics and actions of their ancestors, rather than on an individual basis. More often than not, these assumptions will

Many people have an oversimplified and erroneous view of a certain group of people. Stereotypes are typically associated with having negative connotations of a particular group of people. In many occasions, positive qualities of the group are overlooked and they are instead categorized by social norms created by stereotypes. Stereotyping affects everyone, whether it is through the discrimination of age, race, gender

A female officer has to deal with a lot of criticism, there is the female cop stereotype, the pressures of having to prove themselves to their male counterparts, as well as society’s expectation of any female who is out in the work force. A stereotype is a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular of person or thing. Along with stereotypes, comes exaggerations of those stereotypes being made. An exaggeration is a statement that represents as better or worse than it really is. After that exaggeration has been made from the stereotype comes the misconceptions of it all.

Individuals are bound by the community and culture that they are involved in, and many cases people tries to define them as a group, and idea of stereotypes, defined as “… fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing” (Stereotype [Def. 1], n.d.) begins to form. However when these stereotypes are held among the larger population,

Stereotypes or as some people call them generalizations are assumptions people often make about the characteristics of members apart of a certain group or race. Though there is no exact period to determine when stereotypes were developed, through commonsense, the answer to these questions is captured in the social learning theory which specifies that learning is a cognitive process that takes place in a social context and can occur purely through observation or direct instruction. In agreement with an article in Psychology Today, the brain uses stereotypes to create shortcuts for itself to explain why things may be a certain way, and many people don’t realize that their brains are making these presumptions subconsciously. Growing up in the

Although stereotypes may not always be negative, stereotypes can lead to prejudice and/or racism through the inaccurate beliefs of some people about the social and cultural beliefs of others (Stuurman, 2004). The tragic consequences of these predisposed assumptions are that

In today’s society there are many different stereotypes, many of which can be applied to every single ethnic group. At one point in any person’s life, they would have experienced some form of stereotyping. Every individual, whether young or old, is labelled with either a negative or positive stereotype. For example, it is often typically said that lawyers are deceitful, females tend to be less aggressive than males, all African Americans are extremely virtuous at basketball, and the list is simply endless. Stereotypes are often heard every day and everywhere, at any given moment. They are usually very widespread and used so frequently that they have seemed to become a natural behavior for human beings; and it is a part of our everyday life. At times we can find ourselves in situations where we make stereotypes and or assumptions for a large group of individuals. Stereotyping is a way in which people categorize and group one another. Stereotypes can affect people’s social lives, along with their emotions, and also how people interact within a particular environment as well. Stereotyping is a form of prejudgment that is as customary in today’s society as it was many years ago. It is a social attitude which has stood the test of time and attracted much attention from social physiologists alongside philosophers. Many approaches to, and theories of stereotyping have consequently been raised.

Stereotypes and do occur in different ways and from the wide range of ages, culture, cultural, etc. stereotypes can almost reach anyone. Stereotypes are so versatile and they are often called, seems to be almost the essential part of human existence (Mosser 2011). For this reason, it can be difficult to know where they come from and why are they so hard to hard to extinguish. Stereotype, when principles and values associated themselves because of their characteristics in culture because of their common characteristics, they seem the lot.

A stereotype is an inference that a person has certain traits that all members of the group have. It is a mindset that is based on assumptions. These structures affect how people process information and perceive others. The innate need for order leads humans to sort people into groups based on certain traits. This type of categorization is not only socially acceptable but encouraged as a way to simplify daily social interactions. While stereotyping reduces the amount of processing required during social interaction, it often leads to prejudice and misguided assumptions. Stereotypes can be based on numerous characteristics, including race, religious affiliation, and even gender. Gender stereotypes are especially prevalent and often used. Gender stereotyping includes automatically assigning certain attributes to a person based on their gender. This mentality has been prevalent in almost every era, including the 16th and 21st century. In both the 16th and 21st century, society has a huge impact on the individual by creating stereotypical gender roles and then applying pressure to conform to them.

The presences of stereotypes are overwhelming and are developed by both the environment a subject is raised in and their family. Stereotypes, which are pervasive throughout different societies, become intertwined in the collective values of the society as justification for all forms of social, economic, and political inequality among groups (Devine and Elliot 2000;Kaplan 2004; Operario and Fiske 2004). As people become more exposed to stereotypes they start to become a permanent part of a person’s life, they begin to stereotype themselves almost always involuntarily.

Robert Heilbroner, in his essay “Don’t Let Stereotypes Warp Your Judgments,” justifies why the ideas stereotyped aren’t always correct. He goes on saying that stereotypes are “a kind of gossip about the world, a gossip that makes us pre-judge people before we ever lay eyes on them. ” which makes us fit more into the life we think we need to live. He

People often subject others to a variety of stereotypes, accusing them of being a certain way without regard to what kind of person they actually are. Stereotypes are one or many generalizations of a group of people, whether negative or positive, founded on the basis that a majority of them share said characteristic (McLeod). Though people have come to realize the dastardly consequences of labeling, stereotypes have persisted in our culture, unrelentingly. Why? Stereotypes, whether racial, gender-based, religion-based, age-based, etc., continually permeate our society because it is difficult to undermine the psychological aspects of stereotyping, because of the media, and because it’s easier for people to cope with certain situations when

In today’s society, and many generations before us, stereotypes have overrun how we think as a collective group. From the way we act around others to the way we perceive the actions and conversations around us, they are all influenced by stereotypes. Whether these stereotypes are taught to us from our parents, our peers, or through media influences, they are strongly embedded in our conscious mind and thoughts.