"North Eastern Chinese" Stereotypes Essay

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

Stereotypes are socially constructed, over-generalized views regarding a particular group of persons with certain characteristics that are widely accepted, and usually expected, in a society. The dominant group of a certain society, which in this case is probably Caucasians and men, usually creates these social constructions. Claude M. Steele, a researcher from Stanford University, performed multiple research studies on the idea and psychological effects of stereotypes on its victims. In his studies, he coins the term “stereotype threat” as the “social-psychological predicament that can arise from widely-known negative stereotypes about one's group,” which implies that “the existence of such a stereotype means that anything one does or any of one's features that conform to it make the stereotype more plausible as a self-characterization in the eyes of others, and perhaps even in one's own eyes” (Steele 797).

It is common for people in society to assume certain characteristics about a person based solely on their visual appearance. Though it is extremely easy to confuse ethnicities when judging by appearance, it is common for people to make assumptions about people’s culture, habits, and overall livelihood when they assign people to an ethnic category based on their looks without knowing the truth. A major issue with ethnic stereotyping is its ability to influence people to conform to ethnic stigmas. Many people subconsciously adapt to socially-constructed expectations related to ethnicity. This is often caused merely by human nature, in which people usually seek affiliation among their peers and fail to explore alternative ways of

Devine (1989) argues that stereotypes are inevitable on the basis that stereotypes and prejudice coexist and that stereotyping occurs automatically. Devine attempts to prove this hypothesis in three experiments. Devine reasons that “as long as stereotypes exist, prejudice will follow.” This hypothesis is rooted in a correlation. Prejudice and stereotypes are related, however there is no clear evidence of causality; Knowledge of a stereotype does not mean an individual agrees with it.

2. Reviewer question: Is the thesis clearly stated? If not, how would you help the writer restate it?

I would like to address the use of English in your essay, particularly for several incorrect spelling and grammar, which I already marked and inserted comments on your paper.

There are three major perspectives on stereotypes: Psychodynamic perspective, sociocultural perspectives and Cognitive perspectives. Psychodynamic perspective argues that stereotypes serve intra-psychic needs - protect self against anxiety (ego defense mechanisms); self-esteem benefits to viewing outgroup negatively. If stereotypes are to change, alternatives must be supplied for protecting against anxiety. Sociocultural argues that stereotypes are made by society and that for stereotypes to change new stereotypes need to be made. Cognitive Perspectives suggest that categorization is fundamental - simplifies, organizes, allows predictability. Stereotypes guide information processing to produce a bias that maintains the status quo. Attend to, notice stereotype-consistent information, make stereotype-consistent inferences, and recall stereotype-consistent information better, and so on.

To begin with, after reading the comments given to me by my fellow classmates; I noticed that some of my classmates didn’t like the idea of jumping straight into book without a brief description. In other words, they felt that I needed to provide an introduction to my paper and make my thesis clear in the beginning, rather than stating it on the second page. With that in mind, and since the readers pretended like they never read the books before, I decided to take some sentences out and rearrange the order of the first two pages. In addition to this, it bothered me that all the response forms interpreted my thesis statement differently, which meant my thesis wasn’t clear to the readers. Granted that some of the readers understood what I was trying to do, I decided to rephrase my thesis and try to make it as clear as possible that way they know early on what this paper incorporates.

Thank you for your help on my discussion. When I read your thesis statement it sounds like your goal is to complete your degree. I also sense that learning the material in this class seems to be a vital piece to completing the entire degree. Is that where you are going with this paper?

In our society, when people encounter someone, the first concern appearing in their minds about that person are race, gender, and appearance that are crucial since it can determine how they relate to the person. That consumption mostly comes from stereotype, the firm thoughts that people make about a particular group of people based on observation of several members of the group. The advantage of stereotype is helping people respond rapidly to their situations by applying the same thoughts to the similar experience, but that applying may be incorrect because individuals are different. That black people are good at athletics, or Asians are wealthy are positive stereotypes. Conversely, that Latinos commit illegal immigration, black people are associated with urban crime, or young Asians are gangs are negative stereotypes. That indicates the existence of both positive and negative stereotypes in the society; however, the negative stereotypes are likely

Stereotyping is the “selective attribution of specific trait of characteristic to particular social groups and their members” (Wyer 1). As human beings, our brains have developed a way to store information about other people’s behavior, through similarities. This

It has been demonstrated by previous research that the illusory correlation in stereotype formation is to separate groups in a meaningful way (Ford & Tonander, 1998). Attributes can become strongly associated in memory when the difference of groups is high. Stereotypes are used to maximize self-esteem by differentiating into an in-group and an out-group as

There are many cons about being stereotypical to someone. Some of the cons are, it might hurt someone’s feelings, have a lasting impact on someone’s life, and could cause problems at workplaces, schools etc. It can hurt someone’s feelings because it causes a terrible understanding of a person. If people say that all Asians are terrible drivers, which might give other people an idea that all Asians are bad drivers which is not true. That will also give Asians a bad reputation because just a handful of Asians are terrible drivers. Sometimes, being stereotypical could cause people to take it to heart and stays with them for a long time. Especially when something tragic happened to someone which is similar to the stereotype. A family of the victim could have died because of an Asian driver who was driving recklessly. That could remind them about that situation and could really impact them. Sometimes, being stereotypical could lead to conflicts at work or school or any other place. There are many people who take stereotypes too far and some who take it too seriously. With only 1 of them, that could lead to a

Stereotyping is a process that every person will experience in their lives. It is part of being of a group to be associated with others of the same group. Stereotyping can come in many forms either by judging the whole group by the action of a few, or by judging a single individual by the action of someone else in the same group.”Stereotyping means classifying a person as part of a group, making a generalization to that person”(Floyd, 2012, p. 116). Stereotyping is disliked by so many people because they do not wish to be judged by the actions of others. When you meet new people you often want to make a good impression and show

Cultural influence affects not only the formation of a stereotype, but also its acceptance. According to the tripartite model of attitudes, a stereotype is the cognitive component of prejudiced attitudes. Many contemporary theorists suggest prejudice is an inevitable consequence of the stereotyping process (Devine, 1989). This makes learning attitudes and stereotypes of social groups inevitable. There is strong evidence that stereotypes are established in children’s memories before they have the ability to use cognitive processing to accept or reject the stereotypes. In this developmental process, the stereotype is easier to access for the child than personal beliefs; therefore, the culture an individual lives in makes it impossible not to apply stereotypes in daily life (Devine, 1989).