Essay about Psychological Theories of Prejudice

I was born and raised in Europe. I have learned from my history books that there were freedom and equality in the United States. I learned that, among many other rights, people enjoy freedom of religion and freedom of speech - the rights that were envied by millions of people of the Eastern Block countries.

Prejudice influences the historical record because those opinions and beliefs are handed down through the generations and believed by others due to the influence those that express those views have on others. In the context of the Understanding Prejudice quiz about slaves and their treatment, the textbook states that “contemporary institutional and individual racism, which is central to today’s conflicts, has its origins in the institution of slavery” (Schaefer, 2015, p 168) which was embraced by many of our past presidents and which allowed long-standing prejudice and discrimination to occur against black people. The prejudicial theories of authoritarian personality, exploitation, and normative come into play as well as the theoretical perspectives of functionalist and labeling.

Human equality has always been an issue in every part of the world. Prejudice, discrimination and stereotypes have been passed on from one generation to the next. The Society has accepted these behaviors to be normal and acceptable. According to the article, “Causes of Prejudice” by Vincent N. Parrillo, there are two types of prejudice; psychological and sociological. Psychological prejudice focuses on individual behavior, where as sociological is focused more on a group. Psychological Prejudice is based on an individual’s behavior and occurs when an individual thinks and acts certain ways that can positively or negatively affect someone else. I believe that both Causes of prejudice are important, however in my opinion sociological prejudice can harm not just an individual but certain race or group of people. Therefore, sociological prejudice can be very damaging because these are beliefs that have been passed down from generation to generation in a form of a discrimination, and stereotypical behavior.

The psychological perspectives concerning prejudice is assuming someone or something is a certain way before actually knowing and having facts. The sociology book gives a few examples of theories on prejudice. It is often to hear an assumption rather than the facts when something or someone is referenced. I believe people judge to quickly. Anymore we are so focused on first impressions we tend to forget who we are. Also, it is typical to try something out once and if you were not pleased we often not give it a second chance.

Fat people are funny. If you wear Crocs means that you are a complete dork. If you are pretty, you are smart, and if you are ugly you are stupid. Little old ladies that have a lot of cats are nice. These are examples of prejudice. It is in schools, on the radio, and on TV. Prejudice is what we think of people or things just because other people look like or act like that. Prejudice is a preconceived idea that is in no way based on a reason or actual experience or evidence. Prejudice is a major problem for many people in the United States and many other places in the world, but the more you know about prejudice, the easier it is to identify and stop it.

The world has operated on a mixture of hate and envy. The United States alone has continuously had issues of prejudice – which contradicts what the nation stands for. America symbolizes the freedom, equality, and peace that people worked so hard to attain. With racial hatred and discrimination lingering in our communities, love and the principles that were fought for have not seen the light of day. It goes unnoticed by an overwhelming majority, yet there are groups of people that see this phenomenon daily and try to spread awareness. Love has the ability to fix long-lasting problems, but society’s ignorance and greediness gets in the way and clouds our understanding of how to deal with situations. A universal flaw in the human condition is

Stereotypes are something that we are all affected by in our everyday lives in one way or another. You may have made a stereotype about someone, and not even realize that you are stereotyping them. For that reason I believe that there are many different stereotypes embedded into our minds. Everyone has made a stereotype about someone, and may have been wrong or right about that stereotype. Either way if you were wrong or right about what you thought about, or labeled on a person, it is still a stereotype. I have noticed that people do not take the time to get to know someone, but rather stereotype them off appearances or gender, or religion, and many other different categories of people.

We are an insensible society. We jump at the chance to trust that bigotry is a relic of days gone by; this is a long way from reality. We, the general public, love to play imagine. We jump at the chance to trust in the uprightness and virtue of this general public. Interracial marriage is legitimate; we have pioneers of shading, and believe that anybody, regardless of what shading they are, can be anything they accomplish. Yes, we have come some routes as a general public, yet at the same time, glance around. Prejudice runs wild through urban and rural lanes alike, bringing about racial strains to flare and many to question how far we have truly originated from the times of subjection. These pressures can be viewed as in America, we saw the most transparently bigot president hopeful turn into the president of the United States of America.

The difference between racism and being prejudice is nothing. They’re the exact same thing. Both affect different minorities in America based on stereotypes. Stereotypes aren’t the only thing. Not everyone gets to live the American Dream because of their race & beliefs. People struggle feeding their families at the end of the day because they couldn’t get a better job because of their skin tone. Others can’t go to certain places without getting judged because they have hijabs on. People can be very prejudice against women, too. Women can’t live the American Dream to the fullest because men think they belong in a certain place. They shouldn’t do

Prejudice, in many forms, is defined as a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or an actual experience. This prejudgement is often a negative attitude towards members of a group and can lead to intolerance of certain groups of people based on characteristics like race, color, gender, class, ability, weight, or country of origin. Despite some progress that our society has made to counter prejudice, prejudice and discrimination have been present throughout our history, due mostly to fear and oversimplified beliefs about other cultures and people that we don’t understand or typically know nothing about.

Prejudice is a biased view of people of a different culture or race.Prejudice is deeply rooted in human nature, and lack of interaction between different racial groups also contributes to prejudice. Also,society’s prejudice against a certain group of individuals will cause other people to feel the same way.

The general populace is guilty of articulating prejudicial remarks to one another. While there are people who are fully aware of the derogatory remarks they make, others act with ignorance or with the intention of humor. The existence of insensitivity towards a crucial subject is the continuous acceptance of discriminatory behavior against minorities. Consequently, the resentment is reciprocated by the minorities back to the middle and working class people. This is the culture families implement and learns to live with and as a result, prejudicial attitudes pass on from one generation to another. The primary cause of prejudice is a sociological perspective of a person under predominance of the socialization process, economic competition, and conforming to social norms.

In today’s world, there are many social issues, like poverty, vandalism and unemployment. However, prejudice has become the most dramatic one. Prejudging people for their appearance is a common practice that humans perform. People are not only ridiculed for their color, but also by their religion, sex or age. Therefore, I consider that racism, ageism and sexism are the three major problems in our society and we need to cease them immediately. Much of our world’s history were based upon racism. In the 1600’s, white men used Africans as slaves and treated them as they were not human. "Colored" people were not even allowed to use the same drinking fountains as white people. Fortunately, in the last three decades, race

Social conformity can be toxic, it often leads to the epidemic that is prejudice. To give a better idea of what prejudice means, Judice translates to judge in Latin, therefore the term “prejudice” literally translates into “pre-judgment”. There are innumerable forms of negative preconceived notions that exist in our world today, the biggest one being racism, which often is a stem of having anti-immigration views. Immigration prejudice is not unknown to any person who lives in America and has eyes and ears to know it exists, but it’s important to know that prejudice is not innate, it is learned, and as long as we allow our society to practice xenophobia among present and future generations we will never be free of it.

In any society, how we see ourselves and how others treat us depends on many factors. Race, ethnicity, and cultural background are identifiers of individuals. Most people have confronted prejudice based on these identifiers, either personally experiencing discrimination or knowing someone who has. Beyond ensuring organizational compliance with a country’s anti-discrimination laws, it is incumbent upon managers to support diversity in the workplace and to be culturally competent.