Prejudice:
An attitude
(usually negative) shown towards individuals based on his/her religious,
cultural, ethnic, political or other affiliation without having prior knowledge
about the group. Such attitudes are based on assumptions far from objective
reality. Prejudice has cognitive,
affective, and behavioral components. Based on beliefs, it can affect one's emotions and behavior, sometimes leading to discrimination. Prejudiced
beliefs primarily take the form of stereotypes, overall impressions based on
the assumption that all members of a group possess similar attributes. Prejudices can both negative and positive.
Eg. Women are weak. (Negative)
Europeans are educated and intelligent. (Positive)
Stereotype:
Stereotype is
defined as an “oversimplified, usually pejorative, attitude people hold towards
those outside one’s own experience who are different. They are a result of
incomplete or distorted information accepted as fact without question. A
stereotype is simply a widely held belief that an individual of certain group
holds distinct characteristics. Due to the process of overgeneralization within
social perception, stereotyping leads to a great deal of inaccuracy in social
perception. Sex, race, age, religion, sexual orientation and physical ability
are various categories which exist in stereotyping. The most prevalent and
controversial forms are sex and race.
When prejudice becomes a
belief then it is termed as stereotype. Such belief may or may not be real. Prejudices
are reproduced time and again due to conformity biases in individuals which
embeds into the belief system. E.g. Muslims are stereotyped as terrorists.
Discrimination:
Discrimination
is a behavioral aspect just opposite to generalization. In psychology
discrimination is neither negative nor positive. Discrimination is the tendency
to react against different stimuli in different ways. For example: if a person
encounters a tiger in the wild, he/she tries to flee but the same person may
not flee if he/she encounters a peacock.
However, if the
discrimination is resulted by prejudice or stereotype then such discriminations
are usually negative. Usually negative discriminations are studied in the
social sciences. Eg. Racial discrimination, caste based discrimination,
religious discrimination, gender discrimination etc.
