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Prejudice and Stereotypes Facts & Worksheets

Prejudice and Stereotype are a belief and an assumption, and the combination of the two often results in an action that is discrimination.

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Stereotypes not only describe how individuals are; they also define how they should be or what role they should play based on attributes such as sex, gender, marital status, religion, or race. Prejudices also lead to value judgments and assumptions about what people can and cannot do because of who they are. All of this contributes to discrimination and hinders equal opportunity.

See the fact file below for more information on Prejudice and Stereotypes, or you can download our 27-page Prejudice and Stereotypes worksheet pack to utilize within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

PREJUDICE AND STEREOTYPES

  • Prejudice and stereotypes are types of social biases that can exist independently of one another. Furthermore, it inevitably establishes an inequitably mainstream society.
  • Our social groups help shape our identities, and people are frequently biased against persons outside of their social group (out-groups), displaying prejudice (emotional bias) and stereotypes (cognitive bias). 
  • Individuals’ social identities, including ethnic group, sexuality, gender, socioeconomic status, immigration status, language, nationality, and religion, determine these social groups.
  • However, persons from minority social groups are more likely to suffer the harmful consequences of these biases.
  • We frequently do not consider the stereotypes or prejudices we carry, and as a result, we may unknowingly harm or disadvantage others. 
  • We may believe that we merely reflect the facts or capacities of men and women, but we are discriminating and maintaining inequity. 
  • Stereotypes and prejudices are damaging because they fail to recognize that each person has unique abilities, strengths, flaws, desires, thoughts, and feelings. 
  • Even if a stereotype is valid in a particular scenario, disparaging someone or acting in a prejudiced manner does not promote that person to succeed.
  • In simple terms, the stereotype is an assumption, prejudice is a belief, and the combination of the two often results in an action that is discrimination.

PREJUDICE, STEREOTYPES, AND DISCRIMINATION

  • Prejudice, stereotypes and discrimination can be pretty similar, but they are different. While prejudice involves having negative thoughts against that person or group members, and stereotype is a perception of a person or group, discrimination is when those two biases become converted into action.

PREJUDICE

  • A prejudice is an unfavorable view formed before any evidence, not based on reason or experience.
  • However, while negative bias receives greater attention, prejudice can still be, in fact, good or negative.
  • The most common basis of prejudices is the belief that certain types of people are less valuable or capable than others.
  • Prejudice against members of an uncommon cultural group is prevalent. 
  • Unfavorable attitude toward persons not born in the United States exemplifies prejudice. Even though persons with this prejudice do not know all people who were not born in the United States, they despise them because of their position as outsiders.
  • When people have prejudiced views toward others, they tend to see everyone with the distinguishing feature as “all the same,” painting every individual with specific characteristics or ideas with a broad brush and failing to see each person as unique.

Types of Prejudice

Positive Prejudice

  • Positive prejudice occurs when an individual has positive ideas about another based on their social group membership; for example, someone may have particularly positive feelings toward Hindus. Nonetheless, although being classified as positive, positive prejudice can be rather superficial.
  • One example of positive prejudice toward Hinduism. Non-Hindus may have good opinions about Hinduism merely because they love doing yoga. Still, they may have little grasp of the religion and what it means to utilize yoga vocabulary from a Hindu perspective.

Implicit Prejudice

  • Implicit bias is unconscious, which means that the person who harbors prejudices is ignorant that they exist. 
  • They have conducted sociological studies to analyze people’s emotions toward out-groups or individuals who are not part of their social groupings in the case of unconscious prejudice.
  • The Implicit Association Test (IAT) asks participants to categorize phrases and images swiftly, and the majority of results demonstrate that people are quicker to positively label words and pictures representing their social groupings or in-groups than those that represent out-groups. 
  • Furthermore, negative attitudes toward the IAT are frequently related to prejudices.

Explicit Prejudice

  • When someone is upfront about and conscious of their emotional biases, it is explicit prejudice.

Classifications of Prejudice

Prejudice divides people based on stereotypes as well. Examples of these includes:

  • Ableism refers to negative views toward physical and mental capabilities.
  • Ageism is the belief that someone is “too old” or “too young” to work in a specific profession or participate in a particular activity.
  • Cissexism refers to negative views toward people who do not identify with the sex assigned to them at birth.
  • Classism refers to looking down on someone because they are “poor” or a part of the working class or just having a bad attitude toward someone based on their money.
  • Homophobia refers to negative opinions against members of the 2SLGBTQ+ group.
  • Nationalism is the view that your country’s group’s interests are more significant than those of other nations.
  • Racism is negative sentiments toward race, ethnicity, and culture.
  • Religious prejudice is a negative attitude toward someone because of their religious beliefs, practices, or philosophies.
  • Sexism refers to negative sentiments based on gender identity, gender expression, and birth sex.
  • Xenophobia refers to unfavorable views depending on national origin/country.

STEREOTYPES

  • A stereotype is a specific view or assumption (thoughts) about people based purely on their group membership, regardless of their traits. 
  • Even if a stereotype is perceived or intended to be positive, the reality that not all group members fit that criterion frequently results in a “positive” stereotype which is disadvantageous to specific individuals.
  • Stereotypes exist everywhere. Whether you agree or disagree with a stereotype, its content is often well-known within a specific community.
  • A stereotype is a cognitive bias found in an assumption about all people who identify with a particular social group, regardless of individual distinctions within that group.
  • Stereotypes frequently emerge as society draws judgments about social positions. Women, for example, are often stereotyped as caregivers who work at home, and this image arose as a result of women’s historically low labor-force participation. 
  • While people may find stereotypes in observations of everyday life, it is vital to analyze why different social groupings are around for specific social responsibilities.

Types of Stereotypes

Stereotypes, like prejudices, can be positive or negative.

Negative Stereotypes

  • Negative stereotypes, for example, suggest that all Mexican American women work as maids because they frequently seek employment in the hospitality industry, where they are allocated housekeeping jobs despite any advanced education.
  • These negative stereotypes are not only difficult to define, but they frequently have very significant repercussions. 
  • Women, for example, have a more challenging time finding jobs, and when they do, they do not experience fair compensation.

Positive Stereotypes

  • Positive stereotypes can also have negative consequences. For example, according to the mainstream definition of success, the model minority stereotype is due to Asian Americans who have attained success in the United States. Despite the positive meaning of success, recipients of this stereotype frequently have unpleasant reactions.
  • Not all Asian Americans have a track record of success, and this generalization ignores individual diversity. Furthermore, this stereotype stresses Asian Americans, who think they must perform at an exceedingly high level.
  • Asian Americans also face negative stereotypes; hence, when the model minority comes into generalization, out-groups disregard and underestimate the unequal structures. They must battle to succeed in mainstream culture.

Intersectionality 

  • When it comes to identifying people, intersectionality is critical. In other words, a Black male who identifies as transgender will undoubtedly have different life experiences than a Black male who identifies as cisgender.
  • Because people’s social groupings are interrelated, each individual has unique experiences, frequently resulting in different examples of oppression and discrimination.

Classification of Stereotypes

  • Gender Stereotypes
  • Race and Ethnicity Stereotypes
  • Sexuality Stereotypes
  • Social-class Stereotypes
  • Dis(Ability Stereotypes)
  • Age Stereotypes
  • Nationality Stereotypes
  • Religious Stereotypes
  • Political Stereotypes

CAUSES

The factors that cause prejudice are much likely the same as stereotypes. The following are examples.

  • Stereotypes and prejudice are often the results of the following:
    • Societal inequalities.
    • Ideas learned about other people/groups from family members, friends, and the media. 
    • Not spending enough time with people who are different from you somehow.
    • Not being open to new ideas and ways of life.

Prejudice to Stereotypes, and Stereotypes to Prejudice

  • Stereotypes may often root prejudice, and the same goes for prejudice, which can also entrench stereotypes. 

Categorizing

  • We have just too much information to filter it in a logical, systematic, and rational manner. As a result, we frequently rely on our ability to categorize people, ideas, and objects to simplify and understand the world.  

Prejudgments

  • Participants were to evaluate the height of people in photos in one classic experiment. They told the participants that for every lady of a certain height, a male of the same height existed. Therefore, they must not rely on the person’s gender in their judgment.
  • Participants repeatedly judged men as a few inches taller than women, despite being offered a $50 cash award for the most accurate judgments. They could not discard their initial categorical ideas and appropriately estimate the heights due to their prejudgment that males are taller than women.

Family, Friends, and Social Groups

  • According to research, for children between the ages of three and nine, if their parents held even modest ethnic bias, it would indicate whether their children had an implicit prejudice, regardless of their parenting style. It suggests that if a prejudice/stereotype develops, parental figures’ ideas are the ones who impact them.
  • Another study showed similar outcomes, although with friends rather than family. This study involved 1,009 teenagers aged 13 to 16 and discovered that the attitudes of their peers influenced the participants’ level of individual prejudice.

Prejudice and Stereotypes Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle that includes everything you need to know about Prejudice and Stereotypes across 27 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use worksheets that are perfect for teaching kids about Prejudice and Stereotype, which are a belief and an assumption, and the combination of the two often results in an action that is discrimination.

Complete List of Included Worksheets

Below is a list of all the worksheets included in this document.

  1. Prejudice and Stereotypes Facts
  2. Division of Prejudices
  3. Pre, Ster, or Both?
  4. Stereotypes
  5. Write the Missing Answer
  6. Aspect of Biases
  7. Movie Search
  8. My Personal Trials
  9. Biases in Neighborhood
  10. Bias Prevention
  11. Spoken Poetry

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between prejudice and stereotypes?

A stereotype is a generalization that is often flawed and not accurate. It can be positive or negative. A prejudice is an unfair feeling of dislike for someone or something, usually based on inaccurate information.

How is stereotyping harmful?

Many social prejudices come from harmful stereotypes. These are false beliefs that one group of people is better than another group. This can lead to bad feelings between groups of people. sometimes people can be friends with each other because they share common interests, not just because they have the same beliefs.

What is the importance of stereotypes?

Stereotypes have both benefits and costs: though they help us respond quickly to new situations, they also often cause us to overlook distinctions between individuals. This can result in hasty judgments that may not be accurate.

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Use With Any Curriculum

These worksheets have been specifically designed for use with any international curriculum. You can use these worksheets as-is, or edit them using Google Slides to make them more specific to your own student ability levels and curriculum standards.

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