Social Expectations Of Racial Stereotypes In Society

The world is full of many evils, including hate, war, discrimination, poverty etc, and though it is nowhere near as bad as it once was years ago it is still an issue for society today. The idea that an entire group of individuals who share similar characteristics are all the same is known as a stereotype (Kassin, Fein, Markus, Burke, 2013). There are several different stereotypes ranging from gender to race, age, social class, ethnicity, etc. Unfortunately far too often members of different social groups experience discrimination by people who are prejudice towards them because of their social group. The majority if not all people will experience some type of discrimination due to stereotyping throughout their lifetime. This also means

Racial stereotypes suggest that all black people are great at sports (YourDictionary, 2014). Gender stereotypes can include the idea that men do all the work and are stronger than women (YourDictionary, 2014). They may also suggest that women are not good at sports or cannot drive as well as men (YourDictionary, 2014). Sexual stereotypes send out the idea that men who show their feminine side and women who show too many masculine traits must be homosexuals (YourDictionary, 2014). Additional stereotypes include blondes being unintelligent, teenagers being rebellious, women focusing on nothing but their looks, the list goes on and on (YourDictionary,2014). Far too often people feel as though they are being viewed negatively because of their belonging specific social groups (Kassin, Fein, Markus, Burke, 2013). Whether it be because they do exhibit the stereotypical behaviour or even because they do not exhibit the behaviour and they feel as though they should (Kassin, Fein, Markus, Burke, 2013). This concern is known as a stereotype threat and can have negative outcomes (Kassin, Fein, Markus, Burke,

Stereotypes form because of people unintentionally passing on social information to one another (Martin, Hutchison, Slessor, Urquhart, Cunningham, Smith, 2014). Information that is generally complex gets passed onto others who unwillingly select simple traits creating categories for people (Martin, 2014). Whether it be our own family members, teachers, peers, the media, etc., who pass the idea of stereotypes on to us it is almost impossible to avoid any of the information. Research suggest that stereotypes begin with slight aspects of the truth that over time explodes into overwhelming ideas of what others should or should not be (Jacobs, 2014). Stereotype inconsistent information is any information that does not conform with societies general idea of stereotypes (Kashima, Lyons, & Clark, 2013). Stereotype consistent information is information that is passed to one another that follows the general ideas that we already have about other social groups (Kashima, Lyons, & Clark, 2013). Plenty of studies have shown that during communication people tend to remember stereotype-consistent information much more than stereotype-inconsistent information (Kashima, Lyons, & Clark, 2013). Researchers believe this is due to stereotype-consistent information appearing to be truer than stereotype-inconsistent information (Kashima, Lyons, & Clark, 2013). This strengthens societies