Discrimination & Prejudice – A thing of the past?
By Simran Chandrasekaran
Discrimination and prejudice! These are two words that are often used interchangeably, but do you know difference?
Discrimination is treating people poorly because of their race, gender, age, disability, or even religion. Prejudice on the other hand is an opinion one has against the other solely because they belong to a particular group of people (Greenberg et al., 2015). Now that you understand what I mean by prejudice and discrimination ask yourself a few questions: Have you ever kept your distance from certain people only because they belong to a group you dislike? Have you ever felt like you are biased towards people like you, and displayed an attitude towards those who aren’t as similar? These might be subtle forms of what psychologists call discrimination and prejudice.
Figure 1: Discrimination and Stress Go Hand-in-Hand (2015)
On the other hand, if you were someone who has faced discrimination, and I asked you to describe how you felt in one word, the word is likely to be similar to ‘awful’ or ‘hurt’. Greenberg (2015) suggests that discrimination tends to lower the victim’s self-esteem causing them to feel emotions like pain and helpless. But this comes along with another question: Is reduced self-esteem the extent of the problem for people who experience discrimination? The answer is NO. Apart from reduced self-esteem, discrimination has also been the cause of mental distress. In the figure, you can see that people (marked with the orange bars) who experience discrimination are more mentally distressed than those who do not (the blue bars). If you are anything like me you would probably think, “What can we do to change our attitudes?” This is a question I have an answer to, but before we get into the solution it is important to thoroughly understand the different aspects of the problem. You might be wondering that discrimination is a thing of the past just because you don’t see or hear much about it anymore. But it isn’t all in the past!
Shocking evidence shows that a person is the most vulnerable to discrimination at his/her workplace. To find a solution to this problem, it is important to understand the different forms of discrimination that occur in such places.
David is a man using a wheelchair who applied for a job. He was confident about getting the job as he had a lot of prior experience in the field and was a perfect fit based the job description. He goes for his interview but sadly gets rejected. When David asks for the reason for being rejected, the hiring committee says, “we will have to make specific arrangements in order to accommodate you and that is something we do not want to invest in.”
This is a form of classic or explicit discrimination. This kind of discrimination stems from minds that are aware of their wrong beliefs but intentionally choose to stick to them. Negative attitudes against those who have disabilities is one of the most common forms discrimination can take in a workplace. Due to situations like these, multiple acts have been passed to protect those with disabilities and provide them with equal opportunities. One of the acts that protect disabled people from discrimination is the Americans with Disability Act (ADA) of 1990.
In contrast to explicit discrimination, there exists modern discrimination or in other words covert discrimination. The manager of a company calls for a meeting to discuss a crisis. Two of his employees, one male and the other female, put forward very good ideas. The manager leans towards the opinion of the male employee even though the female employee had a better idea. This is a form of covert or implicit racial discrimination. Attitudes and behaviors like this come from people who may be unaware that their thoughts are harmful or biased (Perception Institute, 2017). This is the most common form of discrimination we see in society nowadays. An act was passed in order to protect people in the workforce from sex discrimination. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employers from treating employees differently or less favorably because of their sex.
There are acts and laws in place to reduce discrimination in the workplace, but what about outside one’s office - in society, among people like you and me? What are some things we can do to stop ourselves from holding biases?
Training ourselves to have more empathy towards people who belong to other groups has been one of the most effective methods to reduce both implicit and explicit forms of discrimination (The Psychology Behind People’s Prejudices, 2022). Empathy is one’s ability to understand what someone else might be feeling. People high in empathy are able to put themselves in other’s shoes and view the world from different points of view. Reaching this level of understanding and connection is not easy, but it is an important step we must take.
Another method that has proven to be effective is increasing contact with members from other groups. Frequent interaction with such members helps us relate to them more, and once we relate to a person, we begin focusing on similarities rather than differences.
Discrimination and prejudice aren’t things that can be wiped away overnight. It takes time, patience, and understanding. So, why don’t we start here? Practice empathy every time you get the opportunity to do so. Begin interacting with people outside your circle and familiarize yourself with others’ views. These might seem like little steps to you, but these little steps will have a huge impact. Start now. Let’s work towards making the world a better place for not just friends and family, but for EVERYONE.
References
Discrimination and stress go hand-in-hand. (2015). [Graph]. American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2015/impact
Discrimination at Job Interview. (2016). [Illustration]. iStock. https://www.istockphoto.com/vector/discrimination-at-job-interview-gm512806184-87319045
Employment Laws: Disability & Discrimination. (n.d.). U.S. Department of Labor. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/odep/publications/fact-sheets/employment-laws-disability-and-discrimination
Greenberg, J., Schmader, T., Arndt, J., & Landau, M. (2015). Social Psychology: The Science of Everyday Life (First Edition). Worth Publishers.
Perception Institute. (2017). Implicit Bias Explained. https://perception.org/research/implicit-bias/
Sex Discrimination | U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. (n.d.). U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. https://www.eeoc.gov/youth/sex-discrimination
Statista. (2019, October 24). How Common Is Workplace Discrimination? Statista Infographics. https://www.statista.com/chart/19761/discrimination-experienced-by-respondents-in-the-workplace/
The Impact of Discrimination. (2015). American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2015/impact
The Psychology Behind People’s Prejudices. (2022, March 17). Verywell Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-prejudice-2795476#toc-how-to-reduce-prejudice