Prejudice can be difficult to change due to its deep-rooted sources. Imagine you are working on a community outreach programme aiming to reduce prejudice. How would you explain the main causes that lead to development of prejudice ?
Prejudice can be difficult to change due to its deep-rooted sources. Imagine you are working on a community outreach programme aiming to reduce prejudice. How would you explain the main causes that lead to development of prejudice ?
Prejudice develops from several interacting sources rather than a single cause.
Social Categorisation (Ingroup–Outgroup Bias)
- People naturally divide the social world into 'us' (ingroup) and 'them' (outgroup), favouring the ingroup and viewing outgroups negatively or stereotypically.
Social Learning
- Prejudiced attitudes are learnt from parents, teachers, peers and media through observation, direct teaching and reinforcement, often internalised in early childhood before critical evaluation is possible.
Cognitive Factors (Stereotyping)
- Stereotypes act as mental shortcuts (heuristics) that oversimplify outgroups; illusory correlations make people see patterns between group membership and negative traits that do not really exist.
Motivational/Realistic Conflict Factors
- Competition over scarce resources (jobs, land, status) between groups, and frustration-driven scapegoating of a weaker outgroup, both fuel prejudice.
A community programme must therefore target contact, education and shared goals across all these levels simultaneously.
Marking Scheme
- 11 mark: Social categorisation — ingroup favouritism and outgroup bias.
- 21 mark: Social learning — prejudice learnt from family, peers, media.
- 31 mark: Cognitive factors — stereotyping and illusory correlation as mental shortcuts.
- 41 mark: Motivational factors — realistic conflict over resources and scapegoating due to frustration.
Hint
Organise causes under four heads: social categorisation, social learning, cognitive stereotyping, and motivational/competition factors — don't just say 'stereotypes cause prejudice.'
Quick Oral Answer
Prejudice develops mainly from social categorisation into ingroups and outgroups, social learning from family and media, cognitive stereotyping as a mental shortcut, and motivational factors like competition over resources and scapegoating.
Analysis & Explanation
This question expects students to organise prejudice's origins under clear categories rather than a single vague cause like 'people are prejudiced because they don't like others.'
Concept
NCERT groups the sources of prejudice broadly into social/cultural (categorisation, socialisation), motivational (realistic conflict, scapegoating) and cognitive (stereotyping, illusory correlation) factors, sometimes alongside historical factors like long-standing social inequality.
Exam Trap
A common error is describing only stereotypes as the cause of prejudice, ignoring the equally important socialisation and intergroup-competition roots — a 4-mark answer needs at least three to four distinct, well-explained sources.
Application angle
The question's 'community outreach programme' framing rewards students who briefly connect each cause to a possible intervention (e.g., intergroup contact to reduce ingroup–outgroup bias, media literacy to counter learnt stereotypes), showing applied understanding, not just definitions.
Real-world relevance
Understanding that prejudice is multiply determined explains why single interventions (like one awareness workshop) rarely eliminate it — sustained, multi-level programmes are needed.
Common Mistakes
- 1Explaining only 'stereotyping' in depth while ignoring social learning and intergroup competition as equally valid causes.
- 2Confusing prejudice (attitude) with discrimination (behaviour) and describing acts of discrimination instead of causes of the underlying attitude.
- 3Giving generic causes like 'ignorance' or 'hatred' without linking them to the specific psychological mechanisms (categorisation, learning, cognition, motivation) the syllabus requires.
Interesting Facts
Muzafer Sherif's Robbers Cave Experiment (1954) demonstrated that intergroup competition over scarce resources alone was enough to create prejudice between two groups of boys within days, and shared 'superordinate goals' reduced it.
Gordon Allport's Contact Hypothesis (1954) proposed that prejudice reduces most reliably when groups have equal status contact, common goals, cooperation, and institutional/social support — a principle still used in modern anti-bias programmes.
Children as young as three to four years show ingroup preference in experiments, suggesting social categorisation begins developing well before explicit prejudice is verbally expressed.
Spotted a mistake or something unclear?
Tell us — we fix reported answers fast.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the main sources of prejudice according to NCERT Class 12 Psychology?
The main sources are social categorisation (ingroup-outgroup bias), social learning from family/media, cognitive factors like stereotyping and illusory correlation, and motivational factors such as realistic conflict over resources and frustration-based scapegoating.
How can prejudice be reduced in a community programme?
Strategies include equal-status intergroup contact with common goals (contact hypothesis), education/media literacy to unlearn stereotyped socialisation, and cooperative activities that replace resource competition with shared superordinate goals.