Do you ever unconsciously stereotype someone or something at a glance?

Question

I asked a question earlier concerning this issue; I guess I should have clarified what I meant. I don’t consciously buy into stereotypes (I don’t judge people by their appearance), but sometimes I reflexively associate someone or something at a glance; though I don’t hold on to such unconscious reasoning.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080827173231AAX0kBZ&r=w

Answer 1

Judging by your avatar, you're a proponent of nuclear disarmament. Does that count?

Answer 2

I think everyone does it to a degree whether they'll admit it or not. I know I do. It's how we asses danger/safety, flight/fight, defense/offense and other environmental factors. It's instinct to react then asses the situation and decide how to proceed.

It looks like you got bit on your previous question because people assumed you asked it in a threatening or judgmental tone. I hate that aspect of the internet that you can't hear how a question/answer is being asked/answered.

Answer 3

Constantly, how else can I look down on them?

Answer 4

Absolutely. And not only racial ones. I look at a child and assume it's a student or assume things about it's behavior.. ( I don't typically like children)  

Answer 5

I don't even think that we do it unconciously all the time. It's human instinct to judge people, whether we do it conciously or subconciously. Thus by judging their appearence upon first glance without getting to know them, we automatically stereotype and catagorize them.  

Answer 6

yeah i have to say i do.

but im not proud

Answer 7

Well if I see a guy in a rice rocket painted burn-your-eyes-out yellow swerving through traffic. . . . I'm gonna think he wants me to race him.

It's fun cutting them off too. :)

Answer 8

well kind of when i see a pretty girl i think she is dumb and she do not know how to cook and she is selfish. but its like the first thing i tink but then i feel bad for judging someone without knowing her.

        plz to all girls who i've judge, forgive me

Answer 9

yes, like black people, white people in old pick-up trucks and europeans.

everyone does it and those who say they dont are LIARS. we all have some sort of racial tendencies. it's human nature

Answer 10

I would say yes.  When you see something you don't know, your mind will try to fit it into some framework that you already know.  That's the academic definition of a stereotype.  The real question I believe is whether or not one operates off of their stereotypes.

Answer 11

I consciously do it.  How a person presents themselves (clothes, hygiene, lots of tattoos, excess jewelry, etc...) can tell you a lot.  Although, I am willing to change my initial opinions of a person if my opinions turn out to be inaccurate.

Answer 12

why is everyone so mean?  

I grew up in a non-stereotype house, or at least as much as possible, but once and a while, I find myself wondering how on earth that a random girl could achieve something but if it was a guy, it would had never been a problem.  I am a girl, but still. And sometimes it's really hard not to judge like if you see a pregnant girl or a relly fat man.  It's just that we are so used to our little circle we don't learn to accept others.

Answer 13

Your own answer to this question is absurd.

By human nature all humans do that all the time.

This is not a feeling one can control.

People such as yourself say they don't do it, but........... of course you do.

Btw, this idea is a far left liberal idea and as are most far left liberal ideas it is fun to say, but not really workable.

Edit: no, actually you hold on to the sterteotype until you are proved wrong. Just a fact.

Answer 14

I know I have, and often I have to deliberately remind myself of what I'm doing.

For instance, I see a man in a suit I think, successful.

I see a guy in tattered jeans, I think bum.

Then one day I realized the guy in the tattered jeans WAS the same guy I had seen wearing a suit the other day.

That taught me a lesson right there and then.

Answer 15

I do it consciously. My only saving grace is that I am aware of what I'm doing.