Which term describes a form of prejudice characterized by professed egalitarian values while still holding negative attitudes toward racial minority groups?

• A. Cisgender
• B. Brain drain
• C. Aversive racism
• D. Co-ethnic

Answer: (C)

Aversive racism is the form of prejudice described. It involves professing egalitarian values and a commitment to equality while still holding negative, often implicit, attitudes toward racial minority groups. People with this pattern want to appear nonprejudiced and will endorse fair treatment in principle, but in practice they experience discomfort around racial groups and may rely on subconscious stereotypes when judging or interacting with individuals from those groups. This can lead to biased decisions or behaviors that seem fair on the surface but produce unequal outcomes—such as avoiding interracial contact, giving subtly less favorable treatment in ambiguous situations, or attributing someone’s performance to personal failings rather than to systemic factors. The important distinction is the mismatch between explicit egalitarian beliefs and underlying negative attitudes that influence behavior unintentionally. The other terms don’t describe this pattern: one refers to gender identity, another to an economic phenomenon, and the last to a concept about shared ethnicity rather than a prejudice rooted in conflicting attitudes and behaviors.