DISCRIMINATION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does discrimination mean? 

• DISCRIMINATION (noun)
  The noun DISCRIMINATION has 2 senses:

1. unfair treatment of a person or group on the basis of prejudice

2. the cognitive process whereby two or more stimuli are distinguished

  Familiarity information: DISCRIMINATION used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DISCRIMINATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Unfair treatment of a person or group on the basis of prejudice

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

discrimination; favoritism; favouritism

Hypernyms ("discrimination" is a kind of...):

social control (control exerted (actively or passively) by group action)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "discrimination"):

able-bodiedism; able-bodism; ableism; ablism (discrimination in favor of the able-bodied)

ageism; agism (discrimination on the basis of a person's age)

cronyism (favoritism shown to friends and associates (as by appointing them to positions without regard for their qualifications))

fatism; fattism (discrimination against people who are overweight)

heterosexism (discrimination in favor of heterosexual and against homosexual people)

nepotism (favoritism shown to relatives or close friends by those in power (as by giving them jobs))

racial discrimination; racialism; racism (discriminatory or abusive behavior towards members of another race)

sexism (discriminatory or abusive behavior towards members of the opposite sex)

Derivation:

discriminate (treat differently on the basis of sex or race)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The cognitive process whereby two or more stimuli are distinguished

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

discrimination; secernment

Hypernyms ("discrimination" is a kind of...):

basic cognitive process (cognitive processes involved in obtaining and storing knowledge)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "discrimination"):

differentiation; distinction (a discrimination between things as different and distinct on the basis of their characteristics or attributes)

individualisation; individualization; individuation (discriminating the individual from the generic group or species)

appreciation; discernment; perceptiveness; taste (delicate discrimination (especially of aesthetic values))

Derivation:

discriminate (recognize or perceive the difference)

discriminate (distinguish)

 Context examples 

This allele, which encodes protein DEK, plays a role in both 3' splice site discrimination and intron removal during mRNA formation.

(DEK wt Allele, NCI Thesaurus)

Located predominantly on B cells and macrophages, HLA-DR antigens function in antigen presentation to regulatory T cells in the immune response and in self/nonself discrimination.

(HLA-DR Antigen, NCI Thesaurus)

In addition, there are horizontal named realationships between concepts called Roles, binary relations between concepts that provide a machine-interpretable definition of a concept and the means for discrimination of sibling concepts.

(NCI Thesaurus Concept, NCI Thesaurus)

'Careful examination of the actual inspection strategies used by animals might reveal that they often employ active scanning behaviors as shortcuts to simplify complex visual pattern discrimination tasks,'

(Scientists Discover Bees Can Count Using Only Four Brain Cells, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Discrimination between myoepithelioma and myoepithelial carcinoma is based primarily on the infiltrative growth of the latter.

(Benign Salivary Gland Myoepithelioma, NCI Thesaurus)

She was always so gentle and retiring that her emotions were beyond his discrimination.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Mrs. Weston had been delighted before, and was delighted again; Emma joined her in all her praise; and the pianoforte, with every proper discrimination, was pronounced to be altogether of the highest promise.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

A patient advocate helps resolve issues about health care, medical bills, and job discrimination related to a patient's medical condition.

(Patient advocate, NCI Dictionary)

I read with ardour those works, so full of genius and discrimination, which modern inquirers have written on these subjects.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Chromatography on non-ionic gels without regard to the mechanism of solute discrimination.

(Gel Filtration Chromatography, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)