Measuring Prejudice and Stereotypes: A Systematic Review of Psychometric Quality and Conceptual Foundations

Prejudice and stereotypes are central constructs in social psychology; however, the instruments used to measure them vary in terms of their quality and conceptual clarity. This preregistered systematic review presents the first comprehensive, cross-method synthesis of the psychometric properties and theoretical foundations of measures assessing racial and ethnic prejudice and stereotypes. Following PRISMA and COSMIN guidelines, we screened 13,363 records and included 263 studies published between 1951 and 2024. We evaluated, among other things, reliability, validity, factor structure, measurement invariance, and conceptual alignment across explicit, implicit, and behavioral instruments. Our findings reveal a field that is methodologically diverse but psychometrically fragile. Most measures were developed with U.S. samples, rarely assessed temporal stability, discriminant or predictive validity, and often lack theoretical–empirical coherence. The GRADE synthesis indicated that only 4% of methods achieved high-quality evidence, while the majority showed serious inconsistency and risk of bias. Conceptually, only one-third of studies clearly defined prejudice, and most operationalized it narrowly at the cognitive, individual level, neglecting affective and behavioral dimensions. The review highlights how conceptual ambiguity and inadequate validation threaten the interpretability of decades of prejudice and stereotype research. We recommend greater construct clarity, multimethod integration of explicit, implicit, and behavioral measures, and stronger adoption of transparent research practices. Taken together, these findings call for a new generation of measurement tools that are psychometrically rigorous, theoretically coherent, and culturally sensitive—capable of capturing prejudice as a dynamic, multidimensional phenomenon.