bias
noun
a particular tendency, trend, inclination, feeling, or opinion, especially one that is preconceived or unreasoned.
bias
1 American
[bahy-uhs]
/ ˈbaɪ əs /
noun
-
biases
plural
-
a particular tendency, trend, inclination, feeling, or opinion, especially one that is preconceived or unreasoned.
The hiring manager was found to have shown bias against job applicants who wore less expensive clothing.
The magazine’s bias is toward art rather than photography.
We need to set aside our strong bias in favor of the idea and evaluate it logically.
- Synonyms:
- leaning, bent, proclivity, partiality, predilection, preconception, predisposition
- Antonyms:
- impartiality
-
unreasonably hostile feelings or opinions about a social group; prejudice.
The show’s host has faced accusations of racial bias.
-
an oblique or diagonal line of direction, especially across a woven fabric.
-
Statistics. a systematic as opposed to random distortion of a statistic as a result of sampling procedure.
-
Electronics. the application of a steady voltage or current to an active device, such as a diode or transistor, to produce a desired mode of operation.
-
a high-frequency alternating current applied to the recording head of a tape recorder during recording in order to reduce distortion.
-
Lawn Bowling.
-
a slight bulge or greater weight on one side of the ball or bowl.
-
the curved course made by such a ball when rolled.
-
adjective
adverb
verb (used with object)
-
biases,
present (3rd person singular)
-
biased,
past participle, past
-
biassed,
past participle, past (especially British)
-
biasing,
present participle
-
biassing
present participle (especially British)
-
to cause to hold or exhibit a particular bias; to influence, especially unfairly.
The defendant gave a tearful plea designed to bias the jury.
The survey was heavily biased toward highly educated people.
- Synonyms:
- bend, predispose, dispose, incline
-
Electronics. to apply a steady voltage or current to (the input of an active device).
idioms
Bias
2
American
[bahy-uhs]
/ ˈbaɪ əs /
noun
bias
British
/ ˈbaɪəs /
noun
-
mental tendency or inclination, esp an irrational preference or prejudice
-
a diagonal line or cut across the weave of a fabric
-
electronics the voltage applied to an electronic device or system to establish suitable working conditions
-
bowls
-
a bulge or weight inside one side of a bowl
-
the curved course of such a bowl on the green
-
-
statistics
-
an extraneous latent influence on, unrecognized conflated variable in, or selectivity in a sample which influences its distribution and so renders it unable to reflect the desired population parameters
-
if T is an estimator of the parameter θ , the expected value of ( T–θ )
-
-
an inaudible high-frequency signal used to improve the quality of a tape recording
adjective
adverb
verb
Usage
Plural word for bias The plural form of bias is biases, pronounced [ bahy-uhs-eez ] or [ bahy-uhs-ehz ]. The plurals of several other singular words that end in -s are also formed this way, including alias/aliases, moss/mosses, and lens/lenses. However, bias is often used as a mass noun, meaning that in some instances bias may be used as either a singular or a plural form. The plural form biasses is obsolete and should be avoided.
Synonym Usage
Bias, prejudice mean a strong inclination of the mind or a preconceived opinion about something or someone. A bias may be favorable or unfavorable: bias in favor of or against an idea. Prejudice implies a preformed judgment even more unreasoning than bias, and usually implies an unfavorable opinion: prejudice against people of another religion.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
biassimple
-
biasessimple
-
have biasedperfect
-
have biassedperfect
-
has biasedperfect
-
has biassedperfect
-
am biasingprogressive
-
am biassingprogressive
-
are biasingprogressive
-
are biassingprogressive
-
is biasingprogressive
-
is biassingprogressive
-
have been biasingperfect progressive
-
have been biassingperfect progressive
-
has been biasingperfect progressive
-
has been biassingperfect progressive
Past
-
biasedsimple
-
biassedsimple
-
had biasedperfect
-
had biassedperfect
-
was biasingprogressive
-
was biassingprogressive
-
were biasingprogressive
-
were biassingprogressive
-
had been biasingperfect progressive
-
had been biassingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bias
First recorded in 1520–30; from Middle French biais “obliqueness,” from Old Provençal, probably from Vulgar Latin (e)bigassius (unrecorded), from Greek epikársios “oblique,” from epi- epi- + -karsios “oblique”; alternatively, from Vulgar Latin biaxius (unrecorded) “having two axes” ( see bi-, axis)
Explanation
Use the noun bias to mean a preference for one thing over another, especially an unfair one. Some biases are completely innocent: "I have a bias toward French wines." But most often, bias is used to describe unfair prejudices: "The authorities investigated a case involving bias against Latinos." It is also a verb meaning "to show prejudice for or against," as in "They claimed the tests were biased against women." (In British English, it takes an extra S in the forms biassed and biassing.) The word goes back at least to Old Provençal, a former language of southern France, in association with the sport of lawn bowling, where it referred to the tendency of a ball to roll in one direction or the other.
Vocabulary lists containing bias
100 Top "SAT" Words
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Argumentative Writing
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Though some literary professionals expressed fears of ghettoization, many welcome these new entities as necessary to fight bias, foster new writers and serve readers of Jewish and Israeli books across borders.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 10, 2026
Furthermore, even if the market turns out to have an upward bias over the next couple of months, contrarian analysis tells us nothing about equities’ longer-term potential.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 8, 2026
At Hawksmoor, the delicate ribbons of Cantabrian anchovy undercut her previous bias against the fishy staple.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 31, 2026
How does bias enter algorithms used in policing?
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026
But knowing their bias, how much credence can we give to their protests that insecticides are harmless?
From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson
Members of UCLA’s Task Force to Combat Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias, which in a 2024 report found “broad-based perceptions of antisemitic and anti-Israeli bias on campus,” did not sign.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 17, 2026
As a college senior, Bias bought an ankle-length fur coat, a Nissan 380ZX sports car and a gold bracelet encrusted with diamonds spelling his first name, the Washington Post reported.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 21, 2026
Craighill told the Post that Advantage advised Bias to moderate his spending but couldn’t force him to do that.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 21, 2026
That is the finding of a new research study, “Conflicting News, Negativity Bias, and Short-Term Return Predictability.”
From MarketWatch ● Dec. 24, 2025
I read the report of Bias Roca, the general secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba, about their years as an illegal organization during the Batista regime.
From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela
But there are also concerns about AI models making wrong decisions as a result of biases in the patient data used to train them, and incorrect medical advice being given by AI chatbots.
From BBC ● Sep. 10, 2026
“Behavioral biases also account for some of the effect, as well—people tend to sell their winners too early and hold losers too long.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 31, 2026
The researchers found significant variability in the advice and spotted some potential demographic biases.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 24, 2026
“Even if they have some of these biases, they recognize that they shouldn’t be telling the experimenter about those biases,” he explains.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 13, 2026
And these differ from each other, sometimes dramatically, reflecting the authors’ biases and ignorance, and their informants’ manipulation of history to cast a flattering light on their family lines.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
As the son of a football coach, I’m admittedly biased.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 3, 2026
Researchers say that skewed ratio may be self-perpetuating: Because more boys are thought to have autism, diagnostic tools are biased toward boys’ autistic traits.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2026
Also, I am kind of biased here because I am really hoping Wirtz has the season now that people expected him to have last year.
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
He was freed after his conviction was overturned on procedural grounds, with the presiding judge also later ruled to have been biased.
From Barron's ● Aug. 5, 2026
Yet there is often a weak correlation between degrees of explicit and implicit bias; many people who think they are not biased prove when tested to have relatively high levels of bias.
From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander
They proceed to their work with a biassed mind.
From Tobacco Leaves Being a Book of Facts for Smokers by W. A. Brennan
That Mr. Wallace himself should be biassed in this matter might, perhaps, be expected.
From Darwin, and After Darwin, Volume 2 Post-Darwinian Questions: Heredity and Utility by George John Romanes
Yet the man might be biassed; sympathy for the deceived might paint the deceiver's conduct in colours even blacker than the truth demanded.
From Second String by Anthony Hope
Shallow, superficial and paradoxical inquiries are mere empty vanities as utterly useless, from a human standpoint, as those which are biassed and one-sided.
From Islam Her Moral And Spiritual Value A Rational And Pyschological Study by Arthur Glyn Leonard
Although his judges were biassed against him he was acquitted on each count, and the result was received with enthusiastic cheers by immense crowds within and without the court.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 13, Slice 6 "Home, Daniel" to "Hortensius, Quintus" by Various
That meant that researchers could keep the organoids separated without biasing their experimental results.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 18, 2025
Much of the research in nutrition is funded by industry, which has been criticized for biasing the results.
From Salon ● May 1, 2025
Some economists viewed this increase as an anomaly given that the sector accounted for about 16% of total employment and speculated that a low response rate could be biasing the numbers higher.
From Reuters ● Oct. 3, 2023
It can mean, for example, that a forensics lab—already strapped for funding and time—needs an extra person to serve as a case manager who screens possibly biasing information from a blinded analyst.
From Science Magazine ● Jan. 18, 2023
There was one rule, or rather the absence of it, which had appealed very strongly to Mrs. Harold and gone a long way toward biasing her choice in favor of the school.
From Peggy Stewart at School by Gabrielle E. (Gabrielle Emilie) Jackson
Still the attitude created by the Tubingen theory largely persists as a biassing element in much that is written about Acts.
From The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia Volume 1 of 28 by Project Gutenberg
However, this is beside the question; and I want to avoid biassing your decision in any way.
From Afloat at Last A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea by William Heysham Overend
Even if he was going to revise his views, was it right, was it candid, was it loyal to the truth, that he should revise them under the biassing influence of Meenie's eyes?
From Strange Stories by Grant Allen
But the truth is that, if we set aside matters of trivial import, the enormous majority of human judgments are those into which the biassing power off likes and dislikes more or less largely enters.
From The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 6 (of 12) Dresden Edition?Discussions by Robert Green Ingersoll
There would be no harm in biassing me in her favour.
From Ellen Middleton—A Tale by Georgiana Fullerton
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
