Prototypicality Prototypicality is the degree to which an individual fits the prototype of a group they could be categorized within. Prototypicality relates to threat perception in that the more prototypical an individual looks, specifically focusing on blacks, the more others who associate blacks with they stereotype of dangerousness will perceive them as threatening. Prototypic black targets display physical traits stereotypically associated with Blacks (broad nose, large lips, coarse hair, darker skin tone). Prototypicality affected prejudice; it was shown to impact judgments about an individual's characteristics. For example, a study by Ma & Corell (2011) showed that individuals are more biased and prejudiced against more prototypic black targets than less prototypic targets. In daily life, individuals are more likely to encounter white people as the default race within the United States as opposed to Black individuals. When encountering atypical whites (white people with features associated with Blackness), individuals ultimately settle on a White response (the general response to typical white targets is to decide not to shoot quicker and more frequently than in trials with black targets), in contrast to encountering Blacks with atypical features where Black cues appear to be more dominant and elicit a Black (to decide to shoot quicker and more frequently than trials with white targets) due to a misplaced threat perception. Lay people are more racially biased, on average, than trained individuals such as police officers. Prototypicality is shown to moderate racial bias which has been shown to be linked to a perceived threat as black people specifically are predisposed to being viewed as more threatening. Police officers show a reduced racial bias in comparison to members of the community; however, police officers were no better than community members in their sensitivity to prototypic targets providing evidence that prototypicality is directly linked to stereotypes and threat perception which ultimately perpetuates stereotype threat. Members of the same category (race) become harder to distinguish from other members of the same category the more they look like a prototypical representation of their category. (Young, Hugenberg, Bernstein, Sacco 2009). Racial ambiguity defies prototypicality Racial ambiguity is linked to prototypicality in that racially ambiguous individuals walk a line of not always looking prototypical of either group they represent, but being a blend of the various groups. This can leave blurred lines in terms of threat perception in having difficulty categorizing a racially ambiguous individual and determining what perception is more accurate: