Meaning
偏 captures the idea of partiality, bias, and one-sidedness — specifically, the state of something that should be neutral but has shifted unevenly toward one extreme. Applied to a person's views, a dietary habit, a statistical measurement, or a physical distribution, 偏 always implies asymmetry: too much weight on one side, not enough on the other.
Structurally, the kanji breaks into two halves. The left element is 亻, the "person" radical — a compressed form of 人 — which commonly appears in kanji tied to human character or behavior. The right element is 扁, meaning "flat" or "thin," also used for a sign hung flat against a wall. Picture a person pressed against that lopsided sign, unable to stand upright: leaning, tilted, stuck to one side. That image is the kanji.
偏 has 11 strokes and belongs to the high-school Jōyō kanji list (常用漢字・高校配当). It sits at the JLPT N1 level and does not appear in the elementary school curriculum. Knowing it opens vocabulary across social science, statistics, medicine, and meteorology.
偏 turns up across a striking range of domains: social prejudice (偏見), picky eating (偏食), standard deviation (標準偏差), and Japan's notorious academic ranking score (偏差値). It threads through casual conversation and technical writing alike. Learning 偏 is not just about adding vocabulary — it is a window into how Japanese speakers discuss fairness, objectivity, and the costs of lopsided thinking.
Readings
On'yomi (音読み) — Chinese-derived readings
偏 has one on'yomi: ヘン (HEN), from Middle Chinese, used consistently across all compound words. It pairs with a wide range of second characters to produce vocabulary spanning social, scientific, meteorological, and academic domains. The ヘン sound also appears in related kanji — 遍, 編, 篇 — all sharing the 扁 component, so spotting this phonetic family helps decode unfamiliar compounds on sight.
- 偏見 (henken) — prejudice, bias; literally "partial view," used for unfair assumptions about a person or group
- 偏差 (hensa) — deviation, deflection; how far a value strays from a standard or average
- 偏差値 (hensachi) — deviation score; Japan's standardized academic ranking system used nationwide
- 偏重 (henchō) — overemphasis; placing disproportionate weight on one factor while neglecting balance
- 偏向 (henkō) — bias, slant; commonly applied to politically skewed media coverage
Kun'yomi (訓読み) — Native Japanese readings
The kun'yomi is かたよ・る (katayo-ru): "to lean to one side," "to be biased," or "to be unevenly distributed." The stem かたより (katayori) works as a noun — "bias," "skew" — and is common in everyday speech. The morpheme かた also appears in words for "one side" or "direction," echoing the physical sense of tilting away from center. Where ヘン compounds lean abstract or technical, かたよる is more concrete and conversational.
- 偏る (katayoru) — to be biased, to lean, to become unbalanced
- 偏り (katayori) — bias, skew, unevenness; covers dietary imbalance, statistical skew, and social unfairness
- 偏った考え (katayotta kangae) — a one-sided or biased way of thinking
Common Words & Compounds
偏 generates compounds across several fields. Grouped thematically, these are easier to retain than isolated word lists.
Social attitudes and psychology:
- 偏見 (henken) — prejudice, preconception, unfair bias against a person or group
- 偏愛 (hen'ai) — partiality, favoritism; excessive preference for one person or thing over others
- 偏狭 (henkyō) — narrow-mindedness, intolerance; resistance to perspectives beyond one's own
- 偏向 (henkō) — ideological or political slant, bias in reporting or policy
Statistics, science, and academia:
- 偏差 (hensa) — deviation; how far a value diverges from a mean or norm
- 標準偏差 (hyōjun hensa) — standard deviation; a core measure of variability in statistics
- 偏差値 (hensachi) — deviation score; Japan's ubiquitous relative academic ranking metric
- 偏微分 (henbibun) — partial derivative; a calculus term in multivariable mathematics
Health and daily life:
- 偏食 (henshoku) — unbalanced diet, picky eating; sticking to a narrow range of foods
- 偏頭痛 (henzutsū) — migraine; literally "one-sided head pain," reflecting how migraines typically strike only half the head
- 偏重 (henchō) — overemphasis; too much weight on one concern at the expense of the whole
Geography and meteorology:
- 偏在 (henzai) — uneven distribution; concentrated in one area rather than spread broadly
- 偏西風 (henseifū) — prevailing westerly winds; the mid-latitude wind belt that shapes Japan's weather patterns
Example Sentences
彼の意見はいつも偏っていると思う。
Kare no iken wa itsumo katayotte iru to omou.
His opinions always strike me as one-sided.
子供の偏食を直すのはなかなか難しい。
Kodomo no henshoku wo naosu no wa nakanaka muzukashii.
Getting kids to eat a balanced diet is harder than it looks.
偏見を持たずに人と接することが大切だ。
Henken wo motazu ni hito to sessuru koto ga taisetsu da.
Meeting people free of prejudice is worth the effort.
この地域では人口が都市部に偏在している。
Kono chiiki de wa jinkō ga toshibu ni henzai shite iru.
Population in this region is heavily concentrated in urban areas.
彼女は偏頭痛がひどくて、仕事を休んだ。
Kanojo wa henzutsū ga hidokute, shigoto wo yasunda.
Her migraine was bad enough that she had to take the day off.
その報道は偏向していると批判を受けた。
Sono hōdō wa henkō shite iru to hihan wo uketa.
That news coverage drew criticism for its political bias.
標準偏差を使ってデータのばらつきを分析する。
Hyōjun hensa wo tsukatte dēta no baratsuki wo bunseki suru.
Standard deviation lets us measure how spread out the data actually is.
偏西風は日本の天気に大きな影響を与える。
Henseifū wa Nihon no tenki ni ōkina eikyō wo ataeru.
Prevailing westerly winds have an outsized effect on Japan's weather.
食事が偏ると健康に悪い影響が出る。
Shokuji ga katayoru to kenkō ni warui eikyō ga deru.
An unbalanced diet will eventually show up in your health.
彼は特定の部下を偏愛しているとうわさされている。
Kare wa tokutei no buka wo hen'ai shite iru to uwasa sarete iru.
Rumor has it he plays obvious favorites among his subordinates.
Memory Tip
Break the kanji into two halves. Left: 亻, a person. Right: 扁, something flat and nailed to one wall — like a sign hanging lopsided. Imagine that person pinned against it, unable to straighten up: permanently tilted, stuck seeing only one direction. That is 偏 — any view, diet, or dataset that has collapsed to one side and lost its center.
When 偏見 (prejudice) or 偏差値 (deviation score) comes up, picture that tilted figure on the wall, unable to look straight ahead. A biased mind can't either.