Researchers at the University of Southern California surveyed more than 3,300 people and found that both men and women are less willing to tolerate discrimination against the genetically disadvantaged.

Study co-author Edward J. McCaffery, a law professor, said an individual who sees nothing wrong with certain kinds of biases will often find others objectionable.

"Discrimination in its traditional forms -- based on race and gender -- may be receding somewhat, discrimination in other domains, as based on appearance, persists," McCaffery said in a statement.

"Men are more willing to accept discrimination, but both men and women converge when we did a telephone survey and there was a live interviewer -- women became more, and men less, openly tolerant of discrimination."

The study, scheduled to be published in June in the Political Research Quarterly, also found tolerance levels between the sexes vary depending on whether or not their response is anonymous -- men tend to understate, and women to overstate, their tolerance for discrimination when speaking to a live interviewer, as opposed to answering questions over the Internet.