People with disabilities have been identified as representing the largest marginalized group worldwide. A negative attitude towards people with disabilities has been an extended paradigm in American society. Improving the treatment of people with disabilities has led to national policy and legislation changes. However, health inequities continue…

Western countries have placed a lot of importance on school inclusion policies in the last decade. Strong promotion of these policies encourages teachers to express egalitarian attitudes and behaviours towards all students. However, at the same time teachers may experience feelings of discomfort because of perceived difficulties and powerlessness…

This article presents the Educators' Attitudes toward Disability Scale (EADS). This scale was developed from the Social Workers Attitudes toward Disability Scale (SWADS). A sample of 128 postsecondary educators from one college and one university in Ontario, Canada completed the EADS, the Attitudes toward Disabled Persons scale (ATDP), and a…

Despite multiple global commitments to protect the rights of people with disabilities, discriminatory attitudes and social norms continue to disadvantage children with disabilities (CWD) in various ways. This manuscript examines the conceptualisation and measurement of discriminatory attitudes and social norms towards to CWD. A systematic review…

Background: Service-learning has been used in adapted physical activity and education (APA/E) courses in kinesiology. However, evidence has been lacking to clarify the need for utilizing service-learning in APA/E courses as an avenue to change attitudes of students. Purpose: This study aimed to compare two APA/E courses, one with service-learning…

Previous research suggests that high quality contact between people from different groups is a relatively consistent way of decreasing stereotypes and prejudices. The authors determined that a very short-term, service-learning project with people with developmental disabilities (DD) could reduce college students' fear of this population. In…

The purpose of this quantitative survey study was to determine the influence of attitudes toward students with disabilities and counselor self-efficacy on school counselors' perceptions of preparedness to provide services to students with learning disabilities using the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB; Ajzen, 1985). One hundred and sixteen…

The rise in the prevalence of autism creates a need for a reliable and valid measure of attitudes towards autism. The current study describes the development of a brief 16-item measure of Societal Attitudes towards Autism (SATA) that exhibits sound psychometric properties and has a demonstrated ability to discriminate between expert and general…

This article presents the findings of a short-term quantitative/qualitative study concerning the attitudes of Vietnamese educators towards individuals with disabilities and its possible implications relative to the development of inclusion and special education in Vietnam. The current conditions regarding the education of students with and without…

Because it is possible to distort the Attitudes Toward Disabled Persons Scale (ATDP) scores, the ATDP should not be used as a screening device unless it is used in conjunction with other attitude measures. It might be used as a measure of a person's knowledge of what constitutes "positive" attitudes toward disabled persons in our…

Fifteen males and 15 females (ages 8.0 to 8.8) who had been identified as gifted were studied to compare their attitudes toward handicapped individuals as measured by the Attitude Toward Disabled Persons Scale (ATDP). Form O of the ATDP Scale was used and a one-way analysis of variance showed a significant difference between males and females,…

This study presents the development of a new instrument, the "Multidimensional Attitudes Scale Toward Persons With Disabilities" (MAS). Based on the multidimensional approach, it posits that attitudes are composed of three dimensions: affect, cognition, and behavior. The scale was distributed to a sample of 132 people along with a…

The purpose of the study was to examine the distribution of attitude responses among college students on the Attitude Toward Disabled Persons Scale (ATDP) and to compare the responses of male students to females within each of three classes of responses on the preferred Student Characteristic Scale (PSCS): affective, affective-cognitive, and…

The monograph provides a review of research studies over the past 25 years which have made use of the Attitude Toward Disabled Persons (ATDP) Scale. The report focuses on pertinent information about the scales, their psychometric properties, and the multitude of ways they have been used. An introductory chapter looks briefly at the history of the…

Data from the responses of 104 medical and rehabilitation students to the Attitudes toward Disabled Persons Scale-Form B (ATDP-B) were factor analyzed using a principal components solution, with particular attention to the problem of the number of factors to retain. Research supports ATDP-B use as a unidimensional measure. (Author/PN)