Attitudes Toward Disabilities Among Speech-Language Pathologists and Educators

Saturday, 2:30pm to 4:30pm
Rooms 74/75/76
ST12
Disability is a term that is generated and prescribed by society, and may carry negative social connotations. Negative attitudes towards individuals with disabilities may have an adverse impact on the quality of services provided to these individuals. In order to better serve individuals with disabilities, providers of services, specifically speech-language pathologists, general educators and special educators, should possess positive attitudes toward individuals with disabilities due to the influence they have on their practices. The purpose of this study was to investigate the attitudes held by speech-language pathologists, general educators and special educators towards individuals with disabilities. One hundred and thirteen practicing professionals in public primary and secondary schools located in Northeastern Missouri were surveyed using the Attitudes towards Disabled Persons Scale- Form O (Yuker, 1970). No attitudinal difference was found between the three groups (p>.01). The findings of this study suggest that these professionals have similar, positive attitudes toward individuals with disabilities. These results have positive implications on the formation and quality of collaborative efforts among the three professionals.
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Multi-Interest