The Educators’ Attitudes Toward Disability Scale (EADS): A Pilot Study

Abstract

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 demographic questionnaire. Confirmatory factor analysis was employed to verify that the subscales from the original SWADS (i.e. affect, behaviour/practice, and cognition) were present in the EADS. Pearson’s correlation was also calculated between the scores on the Attitudes Toward Disabled Persons-Form B (ATDP-B) and the EADS as a measure of validity. Finally, Cronbach’s alpha was calculated for the purpose of internal reliability among the items in the EADS. Preliminary findings suggest that the EADS may be a valid and reliable instrument, but measures attitudes unidimensionally.

Keywords:

• Ableism
• attitudes
• disability
• educators
• metric
• postsecondary
• scale development
• confirmatory factor analysis