Barriers and facilitators of physical education participation for students with disabilities: an exploratory study

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to explore the barriers and facilitators to participation in physical education (PE) for students with disabilities (SWD) from the perspectives of in-service physical educators. A convenience sample of 168 physical educators (72% female, 94% Caucasian) from the United States completed a short questionnaire. After data collection was completed, data were compiled into a spreadsheet and the first and third authors independently open-coded the responses. Cohen’s κ was computed to determine the inter-rater agreement on the open-coding process of the teacher responses. In total, 741 facilitators and 652 barriers were identified, and the most commonly reported barriers and facilitators centered on either teacher- or program-related responses. Barrier and facilitator categories were positively correlated (φ = .42 and Cramer’s ν = .16, p = .00); however, neither years of teaching experiences (r_barriers = .01, p = .89; r_facilitators = .05, p = .45) nor frequency of teaching SWD (τ_barriers = .05, p = .49; τ_facilitators = .05, p = .47) was significantly associated with the number of barriers or facilitators reported. Unique to other research in this arena, teachers frequently reported that personal-related variables were also as barriers to PE participation.

KEYWORDS:

• Physical activity
• special needs
• education
• adapted physical education
• exercise

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Justin Haegele, PhD, CAPE, is an assistant professor in the Department of Human Movement Sciences at Old Dominion University.

Xihe Zhu, PhD, is an associate professor in the Department of Human Movement Sciences at Old Dominion University.

Summer Davis, MS, CHES, is a doctoral student in the Department of Human Movement Sciences at Old Dominion University.

ORCID

Justin Haegele http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8580-4782