Children's attitudes toward peers with disabilities: the Israeli perspective |
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Authors: | Emanuel Tirosh MD Michael Schanin PhD Shunit Reiter PhD |
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Institution: | The Hannah Khoushy Child Development Center, Bnai Zion Medical Center, The Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine;The University of Haifa School of Education;Haifa, Israel |
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Abstract: | Attitudes toward peers with disabilities were compared in two groups of elementary school children, Israeli (2845 children) and Canadian (1831 children), using the Chedoke-McMaster Attitudes Toward Children with Handicaps (CATCH) scale. Israeli children expressed significantly more positive general attitudes (P=0.0001). The more favourable attitudes were seen in both areas evaluated by the CATCH, the cognitive and the affective-behavioural. In both groups, children who had had previous experience with a disabled person expressed more positive attitudes (P=0.001). An effect of gender was seen in the Canadian but not in the Israeli children. Cultural factors appear to play a role in modelling children's attitudes toward their disabled peers and therefore should be considered before educational programmes are implemented. |
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