Determinants of students’ attitudes toward people with physical-motor disability

Background and Aim: This study examined the role of social desirability, self-esteem, and some demographic variables in predicting students’ attitudes toward people with physical-motor disabilities. Procedure: The participants in this cross-sectional study were 300 students at Kurdistan University selected using convenience sampling. The students completed the items in the Google forms of the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MC–SDS), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965b), a Demographic Information Form, and the Multidimensional Attitudes Scale towards Persons with Disability (MAS). The collected data were analyzed using Pearson correlation coefficients and hierarchical linear regression analysis with SPSS software (Version 23). Results: The results showed significant attitudinal differences in students with different demographic characteristics except for gender and education (P < 0.05). In addition, social desirability and self-esteem together were stronger predictors of the students’ attitudes toward people with physical-motor disability than each of these variables alone (P > 0.05). Conclusion: Various demographic variables and other factors like self-esteem and social desirability affected students' attitudes toward people with physical-motor disabilities.  A key implication of the present study is that the role of tested variables could differ depending on cognitive, affect, and behavioral dimensions of attitudes. Researchers must pay attention to this point in future studies.