Validating the revised Attitudes Toward People With Disabilities Scale with health care professionals.

Abstract

Objective: Disability stigma has been linked with adverse chronic and acute health outcomes in people with disabilities. The present study updated the widely used Attitudes Toward Disabled Persons measure (to the revised Attitudes Toward People With Disabilities [ATPD] scale) among health care professionals and validated the measure using a disability stigma framework.

Design: A survey with 272 health care professionals and students was conducted.

Results: Regression analyses revealed that men, compared to women and nonbinary people, scored higher on disability stigma. Quality of contact, but not quantity of contact nor disability status was associated with less stigmatized attitudes. Those who scored higher on agreeableness, openness, and conscientiousness also scored lower on stigmatizing attitudes about people with disabilities. Furthermore, psychological inflexibility, social dominance orientation, and authoritarianism were all positive predictors of stigmatizing attitudes about people with disabilities. Finally, we found that medical model endorsement, but not social model endorsement positively predicted stigmatizing attitudes as measured by the revised ATPD scale.

Conclusion: Our findings validate the revised ATPD scale and illuminate disability stigma as expressed by a diverse sample of health care professionals. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).