Who opposes rights for persons with physical and intellectual disabilities?

Abstract

Research on human and civil rights has only rarely addressed people's attitudes toward disability rights in the context of American society. This study was designed to gain a better understanding of why certain individuals might oppose expanded rights for people who have disabilities. Pearson's correlations revealed that individuals high on social dominance orientation (SDO) and right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) were more likely to reject rights for persons with intellectual and physical disabilities than individuals scoring lower on these factors. Structural equation analyses indicated that both SDO and RWA are directly implicated in opposition to expanded rights for these groups. Moreover, the effects of SDO on rights attitudes appear to be mediated through internal motivation to respond without prejudice.Research on human and civil rights attitudes has tended to address two fundamental questions: What is the structure of those attitudes? (e.g., Crowson, 2004;Diaz-Veizades, Widaman, Little, & Gibbs, 1995;McFarland & Matthews, 2005); and What factors predict their endorsement? (e.g., Cohrs, Maes, Moschner, & Kielmann, 2007;Crowson & DeBacker, 2008a, 2008bDiaz-Veizades et al., 1995;McFarland & Matthews, 2005;Moghaddam & Vuksanovic, 1990). Studies addressing the former question have tested whether attitudes toward human and civil rights may be better conceived as unidimensional versus multidimensional in nature, with some studies suggesting that these attitudes can be differentiated into domains such as economic, political, equality, and privacy rights (Crowson, 2004;Diaz-Veizades et al., 1995); as well as domains of rights endorsement, commitment, and restriction (McFarland & Matthews, 2005). Studies addressing the latter question have found that human and civil rights attitudes are predicted by a number of psychological and ideological correlates, including right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation (Cohrs et al., 2007;Crowson, DeBacker, & Thoma, 2005, 2006McFarland & Matthews, 2005), universalism values (Cohrs et al., 2007), moral judgment development (Crowson & DeBacker, 2008b;Crowson, DeBacker, & Thoma, 2007;McFarland & Matthews, 2005;Narvaez, Getz, Rest, & Thoma, 1999), ethnocentrism (McFarland & Matthews, 2005, political conservatism McFarland & Matthews, 2005), and religious fundamentalism (Crowson & Brandes, 2008;Narvaez et al., 1999).With rare exceptions (e.g., Crowson & Brandes, 2008), many of the aforementioned studies have excluded attitudes pertaining to a group that has been historically marginalized within society: people with disabilities. Indeed, the prejudice and discrimination that people with disabilities face on a continual basis raises the question of whether or not these individuals are perceived by Americans as deserving of the rights that most citizens take for granted. A key aim of our research, therefore, is to strengthen our understanding of Americans' attitudes toward human and civil rights for people with disabilities, with particular emphasis on people wh...

Predictors of negative beliefs toward the sexual rights and perceived sexual healthcare needs of people with physical disabilities in South Africa

“…We discuss our results below with this in mind. That both cognitive and affective prejudice about disabled sexuality predicted beliefs about the sexual rights of people with physical disabilities is consistent with prior research which has found that (affective) prejudice predicts opposition to the civil rights of disabled people [31].This is likely because denying that people with physical disabilities have sexual rights is functionally consistent with both cognitive prejudice (i.e. negative beliefs) and affective prejudice (i.e.…”

“…In a similar vein, we find it plausible that affective discomfort about sexual/romantic relations with people with disabilities may also predict a lack of recognition of their sexual rights. This is consistent with Crowson et al [31] who found that affective prejudice predicts (explicit) opposition to human and civil rights for people with disabilities. We therefore suggest that, concurrently with cognitive prejudice, affective prejudice toward people with disabilities will predict lack of recognition of their sexual rights as an indirect expression of antipathy.…”

“…Crowson, Brandes and Hurst [31] we view individuals' perceptions of the rights of the target social group to be an outcome of more fundamental prejudice-related processes. In a similar vein, we find it plausible that affective discomfort about sexual/romantic relations with people with disabilities may also predict a lack of recognition of their sexual rights.…”

“…The most widely known of these, social dominance orientation, is a personality trait which denotes an individual's preference for the consequent inequality among social groups and specifically that one's own group dominates the hierarchy over other groups [32,33]. Empirical evidence has highlighted that social dominance orientation predicts prejudice and opposition to rights within a variety of group settings, including both the disability and the sexuality (e.g., sexist) contexts [31,34,35,36,37]. For instance, in the case of the former, Crowson and Brandes [34] found that social dominance orientation predicted opposition to the inclusion of disabled pupils within mainstream classrooms among student teachers.…”

“…Moreover, they identified that the relationship between social dominance orientation and opposition to inclusion was mediated by an increase in general prejudice toward students with disabilities. A later study assessed explicit opposition toward broader disability, human and civil rights of people with physical and intellectual disabilities among community members in the United States [31]. Findings provided converging evidence as to the positive relationship between social dominance orientation and opposition to the rights of people with disabilities, although the study did not measure sexual rights specifically.…”