Pre-service teachers' explicit and implicit stereotypes towards pupils with different special educational needs

Area of Science:

• Educational Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Special Education

Background:

• Teacher attitudes significantly impact educational inclusion, with stereotypes playing a key role.
• Direct stereotype measures can be limited by social desirability bias.
• Combining direct and indirect measures provides deeper insights into complex biases.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate and compare explicit and implicit stereotypes held by pre-service teachers.
• To examine stereotypes towards pupils with autism, Down syndrome, and dyslexia.
• To utilize both direct and indirect measurement methods.

Main Methods:

• A sample of 76 German pre-service teachers participated.
• Explicit stereotypes were assessed via questionnaires.
• Implicit stereotypes were measured using lexical decision tasks.

Main Results:

• Pre-service teachers showed significant explicit endorsement of stereotypical adjectives for all groups.
• Faster responses to stereotypical words in lexical decision tasks indicated implicit associations.
• Explicit and implicit stereotypes did not show significant correlation.

Conclusions:

• Pre-service teachers exhibit clear explicit stereotypes and implicit associations, particularly towards autistic pupils and those with Down syndrome.
• Stereotype patterns for dyslexia were less pronounced compared to autism and Down syndrome.
• Findings highlight the prevalence of stereotypes in education and the need for interventions targeting both explicit and implicit bias.