ERIC Number: EJ1171992
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2018
Pages: 9
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0360-1277
EISSN: N/A
Participation in an Intergenerational Service Learning Course and Implicit Biases
Educational Gerontology, v44 n2-3 p90-98 2018
Biases against the elderly and people with disabilities can lead to discriminatory behaviors. One way to conceptualize attitudes toward the elderly and people with disabilities is through the differentiation of explicit (conscious) and implicit (unconscious) factors. Although both explicit and implicit attitudes and biases contribute to the full picture of peoples' attitudes, explicit ideas alone may not accurately reflect people's attitudes. This may be due to societal pressure to conceal explicit biases or the fact that often times, people are not aware they hold prejudiced views. The Implicit Association Test is a computer-based categorization task designed to assess implicit or unconscious attitudes. This test was used in in the current study to assess the impact of an intergenerational service-learning course. We designed this study to determine if greater exposure or contact with the elderly or people with disabilities might influence college students' implicit attitudes. Pre- and post-assessment of participating students, using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, found statistically significant decreased biases after participation. Results from this study that suggest participating in an intergenerational service-learning course can positively affect implicit attitudes. This is encouraging, especially because these attitudes are developed over a long period of repeated exposure, are consistently reinforced by cultural factors, and are notoriously difficult to change.
Descriptors: Older Adults, Social Bias, Disabilities, Service Learning, Social Attitudes, Inferences, Association (Psychology), Tests, Intergenerational Programs, College Students, Attitude Change, Student Attitudes, Pretests Posttests, Program Effectiveness, Animals, Hypothesis Testing, Gerontology
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Colorado
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A