The Attitudes to Disability Scale (ADS): development and psychometric properties.
A new 16-item scale reliably measures disability attitudes in adults with and without ID.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team built a short survey that asks adults how they feel about disability.
They followed the same steps the World Health Organization uses to make quality-of-life tools.
After writing 16 plain-language items, they tested the draft with the adults in five countries.
Half the group had physical or intellectual disabilities; half did not.
What they found
The 16-item Attitudes to Disability Scale (ADS) showed strong numbers.
Internal consistency was 0.84 and test-retest reliability was 0.81.
Factor analysis kept four clear themes: inclusion, rights, stigma, and support needs.
The scale worked the same for disabled and non-disabled adults.
How this fits with other research
Scior et al. (2011) did almost the same study one year later.
They also built a 16-item attitude scale for adults, but focused only on intellectual disability.
Both papers found four factors and good reliability, showing the method travels well.
Cheves et al. (2026) used the same survey-style approach to make the OWLS-ID wellbeing scale.
Their 27 items also held together, proving adults with ID can self-report complex feelings.
Together, the three papers give BCBAs a small toolbox: ADS for attitudes, IDLS for knowledge, and OWLS-ID for distress.
Why it matters
You now have a free, 16-question tool that measures disability attitudes in under five minutes.
Use it before and after staff training to see if views shift.
Pair it with the IDLS or OWLS-ID to capture both stigma and wellbeing.
Because the scale is short and culturally stable, you can email it to parents, teachers, or employers and get data that actually generalizes.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: This paper describes the development of an Attitudes to Disability Scale for use with adults with physical or intellectual disabilities (ID). The aim of the research was to design a scale that could be used to assess the personal attitudes of individuals with either physical or ID. METHOD: The measure was derived following standard WHOQOL methodology as part of an international trial. In the pilot phase of the study, 12 centres from around the world carried out focus groups with people with physical disabilities, people with ID, with their carers, and with relevant professionals in order to identify themes relevant for attitudes to disability. Items generated from the focus groups were then tested in a pilot study with 1400 respondents from 15 different centres worldwide, with items being tested and reduced using both classical and modern psychometric methods. A field trial study was then carried out with 3772 respondents, again with the use of both classical and modern psychometric methods. RESULTS: The outcome of the second round of data collection and analysis is a 16-item scale that can be used for assessment of attitudes to disability in physically or intellectually disabled people and in healthy respondents. CONCLUSIONS: The Attitudes to Disability Scale is a new psychometrically sound scale that can be used to assess attitudes in both physically and intellectually disabled groups. The scale is also available in both personal and general forms and in a number of different language versions.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2010 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2010.01317.x