Impact of a model-based paralympic sports project in physical education on primary school pupils’ attitudes, self-efficacy, and intentions toward inclusion of peers with physical disabilities

Purpose: Decreased involvement in physical education (PE) among children with disabilities can result from negative attitudes toward peers with impairment. School-based paralympic sports programs may improve students’ views about people with disabilities. The present study aimed to determine whether a model-based paralympic sports project in PE would have a favourable impact on primary school students’ attitudes, self-efficacy, and intentions toward including peers with physical disabilities in PE, ultimately improving their prosocial behaviour, while considering their previous experience with disability, according to the theory of planned behaviour. Methods: Participants included 105 fifth-grade pupils of a primary school (mean age 11.0 ± 0.2 yrs) who were randomly assigned to a control (33 boys, 29 girls) or an experimental (25 boys, 18 girls) group. The intervention consisted of 8 PE lessons developed during 8 consecutive weeks: it incorporated sport-based youth development principles and affective learning into PE according to the Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility model (TPSR). The educational intervention focused on paralympic boccia and sitting volley (adapted to pupils’ skill level), comprised information, multimedia material, and the simulation of physical impairments, and used active learning strategies. Pre and post intervention, participants responded to a questionnaire investigating sociodemographic information, their attitudes, self-efficacy, and intention toward inclusion of peers with physical disability in PE, and their prosocial behaviour. A RM-MANOVA was conducted to investigate group × time, and group × familiarity × time interaction effects, on all the variables. A path analysis was conducted to test antecedents of intention and of prosocial behaviour. Results: Results revealed a group × time effect (p <.001) with intervention group reporting significant improvements in all the measures. The intervention efficacy was enhanced by a significant effect of familiarity with disability (group × familiarity × time), with experimental group pupils familiar with interacting with a peer with disability reporting greater improvements in all the investigated variables (p <.001). Conclusions: The integration of the TPSR model within a Paralympic sports program in PE showed positive effects on pupils’ psychological dimensions, contributing to the field of inclusive education. These findings could support primary school PE teachers in implementing TPSR-based paralympic sports projects in PE. Further, paralympic sports could assist in educating students to develop and perform appropriate behaviours towards their peers with disability, to facilitate their mutual development and learning.