Explanatory Style In College Students: Gender Differences And Disability Status - Statistical Data Included

The scoring of the BDI required some modification. Specifically, item 20 was incorrectly entered into the final questionnaire packets prior to its distribution. Therefore, this item was excluded when computing BDI scores.

Results

Females with physical disabilities obtained the lowest (most optimistic explanatory style), M = 4.04, SD = .62, while their male counterparts obtained the most pessimistic; M = 4.48, SD = 1.07. PNPD males and females obtained scores that followed the expected pattern: male M = 4.05, SD = .43 and female M = 4.37, SD = .69.

To determine whether gender or disability status influenced explanatory style, a 2 x 2 ANOVA was computed. The results showed that there were no main effects for gender or disability status: F(1, 56) = .43, p = .54 and F(1, 56) = .06, p = .81 respectively. However, there was a significant gender by disability interaction: F(1, 66) = 3.87, p = .05 (see Table 2). Figure 1 depicts this interaction and shows the slope and group difference follow-up tests.

[Figure 1 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Table 2 Explanatory Style by Gender and Disability

Source of      Sum of         Mean
Variation      Squares   df   Square

Main Effects      .26    2     .13   .23     .80
   Gender         .25    1     .25   .43     .51
   Disability     .03    1     .03   .06     .81

Gender by        2.20    1F    2.20   3.87   .05
 Disability

Residual         37.63   66     .57

Total            40.09   69     .58

Note. Females with physical disability n = 21; females without physical disability n = 22; males with physical disability n = 17; males without physical disability n = 10.

Discussion

Contrary to what might be expected given past social psychological research and theory, the PWPD females obtained the most optimistic explanatory style scores. Moreover, the explanatory style scores of PWPD females were significantly lower than those of PNPD females and PWPD males. Although follow-up ANOVAs used to break down the interaction showed only marginal point-by-point significance, the finding warrants careful consideration. First and foremost, this finding supports the notion that women with physical disabilities (at least those who are in college) are not likely passive and dependent. Such attributions are likely ill-placed social stereotypes.

Some evidence in the literature might offer tentative explanations for the obtained results. Baucom and Danker-Brown (1979) determined that individuals with androgenous sex role types did not react with performance or mood deficits in the face of forced failures. An extrapolation of these findings suggests that androgenous individuals are more likely to possess a more optimistic explanatory style. Also, research has shown that individuals with an androgenous sex role type are more likely to possess response strategies that are not only greater in number, but also more flexible (cf. Bem, 1975). Therefore, it seems possible that those females with physical disabilities who chose to attend and remain enrolled in college possessed more androgenous traits, along with the associated coping strategies, than their non-college bound counterparts. However, this interpretation is only tentative as the present study did not directly address this issue (i.e., no non-college students were included). Future studies in this area might take these issues into consideration.