Teachers' and Nonteachers' Attitudes toward Mainstreaming

The attitudes of special education teachers, regular teachers, and nonteachers toward mainstreaming handicapped individuals were assessed by a Mainstreaming Opinionnaire constructed by the present investigator. This questionnaire is a 30-item Likert-type scale consisting of two subscales: Academic Costs of Mainstreaming, and Socio-Emotional Costs of Segregation. While the results indicated that all three groups have relatively positive attitudes toward mainstreaming on both factors, a multiple discriminant function analysis demonstrated, as hypothesized, that special education teachers view mainstreaming as academically less costly than do the other two groups.