Abstract
Having a disability is a stigmatized trait that may elicit negative behavioural reactions, such as staring, from able-bodied individuals. These behaviours often cause feelings of ostracization and social discomfort. Portraying individuals with physical disabilities as physically active may improve how able-bodied individuals perceive them. Thus, it is of interest to evaluate whether portraying oneself as physically active is an effective strategy for reducing staring behaviour towards people with physical disabilities. This study aims to characterize able-bodied adults' staring behaviour when viewing images of people with and without physical disabilities. It also aims to evaluate whether portraying a person with a disability as physically active reduces staring. Sixty-three university students (mean age=21.2±2.5;81.5% women) viewed 40 images of people with and without physical disabilities engaging or not engaging in physical activity (10 images/condition). Eye movements were recorded during each trial. A multivariate repeated-measures ANOVA was significant for dwell time, number of fixations, time until first fixation, and number of runs, F(15,48)=37.73, p<.001. Follow-up univariate repeated-measures ANOVA revealed significant main effects for image condition for each outcome ps<.001. Participants were quicker to begin staring at images of people with physical disability and examined them for longer than able-bodied images. These findings were more pronounced in the inactive/disability condition than the active/disability condition. The results indicate that there are differences in how able-bodied adults view images of people with and without physical disabilities who are active versus inactive. Staring behaviours may be mitigated by portraying people with a physical disability engaging in physical activity.
