title: Exploring the attitudes and knowledge of support workers towards individuals with intellectual disabilities.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The aim of this study is to explore support workers' attitudes and knowledge towards individuals with intellectual disabilities (IDs) to see whether a new attitude scale needs to be developed.
  
  
  METHODS
  Support workers from a charitable organization located in the West Midlands in the United Kingdom participated in one of four focus groups conducted in late 2013. Thematic analysis was then conducted which identified the emergent themes from the focus groups.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Five themes emerged from the analysis, namely, discrimination of people with IDs, attitude change, impacts of integration, their role as a carer and the impact of training. Only one theme, 'the impacts of integration', is clearly represented in current attitude scales; 'their role as a carer' and 'discrimination of people with IDs' are partially represented.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results suggest that current attitude scales do not accurately measure the attitudes of support workers; therefore, a modified attitude scale could be developed to incorporate findings from this study.
authors.affiliation: The University of Birmingham, UK.
authors.forename: Natalie S
authors.initials: NS
authors.lastname: Golding
authors.affiliation: The University of Birmingham, UK j.l.rose@bham.ac.uk.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Rose
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D017028:Caregivers / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008607:Intellectual Disability / Q000451:nursing*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D036301:Qualitative Research; D012112:Residential Facilities; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: attitudes; intellectual disability; knowledge; learning disability; support workers