Determining Attitudes Toward Ability: A New Tool for New Understanding

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore teacher attitudes toward gifted students in several distinct areas and to provide psychometric evidence of reliability and validity for the use of an instrument titled “Determining Attitudes Toward Ability” (DATA) to measure specific components of teacher attitudes. Subscales of Focus on Others, Problems With Acceleration, Grade Skipping, Identification, and Curriculum/Policy and ranking the goals of gifted programming allow precise understanding of teacher attitudes regarding important factors in gifted education. This study represents the initial efforts to provide a psychometrically evaluated instrument that reflects developments in the field of gifted education.