A Scale for Assessing Hearing Adults’ Beliefs about the Capabilities of Deaf Adults

This paper describes the Opinions About Deaf People (ODP) Scale, a scale for assessing hearing adults\u27 beliefs about the capabilities of deaf adults. It addresses a specific gap in instrumentation, as previous instruments assessing attitudes about deaf persons were not specifically developed to assess this domain. They were adapted from instruments designed to measure attitudes toward other disabilities or general attitudes toward disabilities. The scale addresses a variety of commonly held misconceptions about deaf people. These misconceptions were identified from literature review and interviews with deaf professionals. This paper includes a copy of the GDP scale and administration and scoring instructions. The authors also suggest a variety of applications in educational, employment, and mental health settings and encourage readers to utilize the scale in a variety of contexts