Examing [sic] academic and social bias of educators towards overweight students in the classroom

Abstract

Overweight children have become a hot topic in the media, particularly when it comes to schools and how the schools respond to the overweight children within them. Bias has been an area of research quite thoroughly explored in the schools, particularly when dealing with attractiveness; however, little research is available on bias dealing with obesity. This study intends to expand the research literature available on adult to overweight child bias in the classroom. In order to obtain this data, the researcher sent out ninety-six questionnaires to elementary educators at three school districts in Northwestern Wisconsin. The researcher created a questionnaire in order to obtain this data. The questionnaires either contained a color photo of an overweight child, or an average weight child. This seven-question questionnaire was distributed once, and the participants returned the questionnaires to the researcher through the mail. The researcher used basic descriptive statistics to find mean scores, and determined that the mean scores did not yield significant results. Educators rated both the overweight and average weight student in a similar manner in terms of social and academic expectations in the classroom. Thus, this paper will provide a review of the past literature on the topic area of bias towards overweight individuals, design and implementation of the study, results, conclusions, and implications for future areas of research.