COLLEGE-STUDENTS ATTITUDES TOWARD ELDERLY PERSONS

College students' attitudes toward elderly persons were ascertained us ing a convenience sample of 420. Instrumentation consisted of a 20-ite m semantic differential scale developed by Sanders, Montgomery, Pittma n, and Balkwell (1984). Using the semantic differential format, the re spondents evaluated elderly persons in three target age groups, separa ted by gender. The research questions in this study were as follows (a ) What are college students' attitudes toward a target population of m ale and female elderly categorized as the young old (65-74), the old o ld (75-99), and centenarians (100+)? (b) Are there differences in atti tudes based on gender, size of home community, or experience with olde r persons? Repeated measures analysis of variance were conducted to as sess whether there were differences in attitudes toward the three age categories of elderly targets. Results indicated that significant gend er differences existed. Male respondents viewed female elderly targets in all age groups significantly more negatively than did female respo ndents. They also viewed male targets in the 65-74 age category more n egatively than did female respondents. Implications for social work pr actice and future research are discussed.