Attitudes of sixth graders who participated in a peer tutoring program towards moderately and severely handicapped students were compared with those of sixth graders who did not participate. Prior to the peer tutoring program, tutors held more negative attitudes towards their handicapped peers than they did towards their own classmates as measured by a semantic differential scale. After being peer tutors for seven weeks, attitudes towards handicapped students became more positive and not substantially different from attitudes towards their own classmates. Attitudes of sixth graders not involved in the tutoring program did not change. Similar positive changes were obtained using a social distance measure. This study demonstrated that structured peer tutoring programs can be efficient systems for both increasing instructional time in a special education classroom, and for developing positive changes in attitudes towards handicapped students.
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