Correlates of attitudes toward the application of eugenics to the treatment of people with intellectual disabilities

Eighty-five Canadian men and women ranging in age from 19 to 74 participated in a study of the relationship between personal characteristics and attitudes toward the application of eugenics to the treatment of people with intellectual disabilities. The personal characteristics included gender, age, self-esteem, locus of control, level of education, level of sophistication, and trait-anxiety. Results of a multiple regression analysis indicated that eugenic attitudes were primarily found in men of limited education, who had elevated trait-anxiety, and who believed that they were personally in control, yet also claimed that life is a random series of events controlled by chance or fate.