Honors Theses

Date of Award

5-2026

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Degree Name

BS

Department

Biomedical Sciences

Faculty Mentor

Abigail Baxter, Ph.D.

Advisor(s)

Lisa Turner, Ph.D. and Linda Reeves, PhD.

Abstract

This quantitative and qualitative study examined self-esteem; self-efficacy; self-determination; and disability awareness at the beginning and end of the semester in a sample of young adults with intellectual disability enrolled in a post-secondary education program. Participants’ weekly campus engagement in extracurricular activities during the semester was also tracked. The first goal of this study was to observe changes in self-determination satisfaction and frustration, self-esteem, self-efficacy, and disability awareness after one semester of enrollment in the program. There were 16 participants in the study who varied in their length of participation in the program. Dependent t-tests revealed a statistically significant decrease from pre-test to post-test in their negative feelings of relatedness, indicating participants felt more socially included at post-test. There are no significant differences in the other variables. There is an observable increase in participation in extracurriculars from the beginning to the end of the semester, with a large increase in participation during homecoming week. The disability awareness interview revealed that students were more comfortable giving their disability a label and better at describing their support needs at post-test, suggesting awareness of their disability increased over the semester.

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