and later discussed with them. The results of both studies provided evidence that

individuals can engage in careful and reflective deliberation and ignore potentially

biasing attitudes when motivated (Fazio & Towles-Schwen).

 Kruglanski and Freund (1983) and Jamieson and Zanna (1989) experimentally

manipulated opportunity by adding time pressure to the participants. In both studies,

participant decision-making was influenced by personal attitudes when time-pressure was

a factor. This provides support for the belief that sufficient opportunity, time, is required

for careful and reflective deliberation to occur (Fazio & Towles-Schwen, 1999).

Attitudes towards persons with disabilities

Attitudes towards people with disabilities tend to vary as a function of gender, age,

education, and occupation, to name a few. Although there are other correlates in the

literature such as personality, locus of control, and so on. the focus here will be on those

factors that may have a relationship to attitudes as they relate to perception of bias crime.

 Research has demonstrated that women tend to report more positive attitudes

towards people with physical disabilities than do men (Chesler, 1965; Siller, 1963; Yuker

et al., 1960). A possible explanation for this difference was proposed by Siller who

theorized that women may feel a different amount of social pressure to convey a socially

acceptable attitude. However, the number of studies showing females with more positive

attitudes is decreasing over time with 20% of the studies showed positive attitudes in the

1980's versus 59% of the studies before 1970, resulting in the conclusion that the gap that

exists between men and women appears to be closing over time (Yuker & Block, 1986).

 The relationship between age and attitudes towards people with disabilities is more

complex than gender. Ryan (1981) reviewed the literature and concluded that attitudes

are positive during early childhood through adolescence (Siller, 1963) at which point they