Disability in Physical Education Textbooks: An Analysis of Image Content

The aim of this paper is to show how images of disability are portrayed in physical education textbooks for secondary schools in Spain. The sample was composed of 3,316 images published in 36 textbooks by 10 publishing houses. A content analysis was carried out using a coding scheme based on categories employed in other similar studies and adapted to the requirements of this study with additional categories. The variables were camera angle, gender, type of physical activity, field of practice, space, and level. Univariate and bivariate descriptive analyses were also carried out. The Pearson chi-square statistic was used to identify associations between the variables. Results showed a noticeable imbalance between people with disabilities and people without disabilities, and women with disabilities were less frequently represented than men with disabilities. People with disabilities were depicted as participating in a very limited variety of segregated, competitive, and elite sports activities.