| This study described forces that have an impact on content selection for undergraduate occupational therapy educational programs. Eight clusters of forces were identified, defined, and used as the conceptual basis of the study: (I) Institutions of Higher Education, (II) Funding, (III) Practice, (IV) Professional Organization, (V) Documents, (VI) Disciplines, (VII) People, and (VIII) Publications.; Three methods of data collection and analysis were used in the study: a document analysis of catalogs from forty-nine programs; on-site interviews of six program directors; and a telephone survey of thirty-six program directors. The data were collected from a target population of the fifty-one undergraduate occupational therapy educational programs with accredited status in the 1979-80 academic year. Each program in the target population was included in at least one of the data collection and analysis methods, and eighty-two percent were included in two of the three methods.; Data from the on-site and telephone interviews and the catalog study indicated that behavioral science, psychology and sociology; biological science, anatomy, physiology, and kinesiology; and medical science were the primary disciplines from which required courses were selected.; The data indicated that occupational therapy program directors and faculty have autonomy within institutions of higher education though faculty may restrict their own autonomy by adopting curriculum designs that require occupational therapy faculty to collaborate in any content changes in their own academic unit. Institutional funding was perceived to be adequate to support professional course requirements, though many believed elective courses, enrichment experiences, and travel were being sacrificed in order to maintain professional content requirements. The professional organization was seen as having remarkably little effect on content decisions except for the educational essentials which are developed and enforced by the professional organization.; Practice was reported to have a marked effect on content decisions, especially through therapists who supervise students in clinical experience and local therapists who work in various ways with educational programs. Employers who were not occupational therapists were not perceived to affect content decisions. |
