IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT OF

STUDENTS WITH PHYSICAL

DISABILITIES

BY: PAIGE GUARDIOLA, ALLIE KADELL, JORDAN THOMPSON

 The Blind

Mute
Wheelchair bound
Person with disability Spaz
Brave Hyper-Sensitive

Pycho
Cripple Dwarf
Not like the
Deaf-and-Dumb
“normal Midget
Students” Dumb Special
Condition Inspirational
ELEPHANT IN THE LIVING ROOM

• Disability Disclosure
• Using appropriate terminology
• Examples: Students who are blind vs. blind students,Wheelchair
bound vs. Wheelchair enable

• Evolving functional area

• Sympathy equals frustration
• Identify the person not the disability
• Contact, Ask: Don’t assume, Respect,
Empathize
Activity!
WHAT IS A PHYSICAL DISABILITY

• Causes: • Physical disability:

• Accident • Hearing
• Trauma • Vision
• Disease • Speech
• Genetics • Mobility
• Mental function
 HISTORY WITHIN HIGHER
EDUCATION

Functional
Medical
Moral Limitation

Social Model
Model
Approach

Ableist or Social Minority Group

Justice Model Model
JOHNSTONE, 2004 Identities that
shift the focus
6 Categories away from
disability
Overcompensating
Identities
Externally
Ascribed,
Complexed
Disempowering Identities
Individuals
Common
Empowering
Identities Identities
 FORBER-PRATT AND ARAGON, 2013

Four Phases
Adoption Giving back to
Acceptance Relationship
Phase the Community
Phase Phase Phase
WHAT IS THE CURRENT
PRACTICE?

• Support groups
• Workshops
• Presentations on how to disclose disabilities
• Trainings on how to self-advocate, describes
disability, and manages reasonable
accommodations
OUR THEORY OUTCOMES

• Establishes the relationship between social, emotional, and

communal aspects
• To help student’s identity development students self -
acceptance
• Theory that is designed for practice
• The structure of this theory can be implemented at various
institutional settings and functional areas
• Develop the student rather then the disability
Perceptions Advocacy
• Self • Self
• Society • Community

Self-
Acceptance

Comradery
• Community
 For Self:
For Self:  Mentorship program
 Leadership Training  Workshops
 Volunteering  Student advocacy
Opportunities webinars
Perceptions Advocacy
For Campus: • Self • Self For Campus:
 Welcoming &  Disability Services
• Society • Community  Committees
Passive behaviors
 Representation on
 Programming to Self- governing boards
combat stigma Acceptance  Joining National
Associations

Comradery
• Community

 Clubs and Organizations

 Major/Course curriculum
 Disability support group
 Living Learning Communities
 THEORY COMPARISON

Johnstone, 2004 Forner –Pratt and PACS Model, 2016

Aragon, 2013
Disempowering Identities Acceptance Phase Perceptions

Overcompensating Relationship Phase Advocacy

Identities
Identities that shift the Adoption Phase Comradery
focus away from disability
Empowering Identities Giving back to Community Self-Acceptance
Phase
Complexed Identities

Common Identity
Case Study
BEYOND VISIBLE

• Approximate 10% of Americans live

with a medical conditions that may be
classified as an invisible disability
• Visual disabilities vs. Invisible
disabilities
• A student who is short statured vs. a
student who has a learning disability
• A student with speech impairments vs. a
student with psychiatric disability

• Professional awareness of the

existences of any disability
QUESTIONS?
 Reference List

Blockmans, I. G. E. (2015). “Not wishing to be the white rhino in the crowd”: Disability-disclosure at university. Journal of Language and
Social Psychology, 34(2), 158-180. doi:10.1177/0261927X14548071

Center for Persons with Disabilities (n.d.). Disability Awareness Information. Retrieved from
http://www.cpdusu.org/about/committee/awareness/

Disabled World Towards Tomorrow (n.d.). Invisible disabilities: List & information. Retrieved from http://www.disabled-
world.com/disability/types/invisible/

National Youth Leadership Network & Kids As Self Advocates. (2008). Respectful disability language: Here’s what’s up! Retrieved from
http://www.miusa.org/sites/default/files/documents/resource/Respectful%20Disability%20Language.pdf

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Real Men Real Style. (2012, October 30). How to speak with confidence-speaking with class-wow to speak well & confidently-talking tips
[Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJdkyiyW1iY

StanfordPushProject’s Channel. (2012, February 3). Shit people say to people with disabilities [Video File]. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNoVSusaAVE

Stories by kids. Retrieved from https://www.understood.org/en/learning-attention-issues/personal-stories/stories-by-kids

Student development. Retrieved from http://www.projectshift-refocus.org/student.htm

The University of Texas at Austin. (2009, June 9). Perspective of a blind student [Video File]. Retrieved
from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cP7VqtOLcs&feature=youtu.be

University, B. (2016). Appropriate terminology. Retrieved from https://www.brown.edu/campus-life/support/accessibility-services/resources-

teaching-students-disabilities/appropriate-terminology

Ware, L. (2001). Writing, identity, and the other: Dare we do disability studies? Journal of Teacher Education, 52(2), 107-123.
doi:10.1177/0022487101052002003