The Digital Lives of People with Learning Disabilities: Methodological Considerations

Mobile technology is becoming ubiquitous, with usage ranging across such diverse activities as direction-finding, music storage, photography, texting, checking social-media, accessing newspapers and watching TV. This paper describes a major study examining the use of such technology by people with Learning Disabilities (LD). It concentrates on the issues related to undertaking research with this specific cohort – such as difficulties participants may have in generalising, abstract thinking, and the possible tendency to simply agree with comments or questions made by the researcher (known as acquiesce bias) - and methods being adopted to minimise or obviate these completely

Current Developments in Services for People with Intellectual Disabilities

[Taken from Executive Summary] This literature review is the culmination of the Saskatchewan Community Living Division jurisdictional study which began in the autumn of 2003. Following a brief survey of developments in providing services to people with intellectual disabilities (hitherto the People) for creating the questionnaire for this study, information was gleaned from the provinces and territories on their services. The CLD Jurisdictional Project was completed in the spring of 2005. Subsequently, a thorough search and examination of pertinent resources for serving this People and for policy development was conducted. From over 800 documents about 350 were selected for this literature review. The material is recorded in the following chapters: Public Consultation and Policy Development; Social Philosophy: the philosophical influence on contemporary social issues; Definition of disabilities; Needs assessment systems; Human Rights; Advocacy; Community services & Deinstitutionalization; Issues and Influences; Citizenship; Inclusion; Self-determination; Person-centered planning; Supports; Respite; Individualized funding; Canadian governmental initiatives; Provincial Services

Optimizing the WPI Assistive Technology Resource Center: Marketing and Documentation

The Assistive Technology Resource Center at WPI was established in 1999 as a regional center for the design and development of devices to aid persons with disabilities. As the ATRC grows, there is need for the Center to market itself to potential clients, project sponsors and to WPI students. This project focused on developing a marketing tool and a document describing all past major design projects completed within the ATRC. Distribution of these documents will enable the ATRC\u27s to better fulfill its mission of combining educational goals and community service

Identifying Five Archetypes of Interaction Design Professionals and Their Universal Design Expertise

Systems and services based on Information and Communications Technology (ICT) are now prevalent in our daily lives. Digital transformations have been, and are still being, initiated across private and public sectors. As such, the consequences of digital exclusion are severe and may block access to key aspects of modern life, such as education, employment, consumerism and health services. In order to combat this, regions and countries such as the USA, Canada, EU and Scandinavia have all legislated universal design (UD) in relation to ICT, in order to ensure as many citizens as possible have the opportunity to access and use digital information and services. However, there has been limited research into how higher educational programs address legislated accessibility responsibilities. This paper looks into the discipline of interaction design (IxD). IxD is the design domain focused on ‘how human beings relate to other human beings through the mediating influence of products’ (Buchanan, R. (2001) Designing research and the new learning. Des. Issues, 17, 3–23). The study presents an analysis of Norwegian higher educational programs within IxD. Based on document analysis, we map the skillsets the study programs state to deliver and investigate to what degree UD expertise is included. Our findings indicate the study programs do not deliver adequate training in UD, in order to fulfill the professional responsibilities related to ICT accessibility. From our findings, we extrapolate five ‘archetypes’ of interaction designers. These personas-like analytical constructs hold slightly different characteristics. For each of the five, we propose UD expertise fitting key skillsets. We hope our contributions are useful both for the higher education sector and the industry and will contribute to raised awareness of UD skills so they can educate interaction designers in their different industry roles with required competences.acceptedVersio

Internet Justice: Reconceptualizing the Legal Rights of Persons with Disabilities to Promote Equal Access in the Age of Rapid Technological Change

Although a range of laws and regulations have been created in the United States to promote online accessibility for persons with disabilities, tremendous disparities persist in access to Internet technologies and content. Such inaccessibility is an enormous barrier to equality and participation in society for persons with disabilities. The current legal approaches to online accessibility have not proven successful, focusing on specific technologies and technical solutions to accessibility. This paper argues for a reconceptualization of the approach to promoting legal guarantees of online access for persons with disabilities, focusing on information and communication goals, the processes of accessing information, and new approaches to monitoring, guidance, and enforcement. Without a broader conception of accessibility under the law, persons with disabilities risk being increasingly excluded from the technologies and content of the Internet that are coming to define social, educational, employment, and government interactions

Reimagining Digital Citizenship via Disability

In recent times, disability has gained prominence as an important arena of social justice, politics, and citizenship. This applies also to digital technologies and cultures, where “acts of citizenship” are increasingly generated. Slowly, disability has become recognized as integral and generative part of social life and relations, especially in digital societies. In this chapter I argue that there are various ways in which disability could be explicitly recognized as core to digital citizenship. However, to do this, we need to confront significant cultural baggage.Australian Research Counci

Consumer-directed services: lessons and implications for integrated systems of care

Over the past decade, policy makers in developed countries have begun to pay increasing attention to reform of the long-term care system for the frail elderly and younger people with disabilities. A continuum of strategies have generated interest, including integrated systems of care with agency/professionally managed service packages on the one end, and programs offering cash benefits along with the flexibility to decide how to best use these funds to meet individual needs and preferences, on the other. The latter approach, known as “consumer-directed care,” is found in various forms and degrees in Europe and North America. Primarily organised around the provision of home and community care, consumer-directed services are aimed at empowering clients and family carers, giving them major control over the what, who and when of needed care. Consumer-directed care appears to be the antithesis of integrated care. However, it actually holds important lessons and implications for the latter. This policy paper explores the rationale and models of consumer-directed services at home, reviews developments, designs and outcomes of programs in the Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, and the US. It also discusses how this experience could be helpful in shaping better and more responsive integrated models of care for vulnerable long term care populations

Expressive Arts Therapy in Performance as Trauma Work for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities: A Community Engagement Project

People diagnosed with an intellectual disability (ID) are at a substantially higher risk of experiencing trauma than typically abled individuals. In addition, the nature of ID makes it especially difficult to cope and access treatment. The goal of this research was to examine how expressive arts therapy can support treating this population for trauma. Information was gathered on Trauma-Informed Care, Psychodrama, Drama Therapy, Interactive Behavioral Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, and The Storytelling Method. This investigation led to a community engagement project between August 2019-February 2020 that involved the researcher meeting one-on-one with nine individuals diagnosed with ID. A variety of expressive arts therapy interventions were used to prime their stories for a performance series that would take place at the end of the engagement. Each client had a significant trauma history and the researcher’s goal was to use the expressive arts to cultivate emotional regulation, positive self-concept, and improved self-esteem. Each performer attended sessions regularly and prepared fully realized pieces that were performed to sold-out audiences over the course of three nights. These findings implicate that trauma treatment for this population is crucial and possible through the expressive therapies