Psychology of Disability (POD)

Discipline Specific Elective:08

Unit 1: Conceptualizing Disability: An Introduction a) Beliefs and
attitudes towards disability, Definitional conundrum, Diagnosis and
assessment and its critique, b) Understanding Disability Policy in India:
Equal opportunities Bill, Rehabilitation Council of India, National Trust ,
c) Issues of language and its consequent labeling: How disability gets
constructed: the power of language

Unit 2: Theorizing Disability: Charity Model: Welfare Model; Medical

Model; Social Model: culture as disability; Empowerment Model

Unit 3: Making of a disabled Identity: a) Documenting Disability:

Problems of Certification b) Issues Of Access : Built and Psychological,
Issues of Education and Employment c) Family, Care & Support
Structures d) Intimacy and Sexuality :Marriage, Companion
relationships

Unit 4: Designing Interventions: a) Psychotherapeutic approaches b)

Appreciating heterogeneity of different disabilities c) Contemporary
debates: euthanasia and prenatal selection
UNIT 1: Conceptualizing Disability: An Introduction

a) Beliefs and attitudes towards disability, Definitional

conundrum, Diagnosis and assessment and its critique

b) Understanding Disability Policy in India: Equal

opportunities Bill, Rehabilitation Council of India,
National Trust

c) Issues of language and its consequent labeling: How

disability gets constructed: the power of language
Psychology of disability is an effort to admit into the
various corners of the experiential worlds of people with
disabilities.

Phenomenological accounting of the ways in which

disabled people confront and are confronted by the
world and sometimes peculiar circumstances disability
can generate.
Psychology of Disability attempts to present the
experience from the perspectives of people who have
disabilities:

- the inner states and processes

- the interpersonal situations and interactions, and

- the behavioral mechanisms and patterns that emerge.

The stance form by Psychology of Disability is from
examining the ways in which psychology can work in
ways that contribute to the individual and collective
empowerment of disabled people.

Ways in which psychology can contribute to those

radical social changes demanded by the disability
studies. Not on usual rehabilitative association of
psychology and disability
Prior 1906s, Disability fall exclusively under the purview
of medical and/or rehabilitation professionals.

Referred to professional for cure or for rehabilitation

where the focus was on enabling individuals with
disability to adjust to the society in which they lived.
Studies of disability are familiar with the medical model,
in which the professional decides what needs to be done
to overcome a supposed “deficit” or “problem” and the
person with a disability must follow the doctor’s orders or
suffer dire consequences, some of which are not related
to the condition.
The person with a disability must occupy the “sick” role.

Overall social responses to disability emphasised charity

toward and protection of those with disabilities - if not
outright elimination.
Disability Right movement shift from demand for charity to
demand for civil rights.

Early precursors

In1960s

“Person first movement” sought to upgrade social awareness by

interrogating the linguistic implications of referring to persons
with disabilities as handicapped, crippled or disabled (rather
than as persons with disabilities)

In 1970’s

“Independent living movement” advocated for the

deinstitutionalization of persons with disabilities who previously
would have been confined to nursing homes.
In 1980s

DR (Disability Research) movement urged a rejection of so-

called “medical model” or “cure” approaches to disability

Favouring an approach that emphasised a reversal of the

required direction of “adjustment”

In Reversal of Adjustment instead of requiring that individuals

with disability adjust to their surrounding society, DR activists
insisted that society ought to adjust itself to persons with
disabilities (e.g., by removing environmental barriers and
enhancing the social inclusion of those with disabilities)
First generation of disability activist-scholars

- Follow strict social model and “minority group model of disability,” -

according to which disabled persons constitute a distinct, and
oppressed, minority;

- the notion of “disability as culture,” according to which particular

groups of disabled persons (e.g., those who are deaf) constitute a
discrete culture and possess a unique cultural heritage;

- Idea that disability can be conceptualized as a “diversity category”

similar to race, gender, or sexual orientation.
In this way, the nascent field of “disability studies” came to bear
affinities with other new disciplines that also drew upon notions of
identity politics, such as queer studies, gender studies, and the like.

The most recent “era” of the disability movement stretches roughly

from 1990 to the present.

Since the passage in 1990 of the Americans with Disabilities Act

(ADA), a second “generation” of activist-scholars has continued to
develop various theoretical approaches to disability, and has also
sought for empowerment.
Disability
The word “disability” hints at something missing either fiscally,
physically, mentally or legally.

To be disabled evokes a marginalised place in society, culture,

economics and politics.

Paradoxically, it is increasingly found to be everywhere, due to

the exponential rise in the number of psychiatric, administrative
and educational labels over the last few decades.
Disability affects us all, transcending class, nation and wealth.

The notion of the TAB – Temporarily Able Bodied – recognises

that many people will at some point become disabled (Marks,
1999).

Most impairments are acquired (97%) rather than congenital

(born with)

In India 4 - 8% (40 -90 million) of the population is comprised

of people with disabilities (World Bank 2007)
Disability (Conceptualisation in the
literature)
Rehabilitation model

Social Model

Integrative model
Rehabilitation Perspective
Primary goal of rehabilitation is to enhance the care of the person
with disabilities (PWD) by minimising the effects of disability

Based on a functionalist perspective of illness and conceptualises

disability as a problem of individual functioning

One of the consequences of this paradigm is that as long as a

person is not “fully functional,” he or she is “exempted from [his or
her] normal social responsibilities” and is expected to be dependent
on others for care.

Therefore, for PWDs who cannot regain full function, the

assumptions inherent in this perspective place the PWD in a chronic
role of dependency.
Disability is understood as a limitation in performing
certain roles and tasks that society expects an individual
to perform.

The expression of the gap between a person’s

capabilities and the demands of the environment—the
interaction of a person’s limitations with social and
physical environmental factors.
 Social Perspective
Roots in the historical and political tradition of the civil rights
movement, social justice, and consumerism.

Partial response to the prevailing emphasis on functioning and

the focus of the rehabilitation perspective that disability was a
form of deviance to be eliminated or reversed.

Evolved from the belief that certain groups (PWDs) are

oppressed by the more powerful (healthcare professionals)

Conceptualizes disability as a problem of the social and physical

environments constructed by society. It is based on civil rights
and social justice perspectives.
Make visible the imbalances in power and to secure the
rights of the less powerful people in this society.

The goal was to shift the emphasis and the burden of

disability from the PWD to society.

Disability results from restrictions created and imposed by

the society.
Disability is manufactured by attitudinal and environmental
barriers rather than functional limitations. (Finkelstein, 1993)

Disability is perceived as the result of the discrimination,

prejudice, and stigmatization (Hahn, 1993), and forced
dependence on relatives and healthcare and other professionals

PWDs should be independent and should have the same rights

and responsibilities as people without disabilities.

This is accomplished through empowerment, self-determination,

and activism
Disability is not a condition of the individual. The
experiences of disabled people are of social restrictions
in the world around them, not being a person with a
‘disabling condition.’

This is not to deny that individuals experience ‘disability’;

rather it is to assert that the individual’s experience of
‘disability’ is created in interactions with a physical and
social world. (Swain, Finkelstein, French, & Oliver, 1993)
Three terminology related to disability:

Impairment – refers to the loss or abnormality of

psychological, physical, or anatomical structure or function at
the system or organ level that may or may not be permanent
and that may or may not result in disability.

Disability – refers to an individual limitation or restriction of an

activity as the result of impairment.

Handicap – refers to the disadvantage to the individual

resulting from an impairment or disability that presents a
barrier to fulfilling a role or reaching a goal.
 Integration Perspective
Rehabilitation and social models were oppositional in nature. But
strength in each

WHO International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health

(ICF) (2001) integrate the components of the medical and the social
models of disability

- The defining construct is the health condition (i.e., the disease or

disorder) and its resulting effect on individual function.

- and the Disabling barriers of society are considered as context, the

setting or the milieu in which disability can arise.

BUT Functionalist/medical assumptions prevail to direct the health

condition and its effect on a person’s ability to function in social roles.
From Disablement to emancipation
Disabled people is an ascribed identities

Such an entity includes various group of people who

have been historically situated in a whole myriad of
impairment groupings including physical and sensory,
learning difficulties and people with mental health
issues.
To embrace as a heterogeneous group, with many
impairment labels who face a number of overlapping
experiences of exclusion or disablement.

To focus on the emancipatory disabilities studies. Tied to

the development of the disabled people’s movement - a
new social movement (Campbell and Oliver, 1996)
The emancipation is the radical challenge to the medical or
individual model of disability.

Medical model assumed that the individual is disabled by their

impairment.

Whereas the social model reverses that causal chain to

explore how social constructed barrier have disabled people
with a perceived impairment.
Turned away from impairment (and the associated
consequences on everyday activities) and instead focused
on the ways in disability is created - through the social,
economic, political, cultural, relational - psychological -
exclusion of people with impairments.

Disability is therefore a socio-political category; cultural

artefacts, a relational and psychological phenomenon.

Disablement - the exclusion of people with impairments - is

a form of apartheid of the 21st century.
From leisure settings to work, education, social relationships,
disabled people struggle with and against the humiliation of
marginalisation.

Psychology of Disability is a revolutionary paradigm of

psychology; a counter hegemony to mainstream psychology’s
individualism; an interdisciplinary context that brings together
politics, sociology, social policy, health and social welfare.
Shift in paradigm: From medical to social
constructionist view to one that says that
disability exists when discrimination is
encountered

Alternate paradigms did emerge to replace the medical model.

The social constructionist view of disability says that it is a judgment

about a person made (constructed) by other people in society.

Being unable to fulfill “normal” functional roles in society, people

with disabilities are viewed by others as abnormal and therefore
lacking, dependent, and tragic
 Third Paradigm
Disability exists when discrimination is encountered
- When a person is treated in an unfair or in an unequal
manner due to the existence of an artificial condition (like the
use of a wheelchair), then that person experiences disability.

Handicapism (the preferred term in this case) exists in a

parallel manner to racism, sexism, ageism, and homophobia.
When a person is treated in a fair and equal manner, there is
no disability and the person does not feel disabled
 Definitional conundrum
Who is Disabled?

Disability has been a contested terms, defined in

different ways.
Notion of disability is by simply looking at the opposite
pole - ability/alterity (the state of being other).

Notions Across different categories; as medical

condition, a health condition, status contingent on
privileges, concessions, tax benefits.

The definition of the problem affects what solutions will

be sought and how.

Biological reality is seen as a defect, as a medical

condition or as a human right and social issue.
Many definitional possibilities considering the variability
in the nature of the disability - person stuttering, using
spectacles or vision impairment, having a dark
complexion, being obese, rheumatoid arthritis

However developing functional definitions of disability is

a complex task.
Oliver and Barnes suggest Definitions of disability can be
divided into two groups:

- Official definitions produce by the professional and academics

- those developed by the disabled people and organisations

controlled and run by them

On one hand, we adopt a binary conception of disability

On the other, it is difficult to accommodate the expectations of

those who use a flexible definition.
Definition of disability is instrumental in diagnosing a
particular condition as belonging to a specific category
which can have consequences in shaping the identity of
those subjected to its ramification.
Different disabilities with as many causes:

- Some are congenial (born with) others are acquired

- Some exhibits periodically (fits, seizures) others lifelong

constant conditions

- Severity stays the same others become progressively

worse (muscular dystrophy)

- Some are hidden (epilepsy or haemophilia) impairment of

the body’s function to control blood clotting or coagulation)
Within Indian context , three definitions of disability that are often used

WHO in their International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities

and handicaps (ICIDH) have given three fold scheme:

1. Impairment - in the context of health experience, an impairment is

an loss or abnormality of psychological, physiological or anatomical
stature or function

2. Disability - in the context of health experience, a disability is any

restrictions or lack (resulting from impairment) of ability to perform an
activity in the manner or within the range considered normal for a
human being.

3. Handicapped - a disadvantage for a given individual, resulting from

an impairment or disability or disability that limits or prevents the
fulfilment of a role of that individual.

* the above terms are often used synonymously

Indian Legislations entitled “ Persons with Disabilities
Act” 1995

Uses broad category of people with disabilities and have

the functional limitation without questioning the boundary
lines which decide the difference between normal and
diseased.

Limitation - social and cultural meaning is not reflected

Definitions under “Persons with Disabilities Act” (Equal
Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation)

1. Blind: A condition when a person suffers total absence of sight;

Visual acuity not exceeding 6/60 in the between eyes with
correcting lenses; limitation for the field of vision subtending an
angel of 20 degrees or worse.

2. Cerebral palsy: group of non progressive conditions of a person

characterised by abnormal mortal control posture resulting from
brain insult or injuries occurring in the prenatal or infant periods of
development.

3. Hearing impairment means loss of sixty decibels or more in the

better ear in the conversational range of frequencies.

The definition given by WHO and Person with disabilities Act do not
reflect the ideas propounded by the disabled people themselves.
iii. Union of the physically Impaired against Segregation
(UPAIS) gave alternative definition

Disability - the disadvantage or restriction of activity

caused by a contemporary social organisation which
takes little or no account of people who have physical
impairments, and thus excludes them from the
mainstream of social activities.
The definitional conundrum in disability is extremely
important as they decide the fate of the person
designated as disabled.
According to Mairian Corker

“ Disability, like most, dimensions of experiences is

polysemic - that is ambiguous and unstable in meaning -
as well as a mixture of truth and fiction that depends on
who says what, to whom, when and where”

In India, there is no clear categories such as abled and

the disabled-bodied
 Diagnosis and
Assessment (critique)
Diagnosis is both a medical process as well as a system
of analysis of people’s lives based on special knowledge
and expertise of professionals.

Or tacit agreement within particular disciplinary areas to

make sense of certain events in a particular manner.
Diagnosis is based on categorisation.

Once a category is labelled, society does not allow for

change.

The notion of fixity stays.

It forms obstacles to more viable and liberating

definitions.
On the other hand it can unlock the state’s resources
and other forms of support that is not generally available.

This way diagnosis is a double-edged sword.

(unless you have it you don't get it)

It can lead to dehumanising and disrespectful treatment

and severe restriction of opportunities.
Category produces an official designation whereby one
category is assigned greater value over others.

Once you have the label, it becomes instrumental in the

exclusion of some people from the mainstream.
Diagnostic systems give sense of legitimacy, confidence
and predictability both to the professional and to the client.

But it raises many questions.

- Who has the power to name?

- What role does diagnosis play in creating potentials and

restricting possibilities for disabled people?

- What part does diagnosis play in the maintenance of

professional power?
Disability, has no essential nature.

Disabled people’s lives are determined by how they are

defined.

Disabilities as part of the human diversity. It is possible

for one person to define themselves as disabled when
another person with an identical condition would not.
Diagnosis has lead to classification arrangement, which
include social institutions like:

- Social welfare departments

- Rehabilitation council

- Special education

It has contributed to social exclusion and limitation of

opportunities.
Some of the difficulties faced by person with disabilities
are not the result of functional impairments related to the
disability, but rather are the result of castification process
embedded in societal institutions for rehabilitations and
education and enforce by well meaning professionals.

Castification - an anthropological construct for

differential, institutional exploitation of some minorities
with result in assignment of lower social status.
Castification processes is rooted int the determinist view
(people who are different the viewed as somehow less
human or less capable)

The subjugating impact of castification is stigma, which

affects interpersonal interaction and may mitigate
political activism.
Society which reinforces the abled bodied individuals tends
to have deterministic beliefs that the behaviour and needs of
groups of individuals can be understood by their common
attributes (eg: disabilities, caste, gender, sexual orientation)

Identification is therefore a critical or outcome of

castification.
There is Inherent hierarchy in the very understanding of
disability which is reflected in the categories that are
used to define the character of the disabled versus the
able bodied.

For instance able/disabled, civilised/savage, rich/poor,

normal/abnormal.

In every set, one pair is the privileged, seen as ‘having

while the other is seen as ‘lacking’.
Our understating is thus loaded with such binary
oppositions of inclusion and exclusions.

While in principle they might be postulated as

complementary, their actual meaning/working is
oppositional.
In Indian ideology the notion of Purush (man)/Prakriti
(nature), touchable/untouchable represent the same
paradox.

Bodies that are conceived of as disabled act as locations

where social anxieties gets deposited.

Notions of disability are derived from Variation /difference

which is understood as deviance.
Diagnosis can be a system of exclusion

Diagnosing Disability primarily signifies exclusion, which is

produced through shifting, interconnected web of linguistic,
legal, medical, political, social and economic structures.

Disability attitudes are major barriers in improving life

conditions of physically/psychologically challenged people.

People harbour negative and paternalistic attitudes towards

persons with disabilities.
Disability if often what we perceive.

Disability policies, programmes and practices of any

country are manifestations of the attitudes that people in
different cultures share.
UNDERSTANDING DISABILITY POLICY IN INDIA

In the last three decades socially marginalised

communities have urged psychologists to attend to the
social determinants of human inequality.

As people with disabilities mobilize to oppose

discriminatory practices and social exclusion, they, too,
challenge psychology to consider the sociopolitical
foundations of their disadvantaged status.
Policy can be defined as “a definite course or method of
action selected from among alternatives and in light of
given conditions to guide and determine present and
future decisions”

Policies are influenced by sociopolitical events and

changing cultural norms.
In India we have moved:

- From charity to welfare and finally to rights based approach

for persons with disabilities.

- From medical to social model.

- From viewing people with disabilities as subjects and not as

objects

- From viewing people with disabilities as problems to ward

holders of rights.

Locating problems outside the persons with disabilities

India is one of the first signatory to United Nations Convention

on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS

As per the constitution of India, under rights to equality,

Article 14 guarantees equality for all its citizens before
law and equal protection of law.

Article 16 (3 & 4) encourages the State to frame any law,

make provision for the reservation of appointments or
posts in favour of any backward class of citizens which,
in the opinion of the State, is not adequately
represented in the services.
Directive Principles of State Policy have to secure a
social order in promotion of the welfare of the people, to
minimize inequalities, right to work, education and public
assistance in case of unemployment, old age, sickness
and disablement and in other cases of under-served
want, promoting with special care the educational and
economic interests of the weaker sections of the people.

All these provisions are equally applicable to the

persons with disabilities.
Legislative framework for the protection of the rights of disabled people
is covered by:

1. The Mental Health Act, 1987

2. The Rehabilitation Council of India Act, 1992
3. The Persons with disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of
Rights and Full Participation) PWD Act, 1995
4. National Policy for Persons with Disabilities, 2006
5. The National Trust Act (For the Welfare of Persons with Autism,
Cerebral Palsy, Mental Retardation and Multiple Disabilities) Act,
1999
6. RPWD Act 2016
7. UN Convention on the Rights of the Persons with Disabilities
(UNCRPD) 2008
Rehabilitation Council of India Act, 1993
RCI Act 1993
Amended in 2000

The Act came into force in response to the need to have

uniformity and ensure minimum standards and quality of
education and training in the disability field.

Two responsibilities of RCI:

1. Standardizing and regulating the training of personnel and

professionals in the field of Rehabilitation and Special Education

2. Maintaining a Central Rehabilitation Register for registration of

professionals and personnel working in the field
 Objectives of the RCI are:

1. To regulate the training policies and programmes in

the field of Rehabilitation of people with disabilities.

2. To prescribe minimum standards of education and

training of various categories of professionals dealing
with people with disabilities

3. To regulate these standards in all training institutions

to bring about uniformity throughout the country
4. To recognise institutions/universities running degree/
diploma / certificate courses in the field of rehabilitation
of the disabled and to withdraw recognition, wherever
facilities are not satisfactory

5. To promote research in rehabilitation and special

education

6. To recognise Vocational Rehabilitation Centres as

human resource development centres.
7. To recognise foreign degrees/diplomas/certificates
awarded by universities / institutions on a reciprocal basis

8. To maintain Central Rehabilitation Register of persons

possessing the recognised Rehabilitation qualification

9. To encourage Continuing Rehabilitation Education (CRE)

for professionals trained and working in the field, in
collaboration with organisations working in the field of
disability.

Currently there are nearly 340 Institutions recognised by the

council who are conducting 56 types of training
programmes.
THE PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES (Equal
Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full
Participation) Act, 1995
PWD Act, 1995

Enforceable on 7th Feb 1996

The passing of this Act gave effect to the proclamation on the full
participation and equality of people with disabilities in the Asian
and Pacific Regions.

The ESCAP (Economic and Social Commission for Asia and Pacific)
declared the period 1993-2002 as the Asian and Pacific Decade of
Disabled Persons. India, being a signatory to this proclamation

Started the process for drafting and enacting a specific legislation

that ensures equal opportunities and full participation and protects
the rights of persons with disabilities.
Most important piece of legislation in the history of disability
movement in India.

The drafting of this Act was primarily led by persons with

disabilities themselves with support from many like-minded
professionals.

The Act puts the responsibility on society to provide equal

opportunities to persons with disabilities for their full
participation in every day life.

Prohibits discrimination on the ground of disability in every

sphere of life and strives to create a society where persons
with disability lead a life of equality and dignity.
Objectives of PWD Act:

a) To ensure that the government takes responsibility for

prevention of disabilities, protection of the rights of persons
with disabilities, provision of medical care, education, training,
employment and rehabilitation of persons with disabilities.

b) To create a barrier - free environment for persons with

disabilities.

c) To remove any discrimination against persons with

disabilities in the sharing of development benefits

d) To protect persons with disabilities against abuses and

exploitation.
e) To lay down strategies that will ensure comprehensive
programmes and services and equal opportunities for
persons with disabilities.

f) To make special provisions for including persons with

disabilities in mainstream society.

g) To establish Co-ordination Committees and Executive

Committees at the Central and State levels in order to
ensure the full implementation of the provisions under
the Act.
The PwD Act recognises the following seven disabilities:

1. Blindness

2. Low vision

3. Leprosy – cured

4. Hearing impairment

5. Locomotor Disability

6. Mental retardation and

7. Mental Illness
National Trust For Welfare of Persons with
Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Mental Retardation
and Multiple Disabilities Act 1999

This Act provides for the constitution of a national body

for the Welfare of Persons with Autism, Cerebral Palsy,
Mental Retardation and Multiple Disabilities.
Objectives are:

• To enable and empower persons with disability to live as

independently and as fully as possible within and as close to
the community to which they belong

• To strengthen facilities to provide support to persons with

disability to live within their own families

• To extend support to registered organization to provide need

based services during the period of crises in the family of
persons with disability

• To deal with problems of persons with disability who do not

have family support.
• To promote measures for the care and protection of persons
with disability in the event of death of their parent or guardian;

• To evolve procedure for the appointment of guardians and

trustees for persons with disability requiring such protection

• To facilitate the realization of equal opportunities, protection of

rights and full participation of persons with disability; a
• To do any other act which is incident to the aforesaid objects.
 Thrust Areas
• Campaign for effective positive attitudinal change .

• Programme which foster inclusion and independence by

- Creating barrier - free environment
- Developing skills
- Promoting self-help groups

• Training and Support of Care givers and community members

• Formation of local level committees to grant approval for guardianship.

• Development of sustainable models for Day Care, Home Based,

Respite and Residential Care.

• Research in the four areas of Disabilities.

• Advocacy for the rights of persons with four disabilities

• Programme for persons with severe disabilities and women with

disabilities
Programmes
• Registration of Associations (of Parents and Non-Government
Organisations)

• Formation of Local Level Committees

• Appointment of Guardians

• Support for a range of services including residential facilities

• Home Visiting/ Care Givers Programme

• Development of Awareness and Training Material

• Community Participation Programme for Reach and Relief

.Such other programmes which promote the objectives of the Trust.

NATIONAL POLICY FOR PERSONS WITH
DISABILITIES, 2006

The National Policy for Persons with Disabilities was

released in February 2006.

In response to the need to have a comprehensive

document that will inform all our decisions and actions in
relation to provisions for persons with disabilities.

Seeks to create an environment that provides equal

opportunities, protection of their rights and full
participation in society.
Ensure that persons with disabilities exercise their rights
through a range of equal opportunities provided through
provisions in :

Early identification and support

Education
Rehabilitation programmes
Employment
Social security
Barrier - free environment
Trained human resources
Recreation and cultural options, and access to appropriate
aids and appliances.
Makes a special mention of protecting the rights of young
children with disabilities to access care, protection and security.

Emphasizes that children to receive education right from

preschool years.

Education through a continuum of educational options ranging

from regular schools, community based rehabilitation
programmes to home-based programmes for children with
severe disabilities, who choose to receive education in this
mode.

Education is to be always provided by trained and qualified

persons.
Women with disabilities get a special recognition in this policy.

Highlights the need to protect women with disabilities against

abuse and exploitation.

Supporting programmes which will provide education, employment

and rehabilitation, developed for the unique needs of women with
disabilities.

The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment is the nodal

agency to implement the provisions included in the National Policy.

The Ministry coordinates the implementation of the policy in

collaboration with many agencies including other related
government agencies, disabled people’s organizations, NGOs
working in the area of disability, representatives of family or parent
associations and experts and professionals.
Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act,
2016(RPWD Act,2016)
Criticism of PWD Act, 1995 is that though mental illness
was part of the Equal Opportunities act, not much has
been discussed and implicated in the discourse.

In PWD act did not cover many categories such as

autism, cerebral plays etc. But resulted in National Trust
for Welfare of persons with Autism, cerebral palsy, MR
and multiple Disabilities Act, 1999.

The National Policy for Persons with Disabilities, 2006

recognises the need to replace the earlier emphasis on
medical rehabilitation with an emphasis on social
rehabilitation, but there is no clear roadmap on how to
implement.
Gujarat and Jharkhand have so far drawn up state draft
policies for Public Works Department (PWD)

In Indian there is no single standard in order to evaluate

disability.

The India decision makers have not understood as a

comprehensive category. Rather a charitable piece meal
approach
Issues of language and its consequent labeling:
How disability gets constructed: the power of
language

Representation of disabled people has been laden with

contradictions because of ambivalent attitudes towards disability

The language we used to talk about disability plays a role in the

way society views disabled people

Politics of language is invalid in understanding disability

Language as a vehicle and a means of maintaining the problems

No Uniform terminology
Variety of terms such as:

“handicapped”
Blind
Visually impaired
Learning disabled
Special
Disadvantaged
Deaf and dumb
Mentally retarded
Differently abled
Differently challenged
Children with stuttering
Hearing impaired
Objectionable terms such as:

Invalid
Confined to wheel chair
Mentally retarded
Psychotic
Crazy
Lunatic
Blind
Deaf and dumb
Within Indian scenario the terms disabled and handicapped have
been used synonymously.

Blind people referred to as ‘Surdas’

‘mand budhi' (slow witted)

‘Viklanglapahij’ (disabled/handicapped)

‘Inconvenience’ by some Bengali mothers to describe a disabled child

(The word inconvenience defines the relationship of a non-disabled
person toward the disabled person as essentially characterised by
support and acceptance. It carries a moral imperative, refusal to offer
support to a person with inconvenience is viewed as a moral outrage)
Discriminatory language whether outright verbal abuse or
thoughtless stereotyping has just as much power to
exclude, marginalised and impact on a deep personal,
stigmatising level.
The term “disabled individual” place the disability as the first
categorical representation of that person.

For a woman or a man, disability becomes the central feature

and the issue of personhood assume secondary significance.

Reflects an identity category for political reasons.

The term “disabled individual” has been used when disability
is referred to as a form of social oppression, experienced by
people with perceived impairments and manifested in
discriminatory practices.

On the premise that society disables a person, therefore a

political process is required to undo the harm. This is in line
wth Union of the physically Impaired Against Segregation
(UPAIS)
However, ‘person with a disability’ is preferred terminology within
the formal structural systems, advocacy and political
organisations in India

Here the person with disability is a person first, and the disability
is incidental to that (second)

Reflects way of fighting against the stigma of disability and

reemphasising humanity, wholeness and normalcy of the person.
Need to modify the terms because language is used to avoid the
inherent objectification found within the term “the disabled” and
to escape from insulting terms such as cripple, the lame, the
retarded, the spastic.

The origin of “people first language’ was rooted in the desire to

create some distance between the person and the
understanding that she/he is not completely determined by
disability, which was/is mostly defined as a lack or deficit.
However the usage of ‘person with a disability’ did not initiate
change in the understanding of disability, which is somehow
problematic

‘The person first approach’ conceives of disability as a

troublesome condition arbitrarily attached to some people, a
condition (unlike gender, race) that is only significant as a
remedial or managerial issue.

When conceived in this manner, the political advantage is lost.

Any terminology which makes the disabled reject the language of

deviance for a language of pride, self worth and power is to be
welcomed.
In the definitions given by WHO International Classification of
Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps (ICIDH, 1980)

Categorises Impairment, disability and handicapped separately

Most popular definition

But the distinction between (physiological) impairment and (socially

constructed) disability far too blunt.

Contingent upon the Biomedical framework

Determinist perspective where linear relationship between cause

and effect is established.

Terminology was negative

It was restated by New Definition termed as International
Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF)

ICF structured around the components:

A) Body functions and structure

B) Activities (related to tasks and actions by an individual) and
participation (involvement in life situation)

Disability is an umbrella term for impairments, activity limitations

and participation restrictions. It denotes the negative aspects of the
interaction between a person’s health condition(s) and that
individual’s contextual factors (environmental and personal factors).
ICF defines ‘impairment’ as problems in body function or
structure such as a significant deviations or loss.

Allows the identification of the major environmental barriers

and thus specific challenges to society, ensure the
equalisations of opportunities in organisations and
government.

As long as the conceptual basis of ICF is a medical model,

disability issue will get medicalized.
But the standardisation is problematic, because those
with the power to define impairment and disability were
rarely those with impairments themselves and less often
representative of the grass root.
In India as the disabled people became more socially
visible, rehabilitation issues in the medical work were
rethought as the persons with Disabilities (PWD) Act, 1995.

Many practitioners do not use the legal definitions.

According to Pattanaik the term ‘disabled’ should be

concerned with objective definitions of impairment of
structures and functions. A disabled person means he/she
is only handicapped which is partial but can compete with
restricted range.
Psychologization and Responses
of Psychology to Disability
(Goodley Chapter 5 and 6)
It annoys me when able-bodied people hold forth about how we
should be as independent as possible. Of course we should but
I’d like to hear some talk about the able-bodied being a bit more
independent too – how many of them cut their own hair for
goodness sake? (Elsa, in Campling, 1981: 85)

Whether it is the ‘species typical body’ (in science), the ‘normative

citizen’ (in political theory), the ‘reasonable man’ (in law), all these
signifiers point to a fabrication that reaches into the very soul that
sweeps us into life. (Campbell, 2009: 7)

The ‘self-made man’ is a fitting metaphor for the right, and ‘good
things happen to good people’ a fitting motto. (Bratlinger, 2001: 4)

What do these statements say about the kind of individual

valued by contemporary society?
From the above statements Individual is a problematic
phenomenon.

Individualisation is at the very centre of disablement.

The problem of disability is firmly tied to the constitution

of idealised individuals and their monstrous/horrific/repellent
alternatives.
A crucial element of individualisation is the process of
Psychologisation (This is not the same as psychology)

Psychological practices with dodgy (dishonest,

unreliable) histories in their treatment of disabled people
(though the same can be said of any human and social
sciences of disabling societies)
Psychologisation is a process that is govern by
certain contradictory assumptions, approaches,
prejudices and abuses which emerged from the
mapping/association of the individual by social
and human sciences, institutions and nation states.
Deconstructing ‘psychology’s individual

There is a need to deconstruct psychology’s concept of

‘individual’, because it has an error - laden notion that is
associated with individual defining as a whole, complete,
perfect and self sustaining.
 Average Self- contained
Cognitivism
Individuals individualism

Solitary souls Developmentalism Normalization

Psychologization

Components of the individual capturing the practices of

Psychologization
 Average Individuals
The normal individual (and its counterpart the feebleminded,
parasitic, and morally questionable) is part of the history of
modernist progress, industrialisation and the ideological
consolidation of the power of the bourgeois.

‘An able body’, is the body of a citizen. By contrast, deformed,

deafened, amputated, obese, females, perverse, crippled and
blinded bodies do not make up the body politic.

Psychological understandings of human development came to

view the norm as average as natural.
Self contained Individualism
Psychology is a science that speaks of the individual.

Psychology has long held implicit assumptions (that are then made
explicit) about the individual, and conversely, what is required to be an
individual.

The core concept of psychology’s subject is the unitary rational subject.

The accepted individual is adult, male, middle - class, heterosexual,

rule abiding, sane, non - disabled and European.

And we are expected to mirror the accepted individual adult.

But the converse – the Other – is the unacceptable: child, female,

working-class, homosexual, criminal, insane, disabled, and resolutely
non-European.
Sampson (1977) describes our cultural ethos/atmosphere as the era of
the self-contained individual.

“The modern form (idealised) of personhood is characterised by

private, egocentric (thinking about oneself), agentic, an example of who
has little need for others, directly opposing the notion of
interdependence and mutuality, is inherently masculine and suitably
compliant/cooperative to educational, workplace and industrial
management”

This ideal becomes psychology’s big ‘discovery’ and the preferred

nature of being for all persons.
 Cognitivism
Individualism creates the interiority of the human subject which
is evident in cognitivism.

The individual-as-cognitively-(dis)abled was rapidly embraced

by psychology to categorise short- and long-term memory,
assess problem solving, and measure levels of mental
processing and conscious decision-making.
Cognitivism can be viewed as a hyper-reasoned, conscious and
reasonable conceptualisation of the individual against which all
individuals are universally marked and judged.

Cognitivism was fit for purpose for psychology’s quest for status as a
functionalist science.

Cognitivism allows for the sorting of people in terms of their cognitive

worth.

Deficit thinking is there to be found and eradicated.

 Solitary souls
Psychologist from the 1950s onwards develop forms of
experimentation that aimed to understand the individual.

With experimentation individual became an ever more atomistic

(distinct, separable element), solitary and isolated soul.

Becomes a subject of scientific study that contrasted hugely

with the unruly individual outside the laboratory in the ‘real world’

Eg: Milgram’s obedience studies and Zimbardo’s prison

experiment.
Relationality was considered to be a risk to the
atomistic being rather than a condition of being human.

By studying the subject in isolation, any problems of the

individual were invariably interpreted in isolationist way:
a problem within that individual.

Strange things happen when the complexity of the

individual is lost.
Developmentalism
The child is measured to ensure ‘normal’ development.

When ‘abnormal’ or ‘pathological’ development is observed,

they are classified and corrected.

The ‘developing child’ is not a description of a ‘real’ entity, but

a powerful discursive/digression/departure prescription
(Walkerdine, 1993) which is against prescribed expectations
such as ‘meeting targets’, ‘age-appropriate behaviour’,
‘stages of development’ and marks of deficiency including
‘educational subnormality’, ‘special educational needs’ and
‘below average intelligence.
Children are understood through the application of develop
- mentalist theories which promise universal progress of
emotionality (self-containment), intelligence (cognitivism),
independence (mastery) and rationality (reason) that meets
an end point of normality (average man) or higher (high
functioning man) (Burman, 2008)

Stage theories of universal development were based on

limited samples of people (normally white, middle class and
American Subjects) for which independence, achievements
and academic attainments were seen as the central tasks of
development for all children and adolescence.
Normalisation
Key to the makings of the developing individual is the process of
normalisation

A normalised individual is a confessional individual who is all too

ready and willing to share their innermost thoughts and worries, not
just with professional counsellors and therapists, but also in a public
context that demands it.

Today’s individual is tied to humanist myth of fullness and bliss, of

abstract individualism, ‘an ultimate self free from dependency.

This myth promotes psychological interventions to cure mental

illness, improve education, reduce crime, stamp out prejudice and
create fulfilling lives.

Disabled people have been subjected to a number of questionable

interventions in the name of these aims.
 Psychologisation
Components of the individual describe above capture
the practices of psychologisation

Psychologisation has lead view of the individual as a

unitary isolated cognitively - able - rational - developed -
innately - normed - consensual being.

This view of abstract/ideal individual is in contrast with

the real individual entity. The contradictory assumptions
about individual
Psychologisation reduces social problems to the level of the
individual. It has the potential to be:

- Individualistic: the scientific study of mind and behaviour

- Bourgeois: ideas of the majority (and ruling) are exercised
over the minority
- Apolitical: changing individuals rather than society
- Professional-led: experts over the lay
- Pseudo-scientific: an emphasis on science and a poor
version of it at that
- Normalising: concerned with individuals adjusting to their
impairment
- Oppressive: disabled people are mere subjects of
psychology’s individualising practices

Product of Psychologisation is – ‘preferred individual’

maintains the disabling status-quo.
Disability and the Dominant alterity
Fail to match up to the ideal individual and embodying the failing
individual

Mintz (2002) suggests that social discourses about disability are not
about disability at all. Rather the relation to the need to guarantee
the privileged status of the non-disabled individual, a need that, in
turn, emerges from fears about the fragility and unpredictability of
embodied identities.

Disabled people constitute a huge problem for non-disabled society

precisely because they disrupt the normative individual.
The person that dribbles, disrupts a culture that emphasises
bodily control and associated cultural norms around manners,
convention and bodily comportment.

An individual whose speech is difficult to understand is

assumed to have a problem because they challenge a
colonising stance of certainty about how people should speak.
 Alterity
The non-disabled alterity – the Other to disabled people
– may be experienced as a threatening place.

Analyses of otherness and the standards against which

individuals are expected to judge themselves.

So, what is alterity for disabled people?

‘alterity for the black man is the white man’ (Fanon,

1997); alterity for the disabled person is the non-
disabled.
Responses of Psychology to
Disability
Psychology of Disablism has been addressed by
disability studies.

Fanon (1993) describes disablism as a process of socio-

diagnosis: of waging war on levels of both the socio-
economic and the psychological.
Psychology has a troubling and troubled status in
disability studies.

When disability and psychology cross they tend to do so

in terms of rehabilitation, treatment, therapy and cure.

Disabled people remain un(der)represented on

psychology courses and profession
Disabled people often become the repositories of other’s
anxieties.

Impairment conjures up feelings of lack, tragedy,

vulnerability and fascination, and disablism clearly has a
psychological element to it.

Psychology of the reactions and relationships

Psychology has the potential to individualise material, political
and cultural foci.

Non/disabled selves are constituted in relation to others, against

a backdrop of disabled people’s resistance to their social
exclusion.

Relationality acknowledges that we all need others to develop an

un/conscious sense of our selves.

The boundary/demarcation between self and others is the

distinct subjectivities of disabled (flawed, tragic) and abled
(perfect, heroic)
Disability studies response
- Psychology response to disabilities

- Critical psychology
Psychology in disabilities studies
Goodley and Lawthom (2010) Identified disability studies
literature maintained a politicised perspective while attending to
a psychological realm of analysis.

Position like

1. Psycho-emotional disablism (Reeve, 2008)

The psychological consequences and origins of direct and
indirect forms of discrimination which might be manifested in
terms of low self-esteem and psychological distress

2. Metaphorical - disability is used as a metaphor for

psychological, social and cultural discourses of ‘lack’, ‘tragedy’
and ‘flawed’.
3. Internalised oppression
The psychological consequences of exclusion of
disabled people from mainstream life.

4. Relational/interactional– the dynamic interplay of

biology, psychology and the environment

All the above position renders emotional and legitimate

subjects of social scientific analysis.

Contemplates the persons interiority and their

relationship with the exteriority of others. Or, how the
disabled self is made in the image of others.

Therefore the need for a psychology of disability, ‘which

focuses on the psychological anxieties and distresses
caused by the social relations of disability’
Critical Psychology
Critical psychology have recast psychology in ways amenable
to disability politics.

Confront psychological practices that sustain oppression and

seek, instead, to promote an ethical and politicised
psychology that works alongside activists, users and survivors
of psychology.

Contestation appeared through interpretivists, radical

humanists and Marxists, writers who challenged the
dominating forces of positivism.

Backed by strong qualitative research

Sustained rejection of psychological functionalism: a
mistaken view of isolated beings in socio-political
vacuums – the roots of psychologisation.

Pushed psychologists towards meaning-oriented

persuasions, often with political affiliations.

Critical psychology shares much with disability studies.

Each are reactions to hegemonic constructions of elitist
subjectivities, the medicalisation of distress and the
segregation of some from the mainstream.
Each oppose the diagnosis, assessment and treatment
of isolated individuals and seek to change cultural and
environmental forms of alienation and marginalisation.

Similarly, each invite criticality on the part of activists,

theorists and practitioners.

They share a commitment to forming communities of

practice that are engaged with social change.
Critical psychologists have deconstructed and
reconstructed, revised and rejected psychology.

Developed on the periphery of psychology, often as

counter-discourses to the science of psychology, as
transformative alliances with feminism, queer theory and
post-colonialism that aim to solicit more politicised
versions of the psyche, subjectivity and relationally.
Critical psychology studies

1. Social psychoanalytic – Anxiety is the construction of

individual, social and cultural and institutional lives (e.g.
Bocock, 1976; Frosh, 1987; Hollway and Jefferson, 2000)

2. Narrative psychology – understands subjectivities as the

stories people tell about their lives. These stories combine
personal idiosyncrasies and novel experiences with wider
cultural and political narratives that help the shaping of the
storying of a sense of self (Goodley et al., 2004).
4. Feminist psychologies – draws on the subjectivities of
wo/men with explicit reference to patriarchal domination
and explores the role of male stream psychology in such
practices as gender differentiation, the medicalisation of
women’s distress.

5. Queer and Postcolonial Psychology – Understands

dominant forms of subjectivity as reflecting accidental
and heteronormative ideals and poses alternative
hybridised and queer subjectivities and subjugated/
outlawed ontologies.
 Two psychologies of disability (Olkin and
Pledger, 2003)
Paradigm 1 - Traditional
(Rehabilitative and curative) Paradigm 2 - New

• Is based on a medical model of • Is based on a social model or the

disability new paradigm of disability
• Is pathology oriented • Shifts to systematic and societal
perspective
• Views differences due to
disability. [impairment] as deficits
or developmental aberrations
• Takes a lifespan approach

• Is usually cross-sectional, • Uses concepts of ‘response’ to

constituting a typical or disability as a fluid process
representative sample.
 • Promotes health and resilience
• Sees people with disabilities
[impairments] and their families
as at high risk for difficulties
• Values disability history and
• Focuses predominantly on
culture as well as interpersonal
intrapsychic, personal
relationships
characteristics or intrapersonal
variables

• Research on disabled people – • Research with disabled people -

which is more likely to be
incorporates those being
inpatient or treatment settings
researched into the research
process
• Uses concept of ‘adjustment’ or • Sees the major problem of disability
‘adaptation’ to disability as social, political, economical, legal

• Uses norms based on non- • Is grounded in the belief that those

disabled/ able-bodied individuals with impairments have been denied
for comparison. their civil rights

• Is about but rarely by, disabled • Is usually not just abut, but by,
people disabled people

• Perpetuates as “we-they” model • Seeks remedies in public policy,

legislation and systematic
programmatic changes.
 Conclusion
Psychologists should work alongside people to create a new social
setting in which everybody is responsible for supporting emotional
development in others, and where conflicts are used as growing points
rather than disruptions in the proper activity of the establishment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7tS3e_F9vM