Factors that influence elementary school teachers’ attitudes towards inclusion of visually impaired children in Turkey

There is a scarcity of research on inclusion of visually impaired children in Turkey. Specifically, a gap exists concerning the attitudes of elementary school teachers towards the inclusion of visually impaired children in mainstream schools. This article uses data from two questionnaires, leveraging the responses of 253 teachers from rural and urban areas. The results demonstrate that elementary school teachers commonly hold positive attitudes towards the inclusion of visually impaired children and that teachers’ initial and in-service training about inclusion positively influenced their attitudes. Our findings are in contrast with earlier research which argues that teachers do not hold positive attitudes to inclusion, and highlights that a key barrier to inclusion stems from elementary school teachers feeling unprepared to teach visually impaired children. We conclude that greater post-qualification training is required to enable teachers to operationalise different approaches that facilitate the inclusion of visually impaired children.     

Linear scalar-on-surface random effects regression models

Many research fields increasingly involve analyzing data of a complex structure. Models investigating the dependence of a response on a predictor have moved beyond the ordinary scalar-on-vector regression. We propose a regression model for a scalar response and a surface (or a bivariate function) predictor. The predictor has a random component and the regression model falls in the framework of linear random effects models. We estimate the model parameters via maximizing the log-likelihood with the ECME (Expectation/Conditional Maximization Either) algorithm. We use the approach to analyze a data set where the response is the neuroticism score and the predictor is the resting-state brain function image. In the simulations we tried, the approach has better performance than two other approaches, a functional principal component regression approach and a smooth scalar-on-image regression approach.     

Uniform consistency rate of kNN regression estimation for functional time series data

In this paper, we investigate the k-nearest neighbours (kNN) estimation of nonparametric regression model for strong mixing functional time series data. More precisely, we establish the uniform almost complete convergence rate of the kNN estimator under some mild conditions. Furthermore, a simulation study and an empirical application to the real data analysis of sea surface temperature (SST) are carried out to illustrate the finite sample performances and the usefulness of the kNN approach.     

Women with disabilities and their lived experiences of physical,psychological and sexual abuse in Croatia

This research aims to generate a better understanding of the abuse of women with disabilities through a qualitative study with 28 women with disabilities in five towns in Croatia. The results show that more than half of the research participants had experienced physical, psychological and sexual abuse, and financial exploitation. Participants stressed the need for education and empowerment of women with disabilities as well as better training for professionals and ensuring that a formal support system is available in every local community. The role of social workers in emerging countries like Croatia needs to include developing individual, group and community support for women with disabilities and raising public awareness of the abuse and violence shown towards women with disabilities through political and community networks and events.     

‘I walk from trouble’: exploring safeguards with adults with intellectual disabilities – an Australian qualitative study

People living with intellectual disabilities have a right to be safe from abuse and neglect and have a right to be included in the decision-making process determining safeguards that will affect them. However, the research evidence that could underpin good professional practice in terms of co-producing safeguards against abuse and neglect directly involving people with intellectual disabilities is largely missing. This article, based on qualitative research involving semi-structured interviews conducted during the first half of 2014, seeks to strengthen this evidence base. It reports on the prevention strategies identified by 12 adults with intellectual disabilities about how to stay safe and compares these with the findings of similar research. The article suggests that a comprehensive safeguarding approach comprises both life course-focused safety training and access to assisted decision-making. The article argues that given the plethora of risk situations encountered by people living with intellectual disability, assisted decision-making should take the form of a co-creation process that is situation specific and grounded in everyday life.     

Disablism in the lives of people living with a chronic illness in England and Portugal

This article is based on research about the daily lives of people living with chronic illnesses in England and Portugal. Through the first-person narratives of participants, I argue that the lives of people living with debilitating chronic illnesses are affected by disablism, discrimination and exclusion. These aspects affect them in several important realms of life such as lack of or poor social support, difficulties in obtaining reasonable adjustments or the inability to obtain any kind of state support at all. These aspects are also widespread and compound and greatly influence their lives, beyond or in addition to the physical experience of the illness itself. I conclude that it is fundamental to change these structural and policy aspects and that people should have access to what I have termed a paradigm of sustained well-being, despite the illness.     

Distress or disability? Could a theoretical framework drawn from disability studies be a way forward when trying to understand experiences of oppression on the grounds of mental distress?

This article explores whether it is possible to use a theoretical framework drawn from disability studies to understand experiences of social oppression on the grounds of mental distress. Thomas’ extended social relational theoretisation of disablism was used in a PhD project concerned with experiences of mental distress. The tentative conclusion was that Thomas’ conceptualisation of disablism and impairment could offer a way of improving understanding of mental distress and oppression on the grounds of mental distress. However, Thomas and Reeve’s theorisation of the different forms of disablism was not readily transferred to the field of mental distress. Thus, tentative definitions of the different forms of disablism in relation to the field of mental distress were created. Perceived impairment type and disablism appear to be interconnected, and one has to acknowledge what kind of perceived impairment type one is focusing on when theorising disability and the different types of disablism.     

The family caregiving context among adults with disabilities: A review of the research on developmental disabilities,serious mental illness,and traumatic brain injury

ABSTRACT

A majority of adults with serious disabilities are cared for in the home by family members. Guided by an ecological framework, this article presents the findings of a literature review of research on family caregiving and family support for adults with disabilities. This review included 33 research studies published between 2000 and 2015 focused on three disabilities: Developmental disabilities, serious mental illnesses, and traumatic brain injury. A synthesis of the findings underscores the critical role that family caregivers occupy in addressing the needs of their loved one with a disability; however, the needs of the caregiver are insufficiently met by existing service approaches. A better understanding of the unique needs and strengths of the family support context of caregivers and care recipients is needed, giving greater attention to ethnic, racial, and cultural considerations in future research.     

Using institutional ethnography's ideological circle to portray how textually mediated disability discourse paralysed a Supreme Court of Canada ruling

Persons with disabilities created through texts as damaged goods are being ‘cured’ by workplace accommodation, a textually mediated work process. Prior to 1999, workplace accommodation in the Canadian federal public service signified the adjustments necessary to enable a disabled worker to fit into a workplace designed for able-bodied workers. In 1999, a Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruling known as Meiorin turned this accommodation provision on its head. Instead of being focused on individual-level fixes so that a disabled worker could be accommodated in an existing workplace, this legislation required employers to transform their workplaces so as to make them ready to receive as many different types of workers as reasonably possible from the outset. Using Dorothy E. Smith's institutional ethnography, I use my experiences as a disability rights activist employed in the Canadian federal public service to explicate how textually mediated disability discourse paralysed this groundbreaking SCC ruling.