“We don’t have a box”: Understanding Hidden Disability Identity Utilizing Narrative Research Methodology
By A. Valeras. 2010
90 citations recorded by the source corpus.
A "hidden disability," one unapparent to outside observers, defies the outward social construction of disability. A narrative research approach is used to understand the process of personal identification (or lack thereof) with being "disabled." Self-narratives were elicited from three men and three women, ranging in age from 21 to 53 years who have had a hidden physical disability since before age thirteen. The conditions represented are: Juvenile Diabetes, Asthma, Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis, Epilepsy, Muscular Dystrophy, and Celiac Disease. While persons with hidden disabilities are afforded a sense of anonymity, they must contend with different challenges, including learning strategic self-disclosure and impression management; when to disclose and make disability visible and when to "pass" and give society the impression of "able-bodiedness." The choice, to be or not to be disabled, has important implications for the way we conceptualize disability, and the concept of identity as a whole.
Subfields: Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, Safety Research
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3b9258c47b078ec243ced79102183be6516063dc
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In Safety Research
Citations in the corpus
- College Experiences for Students With Autism Spectrum Disorder: Personal Identity, Public Disclosure, and Institutional Support (2017, background): “Students with these identities may decide to actively conceal their status and present themselves as “a member of the dominant privileged group” (Valeras, 2010).”
- Designing an Online Infrastructure for Collecting AI Data From People With Disabilities (2021, background): “This concern was particularly stressed by those who experienced a “hidden disability" [53] such as attention-defcit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), dyslexia, or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), as these participants saw their disclosure of disability as “optional.”