ABA professionals and paraprofessionals frequently work with people with disabilities. In this module, we will examine some of the ethical and professional issues that you may need to be mindful of in your practice.
First, we need to examine what we mean by the word ?disability?.
Disability is a normal part of being human. Most people will experience a permanent or temporary disability at some point during their lives. According to the World Health Organisation, 15% of the global population live with some form of disability. People with disabilities are a vulnerable group. Many have less access to education and vocational opportunities and they are more likely to experience poverty than those who do not have a disability.
There are a variety of different conceptualisations and models of disability. The model of disability that is adopted by policy makers and professionals can have great impacts for those who avail of services. While a full exploration of these models goes beyond the scope of this course, we will examine some of the most common models:
Medical model of disability
The medical model of disability dominated 20th century service provision. According to medical model, disability results from impairments or differences within the individual.
When operating within a medical model, a person seeks to identify what is ?wrong? within an individual and how to fix it.
Social model of disability
While the medical model of disability says that the cause of disability lies within an individual, the social model says that disability results from the way in which society is organised.
The social model of disability emerged in response to the medical model. Instead of focusing on fixing something within a person, it looks at ways of removing barriers that restrict the life choices of people with disabilities.
A good example of how the social model of disability is sometimes applied in society is that short-sighted people living in the UK are not typically classified as disabled. Free or affordable eye-tests and visual aids are available to everybody. This means that a biological impairment does not affect them from participating fully in society. However, in other countries where such services are not available, such impairments would result in disablement. A person might not be able to read or drive and their ability to participate in society would be lessened as a result.
Examples
To examine the differences between the two models, let?s look at the example of an adult with an intellectual/learning disability who engages in aggressive behaviors towards themselves or others.
Under a medical model, such a person might be expected to live in a hospital or specialised community where they could be treated. This might occur even if the person wanted to live in their own home and work in their local community.
Under a social model, this young adult would be supported to live independently, to pay their rent and live as independently as possible.
Let?s look at another example:
A person who uses a wheelchair wants to access their local police station, but cannot use the stairs. Under the medical model, you would try to restore or improve the person?s ability to walk. However, if this was not feasible, then the model does not produce many other alternative courses of action.
Under a social model solution, ramps would be added to the police station.
Biopsychosocial model of disability
While the social model of disability conceptualizes disability as being caused by social exclusion and discrimination, and the medical model stresses impairments located within the individual, the biopsychosocial models aims to link these differing conceptualisations.
The biopsychosocial views disability as the result of an interaction between the biological state of an individual and the way that society is structured. It tends to explain the poor outcomes experienced by many disabled people as resulting from both health conditions and the way that those with them are treated. It conceptualises disability as resulting from an interaction between physical, psychological and social factors.
Like the medical model, the biopsychosocial model tends to support the use of experts to treat the needs of people with disabilities. Like the social model, it supports the idea that society needs to find ways to include people with disabilities within wide society by providing them equal social, educational, political and economic opportunities.
Conclusion
This brief overview of some of the common models of disability is designed to give you food for thought. How have you conceptualised disability? You may find that in the past you?ve adopted different models in different situations.
How you conceptualise disability impacts on what your role is when working with somebody with a disability. Within the framework of ABA, it impacts on what we might consider a socially valid, applied and effective intervention.