1EDST5111
Lecture 1
PEOPLE
with intellectual
disabilities
IINTRODUCTION
Professor Iva Strnadová
i.strnadova@unsw.edu.au
Photo by Agence Olloweb on Unsplash
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We know we are on First Nations land.
We respect the First Nations people from this
land.
On this land we
• Live
• Work
• Play
• Swim
• Dream
Berry Island, Wollstonecraft
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First Nations people have lived on this land for
many years.
Now we live on this land together.
We respect all First Nations people and Elders.
We can learn a lot from their stories.
We can all learn from each other in our meeting
today.
This Acknowledgement of Country is written by
• New South Wales Council for Intellectual
Disability
Berry Island, Wollstonecraft
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2Overview of Today’s Lecture
• A quick guide to EDST5111 in Moodle
• Assessment tasks
• What does the term “intellectual disabilities”
mean?
• Current diagnostic criteria
• Terminology
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A little note about the slides
These slides follow Easy Read
principles
We use many images from
www.photosymbols.com
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Contacting Iva
Email is your best method of contact:
i.strnadova@unsw.edu.au
My consultation times are:
Tuesday 4:00-5:00 pm
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3What Will You Learn in This Course?
• Social constructions and models of disability
• Causes of intellectual disabilities
• Assessment of intellectual disabilities
• Students with intellectual disabilities in early,
pre-school and school age
• Adolescent students with intellectual
disabilities
• Students with profound and multiple learning
disabilities
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• Adults with intellectual disabilities:
employment, self-advocacy, relationships and
parenthood, ageing
• Families of people with intellectual disabilities
• Intellectual disabilities and mental health
issues
• People with intellectual disabilities in criminal
justice systems
What Will You Learn in This Course?
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOwDfnoek6E
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4Policy lurches
Institutions
• Late C19 to
mid C20
• Segregation
in large
institutions
Care in the
community
• Specialist
services in
community
Personalization
• Early C21
• Individualized
budgets and
care packages
(Walmsley, 2012)
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I did have a dream that I didn’t have any disabilities. I
was a normal person like you, because you don’t have
disabilities, do you. You don’t have disabilities. So I feel
that if I start all over again, don’t have disabilities, have
a normal life, everything would be OK. I wouldn’t have
much [sic] problems. But since I have a disability, I
have some problems, and some problems…my
disability, I don’t feel happy about, you know? You’re
lucky. You don’t have disabilities, you can do whatever
you like. It depends [on] what you do, but you don’t
have any problems doing…
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5People with Intellectual Disabilities May Have
• Limited attention span
• Fewer learning strategies
• Language delays
• A slower learning pace
• To do things many more times than their
peers before they learn it
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People with Intellectual Disabilities May Have
Difficulties
• Understanding what other people say or
mean
• Saying what they mean or how they feel
• Understanding social clues
• Learning and concentrating
• With generalisation
• With academics (memory, problem-solving)
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People with Intellectual Disabilities May
• Act younger than their age
• Not understand when somebody is
making fun of them
• Find it hard to read or write
• Not understand when someone tells them
to do something wrong
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6“It affects me really bad, because I have trouble with
learning. Yeah. And sometimes I feel sad because I
see a lot of kids doing great work, and they’re really
smart, and sometimes I sit doing my work and
sometimes I wish I was smart so I don’t have to keep
doing it all over again.”
“It can affect me in a few different ways. It affects my
reading. I read really slowly, and also, I have a third
grade spelling level, so I use Talk to Text a lot,
because I can’t spell very well.”
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Intellectual Disabilities
• A general cognitive slowness with
learning and adaptive skills
Adaptive functioning/behaviour:
• Ability of a person to cope with the
demands of everyday living
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• Communication
• Self-care
• Home living
• Social/interpersonal skills
• Use of community resources
• Self-direction
• Functional academic skills
• Work
• Leisure
• Health and safety
Adaptive Functioning
Diagnosis of intellectual disability – difficulties in at least two
of the following skill areas:
(Hyde et al., 2010)
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7Intellectual disability reflects
the "fit" between the
capabilities of individuals and
the structure and expectations
of their environment.
(NSW CID)
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ROBERT STRIKE, AM
• Intellectual disability is a disability that slows down
learning.
• We can learn if the way of teaching matches how the
person learns.
• Intellectual disability is not an inability to think!
• We know what is going on around us, and we can feel
what’s going on too!
(NSW CID)
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Variety in Terminology
• Australia and New Zealand: “intellectual
disability”, “intellectual disabilities”
• UK: “learning disability”
• USA and Canada: “intellectual
disability”, “intellectual disabilities” (not
long ago “mental retardation”)
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8Cognitive Disabilities
• A set of disabilities that can result from
impairment to the Central Nervous System
(CNS) that manifest in limitations to
general cognitive functioning
• Intellectual disabilities, traumatic brain
injury, learning disability, and dementia
associated with Alzheimer's disease
• Intellectual disabilities: set apart by factors
such as scope of impairment (e.g., global)
and age of onset (e.g., prior to age 18)
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Developmental Disabilities
• Must be manifested in the
developmental period (e.g., prior to
age 18)
• A non-diagnostic category that refers
to people with both cognitive and
physical disabilities whose disability:
• Originates in childhood (from birth to
18)
• Constitutes a significant challenge to
typical functioning, and
• Is expected to continue indefinitely
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Intellectual Disabilities
1. Deficits in intellectual functions, such as
reasoning, problem solving, planning, abstract
thinking, judgment, academic learning, and
learning from experience…
2. Deficits in adaptive functioning that result in
failure to meet developmental and sociocultural
standards for personal independence and social
responsibility. Without ongoing support, the
adaptive deficits limit functioning in one or
more activities of daily life, such as
communication, social participation, and
independent living, across multiple
environments…
3. Onset of intellectual and adaptive deficits
during the developmental period.
Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V)
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9Three Domains of Adaptive Functioning
Conceptual (academic):
• Competence in memory
• Language
• Writing
• Reading
• Math reasoning
• Acquisition of practical knowledge
• Problem solving
• Judgment in novel situations
(DSM-V)
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Three Domains of Adaptive Functioning
Social:
• Awareness of others’ thoughts, feelings and
experiences
• Empathy
• Friendship abilities
• Social judgment
Practical:
• Learning and self-management across life
settings
• Job responsibilities
• Money management
• Self-management of behaviour
(DSM-V)
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Power of Language about Disabilities
Power of Language about Disabilities
Power of Languag
about Disabilities
A record-breaker at the Paralympic
Games in 1996, Aimee Mullins has built
a career as a model, actor and advocate
for women, sports and the next
generation of prosthetics.
https://www.ted.com/talks/aimee_mullin
s_the_opportunity_of_adversity?langua
ge=en (end at 18:34min remaining)
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People with intellectual disability
• Have heard bad things about
themselves over their life
• This can mean some people start
to believe the bad things
• This is wrong!
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What people say has a BIG IMPACT
• Health teams can use words which
make people feel sad
• Problem
• Disorder
• Missing
• Faulty
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ALPHA-THALASSEMIA / MENTAL RETARDATION SYNDROME, CHROMOSOME 16-RELATED;
NEURODEGENERATION, CHILDHOOD-ONSET, WITH HYPOTONIA, RESPIRATORY INSUFFICIENCY, AND
BRAIN IMAGIN; DEAFNESS, CONRIBA; ABNORMALITIES; CONRIBA; CHROMOSOME 2q32-q33
DELETION SYNDROME; INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENTAL DISORDER, X-LINKED, SYNDROMIC,
TURNER TYPE; MRXST; COFFIN-LOWRY SYNDROME; CLS; MENTAL RETARDATION, X-LINKED,
SYNDROMIC, TURNER TYPE; JUBERG-MARSIDI SYNDROME; JMS; BROOKS-WISNIEWSKI-BROWN
SYNDROME; MENTAL RETARDATION, X-LINKED, WITH GROWTH RETARDATION, DEAFNESS, AND
MICROGENITALISM; MENTAL RETARDATION, X-LINKED, SYNDROMIC, BROOKS-WISNIEWSKI-
BROWN TYPE; MRXSBWB; CHROMOSOME Xp11.22 DUPLICATION SYNDROME; MENTAL
RETARDATION AND MACROCEPHALY SYNDROME; NEURODEGENERATION, CHILDHOOD-ONSET, WITH
HYPOTONIA, RESPIRATORY INSUFFICIENCY, AND BRAIN IMAGING ABNORMALITIES; CONRIBA;
COFFIN-LOWRY SYNDROME; CLS; CHROMOSOME Xp11.22 DUPLICATION SYNDROME;
NEURODEGENERATION, CHILDHOOD-ONSET, WITH HYPOTONIA, RESPIRATORY INSUFFICIENCY, AND
BRAIN IMAGING ABNORMALITIES; CONRIBA; ALPHA-THALASSEMIA/MENTAL RETARDATION
SYNDROME, CHROMOSOME 16-RELATED; CHROMOSOME Xp11.22 DUPLICATION SYNDROME;
MACROCEPHALY SYNDROME; NEURODEGENERATION, CHILDHOOD-ONSET, WITH HYPOTONIA.
Labels are for jars - not people.
I am not a
number.
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Language guide
31https://www.genetics.edu.auttps://www.genetics.edu.au
Iva
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Language about Disability
• Social justice underlies the correct use of
terminology
• Always remember person first principle
• Don’t refer to a disability unless necessary
or relevant
• Focus on individual needs or additional
needs of student and not on disability
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People with Intellectual Disabilities
about Themselves
Resa Hayes, a self-advocate with intellectual disabilities
I found a job several years ago working for People
First. We have a motto, which says, ‘We are
people first and our disabilities are second.’ We
do not like using the word disability. We like to use
different abilities, because we all are different and
we all have abilities.
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Institutions
Institutions
• Late C19 to
mid C20
• Segregation in
large
institutions
Care in the
community
• Mid C20 to
early C21
• Specialist
services in
community
Personalization
• Early C21
• Individualized
budgets and
care packages
Walmsley, 2012
34
Social History of Intellectual
Disabilities
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZA
gOs4Ngn4
Group work
•How were people with intellectual
disabilities treated throughout the
history (e.g., key milestones)?
•How are people with intellectual
disabilities valued in society today?
How does their situation compare
to the past?
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Time to Reflect
•Write down 5 new things you have learnt
about intellectual disabilities since the class
started
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Our Perceptions of Disabilities
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Competing or Complementary Models of Disability?
Medical model
• Diagnosis, measurement,
treatment/intervention
• Disability as impairment in the individual
• Positivist approach to evidence and
decision-making
Social model
• Disability results from barriers to
participation in social life
• Separates impairment (individual/bodily)
from disability (social)
• Activist and social change approach to
evidence and decision-making
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Competing or Complementary Models of Disability?
Human rights model
• Emphasises equality and discrimination
• Inclusion as a fundamental human right
• Disability as an interaction between individual
impairments and external barriers
• Relies on international treaties and domestic legislation
Critical disability studies
• Engages with the fundamental concept of disability and
its relationship to society
• Emphasises identity and intersectionality
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Levels of Intellectual Disability
•Mild (IQ scores of 50/55 – 70)
•Moderate (IQ scores of 34/40 –
50/55)
•Severe (IQ scores of 20/25 – 34/40)
•Profound (IQ scores of below 20/25)
Versus Support Needs
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‘Valued Life’
People with intellectual disabilities
can lead valued lives within the
community but may need varying
levels of support in order to do so
NSW CID
How is language reflecting ‘valued
life’ reflected in the following
descriptions?
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• Professor Iva Strnadová, UNSW Sydney
• Twitter: @IvaStrnadova
• Blog: https://disabilityandmeonline.com/
• Contact: i.strnadova@unsw.edu.au
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