Is taking the arm of a woman with an intellectual and developmental disability (I/DD) and pulling her along in order to carry out a routine domestic task an abusive practice? In spite of the existence of some approved definitions, the interpretation of the situation observed may lead to different opinions about what is considered abuse.With this in mind, the authors compare social and legal points of view via an exploratory study. A vignette was submitted to a legal adviser, two groups of parents of people with I/DD (n = 11 and n = 7) and two groups of direct-care professionals (n = 12 and n = 11). The vignette portrayed a realistic scenario in which a care professional, bristling with impatience at the slow pace of activity of a middle-aged woman with I/DD, urges her—in what may or may not appear to be an excessively forceful manner—to attend to a task. The corpus is composed of the legal adviser’s analysis, data from the focus group and questionnaires filled out by the focus group participants. The legal analysis concludes that although they are not trivial, it is quite unlikely that the facts subjected for review would lead to legal proceedings. On the other hand, from the social perspective, both the parents and direct-care professionals saw the actions as an unacceptable infringement and a violation. The authors address the risk of the legal system only being concerned with more extreme “caregiving” practices. The application of a case study approach showed the usefulness of looking at “borderline” situations that are not actually covered by existing laws. The results indicate the need for more pronounced action, specifically in devising professional codes of practice
This qualitative descriptive study aims to explore the lived experience of the adjustment process of couples who face vision loss, investigating the impact of such loss on daily life and the adjustments and adaptations that ensue. To undertake such an exploration, the application of an occupational perspective is relevant where the meaning and purpose partners ascribe to their everyday activities can be investigated. A total of 16 couples living in Western Switzerland were interviewed between January and June 2020. Data collection was carried out with semi-structured face-to-face interview. Three themes emerge from the thematic analysis of transcripts. The first theme emphasizes that either separate or joint everyday activities of partners can be shared within couples, which all give sense to the partnership; the second one shows that vision loss disrupts the engagement of partners in such shared everyday activities. The third theme highlights partners’ efforts to reshape their engagement in their shared everyday activities in order to maintain a sense of couple’s we-ness. While navigating vision loss requires both partners to jointly engage in this process of reshaping, couples described tension that arises because of the partners with vision loss’ growing dependence on the other partner. One’s sense of control when navigating vision loss is critical to adjust to a changing and changed daily life. Further research is needed that focuses on how romantic partners ascribe a shared meaning and purpose to their engagement in everyday activities, separate or joint, and how such meaning and purpose are impacted by the onset or aggravation of one partner’s vision loss.
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