This article presents research derived from a nationwide study conducted at the University of Amsterdam into the psychosocial adjustment and the meaning of social support for Dutch adolescents with visual impairments. The findings indicate that social support, especially the support of peers, is important to adolescents with visual impairments. The differences between visually impaired and sighted adolescents proved to be small, but significant.

This article describes a study of the personal networks and social supports of 316 blind and visually impaired adolescents, aged 14–23, in The Netherlands. The study found that the mean size of these adolescents’ personal networks was 15 persons, compared to 15–20 for sighted adolescents. The oldest adolescents had the largest networks, and the blind adolescents had the smallest. The female and oldest adolescents had more friends, whom they considered important sources of support. However, for all the adolescents, parents were the most important source of support.

In the present study we examined the importance of parental and peer support for well‐being of adolescents with and without a visual impairment. The sample included 178 adolescents who are blind or visually impaired and 338 adolescents without visual impairments. Peer and parental support proved to be important for well‐being of both adolescents with a visual impairment and sighted adolescents. Whereas in the group of adolescents with a visual impairment, a positive linear relationship exists between peer support and well‐being, in the group of adolescents without an impairment well‐being appears not be affected by peer support. Parental support is more strongly related to well‐being of adolescents without impairments than of adolescents who are blind or visually impaired.

The start of the Contact programme coincided with improved quality of interaction between professional caregivers and clients with visual and intellectual disabilities in group homes. Further research is necessary regarding the generalisability, long-term effects and effects on quality of life.

From the perspective of attachment theory, this paper discusses individual differences in the quality of caregiving by direct-care staff for persons with intellectual disabilities. Theoretical arguments and findings from related literature are cited to support the probable role of professionals' own attachment experiences and their mental representations thereof. Case examples are drawn from a study on video-based interaction guidance for direct-care staff in group homes for persons with multiple, serious disabilities. These examples illustrate how interventions may avoid attachment-related defences against changing the quality and affective mutuality of personal contact with clients. However, the possibility is discussed that in parallel processes, quality management systems and institutional culture may selectively reinforce care patterns associated with insecure, dismissing attachment, while failing to reward the positive contribution that sensitive, affectively attuned caregiving makes to wellbeing of persons with disabilities.