“Always trying to walk a bit of a tightrope”: The role of social care staff in supporting adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities to develop and maintain loving relationships

Abstract

Accessible Summary Support staff play an important role in helping people with learning disabilities to meet a partner and have a relationship. Not getting good support can make it difficult for people to have a relationship. Many support staff want to help people to have a relationship, but are worried about people being abused. This is especially true for those who do not have a lot of staff support. Support staff do not always get good support themselves to help people with learning disabilities to have relationships, such as training and a policy to follow. This makes it hard for them to know what they are allowed to help with. Abstract BackgroundPeople with intellectual and developmental disabilities face challenges in developing and maintaining intimate relationships, frequently requiring support from staff. MethodFocus groups were conducted with 26 social care staff members to explore the support they provided to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities to find a potential partner and/or develop an existing relationship. ResultsStaff reported that many people with intellectual and developmental disabilities wanted to be in a relationship and that they did what they could to facilitate this, sometimes providing substantial support. Some staff had to address complex issues relating to sexuality, often with no training and with a lack of clear organisational policies. ConclusionThe need for external inspection and regulatory bodies to prioritise relationship support is emphasised.

The Impact of Austerity Measures on People with Intellectual Disabilities in England

“…These findings indicate that despite considerable research and practice interventions in the interim decades, the reality is that people with intellectual disabilities remain disadvantaged in terms of health, (McVilly et al, 2006), employment;(Forrester-Jones, Gore & Melling, 2010) and romantic and platonic relationships (Bates et al, 2020). Emerging research also reports how needs assessments fail to translate into outcomes for people with intellectual disabilities and their carers Forrester-Jones (2021).…”

Sexuality, Education and Support for People with Intellectual Disabilities: A Systematic Review of the Attitudes of Support Staff and Relatives

“…Heterogeneous attitudes were expressed toward the sexual needs and feelings of people with intellectual disabilities within five studies focusing on support staff [38,40,42,48,49], five on relatives [44,[50][51][52][53], and two studies that took the perspectives of both into account [47,54]. On the one hand, several support staff and relatives agreed that people with intellectual disabilities have the same sexual feelings, in the words of a relative "as the rest of us" [51, p. 285; 40, 47].…”

“…Attitudes toward intimate relationships of people with intellectual disabilities were found within eight studies based on the perspectives of support staff [43,48,49,55,[59][60][61]65], seven studies focused on relatives [44, 50-53, 62, 66], and one study addressing both groups [47]. Both support staff and relatives cited various reasons for why people with intellectual disabilities pursued intimate relations, namely: because they are supposed to; it is important; out of desire to kiss, hug, and/or engage in intercourse; and out of a desire to love and care for a partner [44,48,49,52,55]. Among both support staff and relatives, some shared the belief that relationships are frightening, and that the possibility of relationships provoked concerns around their vulnerability [43,44,46,48,49,53,65].…”

“…Both support staff and relatives cited various reasons for why people with intellectual disabilities pursued intimate relations, namely: because they are supposed to; it is important; out of desire to kiss, hug, and/or engage in intercourse; and out of a desire to love and care for a partner [44,48,49,52,55]. Among both support staff and relatives, some shared the belief that relationships are frightening, and that the possibility of relationships provoked concerns around their vulnerability [43,44,46,48,49,53,65]. According to support staff, for men, this vulnerability primarily concerned the risk of becoming aggressive, whereas for women (unwanted) pregnancies was routinely emphasized [49].…”

“…According to support staff, for men, this vulnerability primarily concerned the risk of becoming aggressive, whereas for women (unwanted) pregnancies was routinely emphasized [49]. Furthermore, in both Bates et al [48] and Abott and Howarth's [55] studies, some support staff viewed people with intellectual disabilities as desperately seeking relationships, which led them to be open toward any gender, or accepting an abusive relationship. Some relatives believed that it was inevitable that intimate relationships would occur, with some believing that marriage and children were future possibilities [50,53,61,66].…”