The complexity of participation in daily life: A qualitative study of the experiences of persons with acquired brain injury

Abstract

The meaning of participation and the conditions and strategies influencing participation are complex. Many of the categories identified for participation can be understood only through subjective experience and cannot be captured by professionals' observation of the performance of activities. These results emphasize the importance of considering clients' unique experiences of participation when designing individually tailored rehabilitation programmes intended to enhance participation.

The meaning of participation to stroke survivors: a qualitative study

“…The sub-theme of "active involvement" for example has similarities to the value "being part of", found in the Hammel and Magasis, (2008) study. It would also encompass concepts described by other authors such as "doing things for others" (Haggstrom & Lund 2008), "being engaged" (Hjelle & Vik 2011), and "contributing and receiving resources from society" (Mars et al 2008). The study also confirms other work (Barclay-Goddard et al 2012;Hammel & Magasi 2008) in illustrating the multiplicity of activities which may be considered participation to an individual, and highlighting that it is the meaning of the activity, rather than the activity itself, which distinguishes it as participation.…”

Social Support Pairs Predict Daily Functioning Following Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury: An Exploratory Study

“…However, objective measures of integration may not fully capture the meaning of participation [16]. For example, integration includes the actual social network or environment as well as individuals' representation (i.e., subjective perception) of the social environment [13].…”

“…Furthermore, others' reactions (acceptance or withdrawal) influence not only the size of the social network, but also subjective experiences of participation [16]. Inaccessible buildings or surroundings also influence subjective feelings of participation [16].…”

“…Therefore, in real-world contexts, subjective appraisal of social support likely co-exists with objectively received social support. Unfortunately, subjective perceptions of social support are less frequently assessed than objective measures [13,16]. Therefore, there is a need for research which (1) assesses the relationship between well-defined forms of social support *Address correspondence to this author at the School of Public Health, La Trobe University, 3083 Australia; Tel: + 61 3 94791745; Fax: + 61 3 9479 1783; E-mail: G.Murphy@latrobe.edu.au and rehabilitation outcomes and (2) examines both the objective and subjective dimensions of social support and their combined ability to predict successful rehabilitation outcomes.…”

Measuring participation in individuals with Parkinson disease: relationships with disease severity, quality of life, and mobility

“…However, it is unclear whether understanding aspects of an individual's physical activity may be associated with one's participation in life situations. Although participation in activities has not been described or quantified in PD, previous studies described, and occasionally quantified, participation in people with neurologic conditions in other populations [12][13][14]. The Activity Card Sort (ACS) [15] has emerged as a unique tool for measuring participation in activities in older adults and individuals with a neurological condition [13,[16][17][18][19][20][21][22].…”