‘Participation’ and Its Related Factors in School-Aged Children with Physical Disabilities in Home, School, and Community Lives---A Longitudinal Study

Participation is defined as ‘involvement in life situations’ based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disabilities and Health (ICF) (2001) and its child and youth version (ICF-CY) (2007) published by the World Health Organization (WHO). Based on the concept of human right and disability-related research, promoting participation is an ultimate outcome of pediatric rehabilitation and services planning for educational placement for children with physical disabilities. The dimensions of participation include objective dimension, that is, ‘performance’ as defined in the ICF/ICF-CY, as well as subjective dimension, such as children’s preferences, autonomy and motivation. Research indicated that school-aged children with physical disabilities had more restrictions in participation in daily activities than children with typical development. Restriction in participation may lead to adverse consequences, such as social isolation, limited life experiences, or decreased quality of life. In particular, children with physical disabilities might experience more restrictions in school setting than in home setting. Studies from western countries regarding participation of children with physical disabilities are mostly cross-sectional studies and age-based norms are not provided. When measuring participation of children with physical disabilities, children with typical development should be used as a reference to understand their changes of participation with age. In Taiwan, studies are more focused on functional performance, and limited measures are available for measuring multiple dimensions of participation in children with physical disabilities. Therefore, we propose a five-year research project and the purposes are to: 1) develop Chinese-version measures of participation; 2) identify children’s pattern of participation based on the perceptions of parents, teachers and children; and 3) identify the child and environmental factors related to participation in school-aged children with and without physical disabilities. This project will be divided into three phases. In phase one of this proposed project, our research team will collaborate with professors in the United States (US) and Sweden to develop Chinese-version participation measures. In phase two, psychometric properties for these measures will be investigated. In phase three, we will determine changes in participation over 4 years in approximately 125 children with physical disabilities and 125 children with typical development, and then conduct the cross-cultural comparison with the US and Sweden. This follow-up study will provide information about how participation changes with age and identify factors related to participation in school-aged children with physical disabilities. This study will have implications for optimizing desired participation of children with physical disabilities including planning intervention strategies in clinical practice.

Project ID:PC10109-0072
External Project ID:NSC101-2314-B182-088