ABSTRACT

Although disability can readily be conceived within a biomedical model as a product of disease, it can also be characterized as limitations in behaviour. Seen as a biomedical entity, psychologists’ inputs focus on the emotional consequences of disability and on facilitating coping with the condition. By contrast, when disability is seen as behavioural, psychology’s capacity to describe, measure, explain, and intervene to change behaviour become more pertinent. Disability is therefore a challenging topic for psychology and many branches have important things to contribute to our understanding of this subject. Whereas educational, occupational, clinical, and social psychology deal mainly with the context and consequences of disability, the focus in health psychology is on disability per se.