Open research questions in Disability Rights and Representation

What the literature leaves open

• Given its focus on reproductive health, the DHS woman's questionnaire does not interview women 50 and older, leading to a lack of data on healthcare access for older women, among whom disability tends to be disproportionately prevalent.

  The association between disability and problems in accessing healthcare: Evidence for women aged 15 to 49 in 16 low- and middle-income countries · 2026 · DOI

• Recent policy updates in 2021 (see footnote 4 for detail), including easing medical examination requirements and mandating public reporting on quota fulfilment, may begin to address some of these tensions, but their impact on entrenched norms remains to be seen.

  Policy progression versus institutional obstacles: disabled employees’ experiences of the disability quota scheme in the Chinese public sector · 2026 · DOI

• Our co‐produced research with people with learning disabilities demonstrates how belonging operates as an important, yet understudied, social determinant of health, as an embodied practice and as a key site of agency and resistance; it also highlights that belonging remains a key concern and research priority for this marginalised group.

  Belonging for Women, LGBTQ+ and Black and Ethnically Minoritised People With Learning Disabilities: Findings From a Qualitative, Co‐Produced Study in England · 2026 · DOI

• Therefore, the extent to which these factors may have contributed to the observed mortality patterns remains unclear. However, the present study did not directly assess healthcare access or utilization; therefore, the extent to which these disparities contributed to the observed mortality patterns remains uncertain.

  Avoidable Mortality Among People with Disabilities in South Korea: A Nationwide 10-Year Trend Analysis, 2015–2024 · 2026 · DOI

• The paper identifies a gap in how compassion is understood and applied in the context of disability and ableist bureaucracy. There is a need for a framework that challenges ableist bureaucratisation and promotes collective well-being. The paper argues that existing research has not adequately addressed the need for a cripped approach to understanding compassion.

  Re‐Imagining Inclusive and Compassionate Futures: Challenging the Bureaucracy of Disability Through Compassion · 2026 · DOI

• While there is no denying that the civil rights and independent living movements led to significant progress and social change regarding disabled people’s rights, much remains to be achieved in the realms of life not directly related to survival, like sexuality, particularly for women. Another key limitation of this study is that none of the authors identify as disabled.

  Disabling Norms, Affirming Desires: A Scoping Review on Disabled Women’s Sexual Practices · 2025 · DOI

• Fundamental LGBTQ-related terminology remains insufficiently understood, and many educators lack awareness of their microaggressions and discriminatory behaviors.

  Educators’ Perspectives on LGBTQ Students with Disabilities: A Nationwide Survey in Special Needs Schools in Japan · 2025 · DOI

• There is a lack of research on the intersectionality of disabled people. The study identifies a gap in the coverage of how to teach about the intersectionality of disabled people in the intersectional pedagogy-focused academic literature. The study also identifies a gap in the use of ability judgment-based concepts to analyze the intersectionality of disabled people.

  Intersectionality of Disabled People through a Disability Studies, Ability-Based Studies, and Intersectional Pedagogy Lens: A Survey and a Scoping Review · 2024 · DOI

• Future research should examine the implementation and effectiveness of differentiated training designed to match various educator profiles and awareness levels.

  Educators’ Perspectives on LGBTQ Students with Disabilities: A Nationwide Survey in Special Needs Schools in Japan · 2025 · DOI

• Few studies have quantified the higher cost of living with a disability and the extent of unmet needs for disability-related goods and services as experienced by adults with disabilities in the U.

  The disability squeeze: Out-of-pocket expenses and unmet needs for disability-related goods and services in the U.S. · 2025 · DOI

• Little is known about the characteristics of those who self-identify with a disability and how they compare with those identified via functional limitation questions.

  A comparative analysis of self-identification and functional measures of disability · 2025 · DOI

• People with intellectual disabilities continue to experience stigmatisation, yet little is known about how they manage or resist stigma.

  Stigma Resistance by Adult Self‐Advocates With Intellectual Disabilities · 2026 · DOI

• Despite growing global interest in participatory research, the practice of including persons with intellectual disabilities as co-researchers remains largely underexplored within the African context.

  Empowerment of Youth With Intellectual Disabilities Through Inclusive Research in Africa · 2026 · DOI

• Studies on barriers and measures to improve the achievement of SDGs related to PwDs in PHEIs are scarce.

  Assessing accessibility and inclusion for persons with disabilities in Nigerian public higher education facilities: stakeholder perspectives and lessons from Malaysia · 2026 · DOI

• Yet little is known about how Chinese immigrant parents engage in advocacy or how such efforts relate to disability and human rights.

  Unheard but Uncompromising: Quiet Politics and Parental Resistance Among Chinese Immigrant Families of Autistic Children in the U.S · 2026 · DOI

• Women labelled with intellectual disabilities face high rates of social exclusion and sexual violence, with limited research and few services tailored to their needs.

  Co‐Designing Peer Support for Women Labelled With Intellectual Disabilities Who Have Experienced Sexual Violence · 2025 · DOI

• Although many people with intellectual disabilities in the UK receive welfare benefits, their experiences of undergoing functional assessments are under-researched.

  “They Don't Understand People With Learning Disabilities”: Exploring the Experiences of People With Intellectual Disabilities Undergoing Welfare Assessments · 2025 · DOI

• The findings indicate that, although presence in public space is common, interactions are often superficial, limited by a lack of accessibility and discriminatory attitudes.

  Participation of People With Intellectual Disabilities in the Public, Consumer and Social Spaces: Barriers and Supports · 2025 · DOI

• While communist gender policies have been widely discussed, little is known about the history of disability in the post-Yugoslav space and its connection to the gender order, and how deinstitutionalization and current process of repatriarchalisation are linked.

  The Struggle for Humanity: Deinstitutionalization of the Post-Yugoslav Space in a Historic Perspective · 2025 · DOI

• Yet little is known about the ways Deaf people are portrayed in movies, particularly films developed outside of the United States and not in English.

  Portrayal of Deaf characters in Korean movies · 2025 · DOI

• The wider use of raw narratives as a lens to probe unspoken elements of human experience and further study of DWSI as a community could enrich feminist disability studies.

  Disability, culture, and erased sexuality: curated raw narratives of disabled women with significant impairments in India · 2024 · DOI

• The significance of individual duties to people with disabilities is not only underemphasized by the African disability rights protocol but is insufficiently addressed by the CRPD and under-theorized in disability justice literature.

  Duties of persons with disabilities under the African disability rights protocol: a sceptical argument · 2024 · DOI

• These codes were grouped during charting under “solutions,” “inclusion,” and “accessibility.”

  Accessing sexual and reproductive health services during climate change-related environmental disruptions in coastal Ghana: a privilege or human right for young women with disabilities? · 2026 · DOI

• Few studies exist about the perceived longer-term impact of the pandemic on this group.

  Living Through the COVID ‐19 Pandemic: The Experiences of People With Profound and Multiple Intellectual Disabilities Through a Family Carer Lens · 2025 · DOI

• However, such figures were scarce in the texts published in the Jewish press, and they generally did not assume leading roles.

  Marginalised within a minority: Jews with disabilities in the Jewish press of the Kingdom of Poland (1860s–1914) · 2024 · DOI

Most-cited papers in Disability Rights and Representation

• The disability paradox: high quality of life against all odds · Social Science & Medicine · 1999 · 1,419 citations
• Avoiding Ableist Language: Suggestions for Autism Researchers · Autism in Adulthood · 2020 · 1,077 citations
• Maltreatment and disabilities: a population-based epidemiological study · Child Abuse & Neglect · 2000 · 862 citations
• Changing the Social Relations of Research Production? · Disability Handicap & Society · 1992 · 727 citations
• Misfits: A Feminist Materialist Disability Concept · Hypatia · 2011 · 642 citations
• The social model of disability: An outdated ideology? · Research in social science and disability · 2004 · 627 citations
• The Concept of Oppression and the Development of a Social Theory of Disability · Disability Handicap & Society · 1987 · 488 citations
• Feminist Disability Studies · Signs · 2005 · 441 citations
• Disability and Poverty in Developing Countries: A Multidimensional Study · World Development · 2012 · 431 citations
• Models of disablement, universalism and the international classification of impairments, disabilities and handicaps · Social Science & Medicine · 1999 · 408 citations

Most recent work

• Understanding everyday harm between young people with cognitive disability and support workers · Disability & Society · 2026
• Audience member perspectives on We Deserve to Work , a disability theatre project · Research and Practice in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities · 2026
• Wheelchair as a nexus: understanding stigma in older adults with stroke in China · Frontiers in Medicine · 2026
• Violence against children: An application of Multilevel Analysis of Individual Heterogeneity and Discriminatory Accuracy (MAIHDA) to the Crime Survey for England and Wales · Child Abuse & Neglect · 2026
• When Ableism Supplants Evidence: Federal Autism Guidance in the United States · Autism · 2026
• Showing not telling: shadowing of people with intellectual disability as an inclusive research method · Disability & Society · 2026
• The critical role of lived experience reporting guidelines to improve research with young disabled people · Disability & Society · 2026
• Why not accessible? Analysing everyday accounts on the gap between promised and performed accessibility for disabled people · Disability & Society · 2026
• Disability inclusion for early childhood care and development: the twin-track approach · Disability and health journal · 2026
• The effectiveness of using visible disabilities in brand ads: when and why it works · European Journal of Marketing · 2026

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