The Excluded Adulthood of People with Profound Intelectual Disabilities Inthe LIGHT of Sociol Relations
There are several barriers to active, autonomous and satisfying adulthood related to the exclusion of this group of people. They concern both internal limitations related to low levels of cognitive and social functioning, as well as external barriers inherent in the family and social environment and the existing support system.
The aim of this article is to present considerations on the subject of the exclusion of adulthood of people with profound intellectual disabilities in the light of social relations.
The adoption of standards to combat social exclusion, the implementation of normalisation and integration concepts and the assumptions of the education reform in the field of educating children and youth with disabilities were somehow forced by Poland's accession to the European Union. Socio-cultural changes, promotion of equal rights of people with disabilities (UN Convention) and increasingly active activities of social organizations for these people mean that we are observing major changes both in the approach to adulthood of people with intellectual disabilities, as well as in existing practical solutions and in building social relations. Social relations are therefore ways of behaving towards others and functioning in a group.
The research assumptions and analysis were based on qualitative methodology of social research. As part of the research, free individual and group interviews were conducted with teachers working with people with profound intellectual disabilities in the Silesian Voivodeship in Poland. The sample was selected using the purposive sampling method and the snowball method. 15 individual interviews and 5 group interviews were conducted (number of groups: 6).