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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
How People With Disabilities Communicatively Manage Assistance: Helping As Instrumental Social Support, Dawn O. Braithwaite, Nancy J. Eckstein
How People With Disabilities Communicatively Manage Assistance: Helping As Instrumental Social Support, Dawn O. Braithwaite, Nancy J. Eckstein
Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications
While social support is often conceptualized as a temporary need in crisis situations, people with visible physical disabilities face an ongoing challenge of balancing the need for instrumental social support against receiving unwanted help on a daily basis. Our goal was to study instrumental support interactions from the perspective of support recipients; in this case, people who are disabled, focusing on how physical assistance is communicatively managed with strangers and newer acquaintances. A qualitative/interpretive analysis was carried out on transcripts of in-depth interviews with 30 participants who had visible physical disabilities. Participants and interviewers discussed how help was communicated and …