Three Perspectives in Supporting the Social Functioning of Persons with Disabilities
The author is a Junior Expert Social Worker at the Directorate General of Social Rehabilitation, Ministry of Social Affairs, currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Social Welfare at Padjadjaran University in Bandung. Their interest in disability issues stems not only from their professional background but also from the learning process of understanding who persons with disabilities are, what their needs are, and how the family and community environment influences their behaviour.
Persons with disabilities are often viewed as having limitations that are then seen as deficiencies. These deficiencies are considered to affect their social functioning, rendering them dependent on others. Yet, human beings cannot truly be understood solely from visible conditions. Behind every limitation lie life experiences, the role of the environment, needs, desires, potential, and the capacity to develop.
Therefore, when discussing interventions for persons with disabilities, it is not enough to focus only on what they cannot do. It is also necessary to identify why a person behaves in a certain way, how the environment plays a role, and what potential can still be empowered.
One way to understand persons with disabilities as whole human beings is through three perspectives:
Psychoanalysis: Understanding Wounds and Past Experiences
This perspective is important because some individuals may have difficult life experiences. From childhood, they may have experienced stigma, bullying, discrimination, excessive treatment, or even rejection from their social environment. Such experiences can shape a lack of self-confidence, anxiety, a tendency to withdraw, or difficulty building relationships with others. This can lead to reluctance to communicate, difficulty establishing social relations, fear of participating in community activities, obstacles in fulfilling family roles, or an inability to take advantage of available educational and employment opportunities.
Current behaviour cannot always be understood separately from the experiences a person has gone through. When seeing a person with a disability who is passive, withdrawn, or lacking in confidence, we need to be careful not to immediately label them as ‘incapable’ or ‘unwilling’. There may be a long history that influences how they view themselves and their environment.
Behaviourism: Building Independence through the Environment
This approach views behaviour as something that can be formed, maintained, or changed through experience, stimulus, response, and the consequences a person receives. For example, a person with a disability who always depends on others is not necessarily unable to carry out activities independently. It may be that for years the environment has always provided full assistance and has not given the person the opportunity to try on their own. As a result, dependence can become a behaviour formed through a learning process.
Conversely, if the environment provides positive support, independence can develop. A person with a disability who was initially unaccustomed to performing daily activities can learn to become more independent through consistent practice and appropriate support.
Humanism: Placing Persons with Disabilities as Subjects
This perspective views persons with disabilities not as passive objects, but as active individuals in determining the right intervention for themselves. This approach can motivate persons with disabilities to become more empowered so that they can fulfil their roles, build social relationships, and participate in society.
The humanistic approach encourages social workers to place persons with disabilities as subjects who have the right to determine their own lives and futures. They need to be given space to express their needs, determine the goals they want to achieve, choose appropriate services, and make decisions relating to their lives.
The Three Perspectives: Not for Choosing, but for Complementing
The three perspectives offer three different ways of understanding persons with disabilities. Psychoanalysis invites us to look at past experiences and psychological wounds that may influence behaviour. Behaviourism helps us understand how behaviour is formed through learning processes and how the environment can reinforce or change that behaviour. Humanism reminds us to see human beings in terms of their potential, needs, choices, and capacity to develop.
None of the three should be chosen exclusively. In the context of social intervention, they can be used to complement one another to restore the social functioning of persons with disabilities. In addition to providing skills, we need to understand their life experiences, observe the behaviours that have been formed and the environment that influences them, while also discovering the potential and strengths that can be developed.
Through these three perspectives, social intervention does not only focus on fixing individual problems but also on preparing an inclusive environment without barriers, giving space for persons with disabilities to live independently and participate fully in society.
So, have we truly understood the human beings we seek to empower?