Empowering Parents with Disabilities Through Home Visiting
Project Description:
Parenting is a fundamental human experience and a recognized right for individuals with disabilities. However, parents with disabilities continue to face persistent societal, legal, and institutional barriers to exercising this right. Advocacy efforts have increasingly highlighted their lived experiences, including positive accounts of family life and child development. This study focuses on parents with cognitive disabilities that affect learning, memory, and information processing, and will leverage the Home Visiting Applied Research Collaborative (HARC) practice-based research network. The proposed study builds on research conducted in 2024, involving interviews with 13 home visitors from five evidence-based home visiting programs in Arizona: Healthy Families, Early Head Start, Health Start, Nurse-Family Partnership, and Parents as Teachers. Despite their broad professional experience, participants reported needing to continually adapt to build trust and address the unique cognitive challenges presented by some parents. Given the small sample size and limited existing research on inclusive home visiting for this population, further study is warranted.
Keyword(s):
parents, cognitive disabilities, home visiting
Core Function(s):
Performing Research or Evaluation, Developing & Disseminating Information
Area of Emphasis
Education & Early Intervention, Child Care-Related Activities
Target Audience:
Professionals and Para-Professionals, Family Members/Caregivers, Adults with Disabilities
Unserved or Under-served Populations:
Disadvantaged Circumstances, Specific Groups
Primary Target Audience Geographic Descriptor:
State, National
COVID-19 Related Data:
N/A
