(PS6-59) My diagnosis is not who I am … even though I may identify as a person with a disability: A Qualitative Exploration of Disability Identity in College Students.

Background: College students experience disproportionately high rates of mental health concerns, with over 60% of students meeting criteria for at least one DSM-5 disorder in recent years (Lipson et al., 2022). Disabled college students face unique barriers due to inaccessible environments (Francis et al., 2019). Accordingly, this population experiences even higher rates of anxiety, academic distress, and suicidal ideation compared to students without disabilities (Coduti et al., 2016). Having a cultural identity can be a protective factor against negative mental health outcomes (Burnett-Ziegler et al., 2013), so it is important to understand how disabled college students perceive their own disabilities. However, this topic has been relatively understudied to date. The objective of the present study is to examine how disabled college students perceive their disabilities.  

Methods: Participants were 21 college students with disabilities coming from one of three universities in the northeast US. On average, students were White (n = 12), women (n = 16), and 23.43 years old. Although all students received accommodations through Disability Services, most (n = 15) reported identifying as a person with a disability, and the most common disabilities were mental health conditions (n = 10), ADHD (n = 8), chronic health conditions (n = 6) and learning disabilities (n = 6). Participants completed a semi-structured interview about their experiences attending college as a disabled student. A subset of questions related to disability identity are analyzed in the current study. Interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis.  

Results: Most participants viewed their disabilities both positively and negatively. Some held more consistent viewpoints than others. When asked how important disability was to their identity, many participants discussed how having a disability brought both strengths and challenges. A minority of participants discussed only one of these themes. Approximately a third of participants also expressed that they were also “just themselves”. Interesting, all participants who endorsed this theme also identified to some degree with disability.  

Discussion: Disabled college students hold a wide range of attitudes towards disability as an identity, believe disability is associated with both strengths and challenges, and maintain the importance of individuality alongside disability. Accordingly, culturally appropriate mental health care for disabled college students should take into account individual student’s identities and hold the dialectic that strengths and challenges can occur in tandem.