Project data

Summary of the project

The aim of this project is to develop, test and pilot a participation measurement tool for young people aged between 12 and 17 and to begin psychometric testing.

As part of a sequential mixed-methods study, young people with and without physical disabilities are asked about their experiences and satisfaction with social participation and the individual significance of self-determination using semi-structured interviews. The young people's perspective is supplemented by focus groups, on the one hand with experts from socio-paediatric care and on the other with parents. These different perspectives provide the greatest possible gain in knowledge for the development of the instrument, which also integrates the current international findings. Based on the results of the first step, a measurement instrument will then be developed for the target group, evaluated by the target group of adolescents and the experts using it, and then implemented and psychometrically tested in a pilot study in exemplary socio-paediatric centres and rehabilitation clinics.

This study provides meaningful findings on social participation in adolescents that make it possible to describe the theoretical construct of social participation and its significance for the lives of adolescents as well as the planning of support goals in rehabilitative processes and to evaluate the core objective of participation in individual measures as stipulated by law. The instrument developed can be used in science to identify disadvantaged groups and to compensate for disadvantages that could impair development with targeted interventions. In practice, the instrument can be used to determine the goals of rehabilitation together with the young person and the importance they attach to it, and to evaluate the achievement of these goals.