What is Disability?

Disability means different things to different people. What should and shouldn't be described as a disability? Is disability a physical, medical or social concept?

The University of Essex follows the Social Model of disability. This focuses on barriers placed on disabled people by society eg ‘John is disabled because this building only has steps and no ramp’. The medical model, which is the best known model, looks only at the impairment and the charitable model looks at disability as a personal tragedy.

A disabled person is defined by the Equality Act 2010 (which brought together previous legislation including the Disability Discrimination Act) as someone with a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long-term adverse impact on their ability to carry out normal day-today activities.

This definition includes people with cancer, HIV, multiple sclerosis and heart conditions and people who have a hearing or sight impairment (except where the person’s sight can be corrected by glasses or contact lenses) or a significant mobility difficulty. It also includes people with hidden disabilities such as diabetes, epilepsy and dyslexia and people who have mental health conditions or learning difficulties.

While they are officially considered to be ‘disabled’, people don’t always choose to use that term about themselves. A recent survey showed that 52 per cent of people who qualified as ‘disabled’ under the legislation did not consider themselves disabled or disclose a disability.

At the University, we aim to respect all views and definitions. Our goal is to offer help to anyone who feels they have been, or may potentially be disadvantaged as a result of their medical, physical, social or emotional circumstances. Please contact us if you'd like to discuss your circumstances.

There is significant underreporting of disability. However if you are ‘disabled’ under the terms of the Act there are good reasons to let the University know.  Personally it could help you by discussing reasonable adjustments. Generally disclosing will ensure that the University’s monitoring data is a more genuine reflection of the numbers of people who are disabled. The University will be better placed to make good decisions in its planning if the data it’s using in that decision making is accurate.

If you are disabled but have not told the University then you can let us know, even if you don’t want or need any adjustments to be made.

Who to contact

Students: Contact the Disability Service in Student Support
e-mail: disab(non essex users add @essex.ac.uk)
phone: 01206 872365
Staff: Contact Equality and Diversity
e-mail: diversity (non essex users add @essex.ac.uk)
phone: 01206 873506