The 6 types of disability and their characteristics

Each and every one of us is unique, possessing different characteristics and living a life different from that of everyone else. However, most of us have a set of common skills and abilities that are generally assumed in most people. And in some cases and for different circumstances, some people lose or have not developed these skills in the same way as most of the population.

These people may suffer from various difficulties in different aspects of their lives, being able to suffer different types of disability depending on the type of problems or the abilities or organs that present any alteration. And it’s about these different types of disabilities that we’re going to talk about in this article.

What is disability?

We understand disability as any situation in which a subject sees limited participation in some kind of scope or action , due to the existence of some kind of deficiency in some organ or intellectual capacity. It is in itself the existence of a limitation, not being cause but consequence.

The existence of a disability therefore implies a difficulty or obstacle to the participation of the subject in society or in some aspect or vital domain in comparison with the possibilities presented by those persons without the deficiency in question or even the subject himself at an earlier time. his life.

Of course, disability does not mean that the subject who has it can not reach and perform the same activities as long as you have a support tailored to their needs.

The different types of disability

As we have indicated previously, there is not only one type of disability but we can find different classifications depending on the type of problem in which difficulties arise. Thus, we can establish different types of disabilities, with the first three being the ones that are most taken into account.

1. Physical disability

It receives the name of physical or motor disability to all that type of limitation generated by the presence of a problem linked to a decrease or elimination of physical or physical abilities , such as the physical loss of a limb or its habitual functionality.

This type of disability arises in the context of spinal problems, traffic accidents, head trauma, medical illness that generates physical limitation, amputations, congenital malformations or cerebrovascular accidents.

2. Sensory disability

Sensory disability refers to the existence of limitations derived from the existence of deficiencies in some of the senses that allow us to perceive the environment, whether external or internal . There are alterations in all the senses, although the best known are visual and auditory disabilities.

3. Intellectual disability

Intellectual disability is defined as any limitation of intellectual functioning that hinders social participation or the development of autonomy or areas such as academic or work, having a CI less than 70 and influencing different cognitive skills and social participation . There are different degrees of intellectual disability , which have different implications at the level of the type of difficulties they may present.

4. Psychic disability

We speak of mental disability when we are facing a situation in which there are alterations of behavioral type and adaptive behavior , generally derived from the suffering of some type of mental disorder.

5. Visceral disability

This little known type of disability appears in those people who suffer from some type of deficiency in one of their organs, which generates limitations in the life and participation in the subject’s community. It is the case of those that can generate diabetes or heart problems .

6. Multiple disability

This type of disability is the one that derives from a combination of limitations derived from some of the previous deficiencies. For example, a blind subject with intellectual disability, or a paraplegic subject with deafness.