Social disability.

Considers social disability as a form of deviance which refers to a broad class of social adaptations based on failures in the development of competence. The concept is related to R. White's biological conceptualization of effectance and competence motivation and to L. Phillips's developmental view of the origins of symptomatology. Empirical evidence is summarized in support of the position that the developmental failures of social disability in all their forms are linked to identifiable, broad, noninterpersonal dimensions of the physical as well as the social environment. Implications are discussed in terms of a reconceptualization of views of a variety of forms of deviance and related consequences for the present system of classification. Suggestions are made for a complex, multidimensional theoretical model which would accommodate the testing of etiological hypotheses linking the development of competence to the environment. It is also shown that the concept is useful as a unifying rationale for specifications of therapeutic and preventive environments and for providing a conceptual and organizing framework for training in the community mental health fields. (114 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)