Doctoral Students with Disabilities: Challenges in Academic Programs and Research Methodology (original) (raw)

2017, Journal for the Study of Postsecondary and Tertiary Education

Aim/Purpose: Doctoral students with disabilities represent 5 to 10 percent of the graduate student population and, yet, research seldom documents their experiences. We propose a research agenda and methodological approaches that circumvent these limitations, including a substantive focus on universal design to measure graduate program’s awareness of disability, experimental methods to minimize response bias, and ways to redefine disability to improve recruitment of potential research subjects. Background: Research suggests that doctoral students with disabilities face different challenges than undergraduate students with disabilities and that graduate advisers are pivotal to their success. Existing literature has several limitations, including small sample sizes, a reliance on survey and interview data, little attention to issues of diversity within doctoral students with disabilities, and difficulty defining disability. Methodology: This article utilizes a systemic literature revie...

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