Research Article | | Peer-Reviewed

Children with Disabilities in India: An Unfolded Story

Received: 1 September 2025     Accepted: 10 September 2025     Published: 9 December 2025
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Abstract

Over the past four decades, Indian society has been more concerned with children's physical and mental disabilities as one of the main societal issues. Nonetheless, most individuals in this nation are still unable to distinguish between mental illness and special educational needs. Research in this field has advanced significantly in the social and medical sciences. It has been noted that awareness of the issue of physical and mental disability is increasing quickly. Such rapid growth in interest is involving more and more researchers doing studies on mental retardation which is in terms of producing a large accumulation of data on the general condition with which individuals with special educational needs are associated. The results show that there was a significant difference between the two groups with regard to class and type of school and shows that age at first recognized, among the psychosocial variables there is a statistically significant difference between the two groups in the domains of family burden. There is a difference between the two groups in other psychosocial variables like self-esteem, marital life, social support and social stigma but they are not statistically significant. Children with conditions like cerebral palsy or Down’s syndrome need to be assisted in feeding. Children with mental health issues cannot comprehend the messages. At the same time, Children with disabilities have a higher risk of conditions such as diabetes and hypertension which are high-risk factors for COVID-19 mortality. Therefore, study observes that children with disabilities need much more support than the rest of the population in the face of a pandemic. It can be concluded from the study that the parental psychosocial problems are found to be much severe during the outbreak of the corona virus pandemic.

Published in American Journal of Applied Psychology (Volume 14, Issue 6)
DOI 10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11
Page(s) 169-178
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Family Burden, Social Support, Pandemic, Social Stigma, Self-esteem, Intellectual Disability

References
[1] Biswas, M (1980), Special educational needs & Normal Children, Starling Publication of New Delhi.
[2] Bassom, A. L (1954), The Wonder That Was India, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, Pg. 450.
[3] Craw Ford, G (1914), History of Indian Medical Service- 1600-1913. Vol. II. London, Thacker.
[4] Doll E. E. (1941), A Historical Survey of Research & Management of Mental Retardation in United States, New York: Appleton Publication.
[5] Greaheart, B. R. (1980), Special Education for the 80’s. St. Louis: The C. V. Morbey Company.
[6] Green, W. A. (1957), Contribution towards the Pathology of Insanity in India. IAMS, 4, pp-374-435.
[7] Goswami, S. (2013), The Parental Attitude of Special educational needs Children, Global Journal of Human Social Science, Volume 13, Issue 5, PP-1-11.
[8] Hurlock, E. B. (1978), Child Development, New Delhi: Tata McGraw –Hill Publishing Company Limited, Pg. 495-497.
[9] Itard, J. M. G. (1952), The Wild Boy of Aveyron, New York, Appleton Century Crofts.
[10] Kamath, V. (1951), A revision of the Binet Scale for Indian Children. British Journal of Education Psychology.
[11] Kaufman & Payne (1975), Mental Retardation: Introduction & personal perspective. Charles E. Merill Publishing Company.
[12] Kolstoe & Frey (1965), A high school study programme for mentally subnormal students. Southern Illinois University Press, U.S.A.
[13] L‘Abate & Carties (1975), Teaching the exceptional child. Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders Company.
[14] Luria (1963), Macmillan, D. L. (1982), Special educational needs in school and society (2nd Edition) Boston. Little Brown Publishing House.
[15] Odrowaz-Coates, A. (2018). Notes on an international context of Korczak’s pedagogical legacy, Gaudium Sciendi 14, 2018, pp. 125-140.
[16] Passamanik, M (1959), Influence of socio-cultural variables upon organic factors in mental retardation. American Journal of Mental Deficiency.
[17] Repp, C (1983), Teaching the special educational needs. Prentice Hall Inc.
[18] Terjan (1987), Intelligence & its measurement: A symposium. Journal of Educational Psychology.
[19] Ravindranadan and Raju, S. (2007), Adjustment and Attitude of Parents of Children with Mental Retardation, Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram, Vol. 33, No. 1, 137-141.
Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    Ghosh, T., Goswami, S. (2025). Children with Disabilities in India: An Unfolded Story. American Journal of Applied Psychology, 14(6), 169-178. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11

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    ACS Style

    Ghosh, T.; Goswami, S. Children with Disabilities in India: An Unfolded Story. Am. J. Appl. Psychol. 2025, 14(6), 169-178. doi: 10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11

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    AMA Style

    Ghosh T, Goswami S. Children with Disabilities in India: An Unfolded Story. Am J Appl Psychol. 2025;14(6):169-178. doi: 10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11,
      author = {Tania Ghosh and Sribas Goswami},
      title = {Children with Disabilities in India: An Unfolded Story},
      journal = {American Journal of Applied Psychology},
      volume = {14},
      number = {6},
      pages = {169-178},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajap.20251406.11},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajap.20251406.11},
      abstract = {Over the past four decades, Indian society has been more concerned with children's physical and mental disabilities as one of the main societal issues. Nonetheless, most individuals in this nation are still unable to distinguish between mental illness and special educational needs. Research in this field has advanced significantly in the social and medical sciences. It has been noted that awareness of the issue of physical and mental disability is increasing quickly. Such rapid growth in interest is involving more and more researchers doing studies on mental retardation which is in terms of producing a large accumulation of data on the general condition with which individuals with special educational needs are associated. The results show that there was a significant difference between the two groups with regard to class and type of school and shows that age at first recognized, among the psychosocial variables there is a statistically significant difference between the two groups in the domains of family burden. There is a difference between the two groups in other psychosocial variables like self-esteem, marital life, social support and social stigma but they are not statistically significant. Children with conditions like cerebral palsy or Down’s syndrome need to be assisted in feeding. Children with mental health issues cannot comprehend the messages. At the same time, Children with disabilities have a higher risk of conditions such as diabetes and hypertension which are high-risk factors for COVID-19 mortality. Therefore, study observes that children with disabilities need much more support than the rest of the population in the face of a pandemic. It can be concluded from the study that the parental psychosocial problems are found to be much severe during the outbreak of the corona virus pandemic.},
     year = {2025}
    }
    

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    AU  - Tania Ghosh
    AU  - Sribas Goswami
    Y1  - 2025/12/09
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    AB  - Over the past four decades, Indian society has been more concerned with children's physical and mental disabilities as one of the main societal issues. Nonetheless, most individuals in this nation are still unable to distinguish between mental illness and special educational needs. Research in this field has advanced significantly in the social and medical sciences. It has been noted that awareness of the issue of physical and mental disability is increasing quickly. Such rapid growth in interest is involving more and more researchers doing studies on mental retardation which is in terms of producing a large accumulation of data on the general condition with which individuals with special educational needs are associated. The results show that there was a significant difference between the two groups with regard to class and type of school and shows that age at first recognized, among the psychosocial variables there is a statistically significant difference between the two groups in the domains of family burden. There is a difference between the two groups in other psychosocial variables like self-esteem, marital life, social support and social stigma but they are not statistically significant. Children with conditions like cerebral palsy or Down’s syndrome need to be assisted in feeding. Children with mental health issues cannot comprehend the messages. At the same time, Children with disabilities have a higher risk of conditions such as diabetes and hypertension which are high-risk factors for COVID-19 mortality. Therefore, study observes that children with disabilities need much more support than the rest of the population in the face of a pandemic. It can be concluded from the study that the parental psychosocial problems are found to be much severe during the outbreak of the corona virus pandemic.
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