Disability and Disability Studies

This page has links to sources of data and statistics about disability.

The first ever World Report on Disability (2011), produced jointly by World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank, suggests that more than a billion people in the world experience disability. It also points out that disability is difficult to measure for multiple reasons, such as:

• "Approaches to measuring disability vary across countries"
• "Censuses and surveys take varying approaches to measuring disability, and the use of these approaches to data collection in the same country often report different rates of disability"
• Some countries and some data collection approaches "use measures focused exclusively on a narrow choice of impairments" while others us measures that ask about limitations in daily activities, which result in different findings
• "Question design and reporting source can affect estimates"
• "Disability is interpreted in relation to what is considered normal functioning, which can vary based on the context, age group, or even income group"

Basically, disability statistics give us important information, but they do not give us the whole story about disability, because there is more than one way to measure disability and many ways to determine who "counts" as a person with disabilities.

• Annual Disability Statistics Compendium
  • Access to disability statistics published by various federal agencies, in annual reports, Excel spreadsheets, and more. From the Institute on Disability, at the University of New Hampshire.
• Disability Statistics
  • Access to datasets and research tools on U.S. populations and disability, with data from the American Community Survey (ACS), Current Population Survey (CPS), and Census 2000. From Cornel University Institute on Employment and Disability.
• Disability and Health Data System (DHDS) 
  • Access to dynamic data on U.S. states related to disability, chronic health, health care, and more. See the Getting Started page to learn how to use this resource. From the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
• National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) DataLab
  • Access to datasets on U.S. students, teachers, schools, and more. Includes data sets on students with disabilities and on school "special education" programs.

• United Nations Disability Statistics Portal
  • Comprehensive data repository drawing from national population statistics, allows comparison by country and across disability categories. From the United Nations Disability Statistics Program.
• World Health Organization Disability and Health Fact Sheet
  • Key facts on disability as it relates to health and healthcare access around the world. Additional links to other fact sheets, reports,  and data. From the WHO Disability Health Topic.