...and I also work in Australia for the Centre for Developmental
Disability Health Victoria. In our case, "developmental disability"
includes any disability that has been present from birth (although it
does include intellectual disability as one of its main categories and
that can be identified up to the age of 18) and affects any part of a
person's development. This includes intellectual disability, cerebral
palsy, autism spectrum disorder, genetic/chromosomal disorders
(including Down Sydrome as one of the more common, and other Syndromes
like Williams, Angelmans, TORCH, Smith-Magenis, etc, etc). It does not
include acquired disabilities though.
You are right Ria - it is complicated!
Vanessa Murray
Research Assistant
Centre for Developmental Disability Health Victoria
Ria Strong wrote:
>
> ><< The term "intellectual disability" correctly covers people who:
> > * acquired their disability before the age of 18
> > * have an IQ of 70 or under
> > * have "significantly below average adaptive functioning"
> > >>
> >
> >This term -- "intellectual disability" -- is not widely used in the
> US, at
> >least not in my experience. "Mental disability" is used broadly as
> an
> >umbrella term. For brain injuries, people refer to that specifically
> --
> >"people with brain injuries," "people with traumatic brain injury,"
> etc. For
> >what is referred to above, people tend to use "developmental
> disabilities" or
> >"DD" and "mental retardation" or "MR," but it's complicated.
> >
>
> The terminology varies a lot from country to country.
>
> I'm writing from Australia, where "intellectual disability" is the
> preferred term. In the UK, people usually talk about "learning
> difficulties" or "learning disabilities". Claudia has given the US
> usage...
>
> It certainly *is* complicated!
>
> *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
> Ria Strong
> Melbourne, Australia
> *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
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