Reefs and Fairways in the Career-Selection Process : Young adults with mobility impairments and their margins for maneuvers

This thesis deals with the career choices of young adults (ages 18 through 40) with mobility impairments and the experiences they had throughout their career-selection process. The purpose of the study was: To find the inhibitory and furthering factors of the career choices of people with mobility impairments from their own perspective, with a special focus on how various factors affected the process over time. The method for collecting the results of this study was biographical interviews. The main theories of the study were Sense of Coherence, Self-efficacy, Learned Helplessness, Social Role Valorization and The Four Rooms of Change. The results show that mobility impairment affects career choices and that the effect is more often inhibitory than it is furthering. Structural factors, such as how the respondents are treated by other people, as well as rules and material barriers (stairs, mal-functioning elevators, etc.) are found to be more limiting than the body itself. Being over-protected is a main inhibitory factor which can contribute strongly to low self-efficacy and drainage of self-image for the respondents. The goal of the respondents is to obtain independence and a job based on their own terms, and not a social care career. This goal was found to form a vital resistance resource versus adversity and obstacles. The respondents consider themselves to be overprotected by society (by parents, teachers, career counsellors, employment officers, etc.) in relation to their career choices, and they would like not to be. Forskningsfinansiärer: Torsten Söderbergs Stiftelse och Ragnar Söderbergs Stiftelse