Community participation among people who are homeless

Thesis (Sc.D.)--Boston UniversityCommunity participation has been regarded as a goal for people with rehabilitation needs, but there is a lack of consensus about the definition and measurement of community participation. In addition, there is limited knowledge about the community participation of individuals who are homeless. This dissertation contains three studies aimed at furthering our understanding about community participation among individuals who are, or were previously, homeless. Study 1 systematically reviewed instruments that measure community participation in people with disabilities and compared these instruments by analyzing the content based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health Perspective (ICF) classification. Seventeen instruments were identified as containing community participation items. None of these instruments covered the full breadth of community participation domains, but each addressed community participation to some extent. Furthermore, most of the instruments lose precision by treating diverse activities as a single concept. [TRUNCATED