"More Than a Paycheck": Parent Perspectives on Meaningful Work for Individuals With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.
Parents see good jobs for adults with IDD as inclusive, interesting, and growth-oriented, not just paid.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Frazier et al. (2023) asked parents what makes a job matter for adults with IDD.
They ran small group chats and one-on-one talks.
Parents shared stories about their adult kids at work.
What they found
Parents care about more than money.
They want jobs that fit personal interests, offer room to grow, and treat workers as insiders.
A paycheck alone is not enough.
How this fits with other research
Goldfarb et al. (2019) warns that matching special interests to jobs can fall short if the worker lacks choice or friends on the job.
The parent view extends that idea: interest fit is vital, yet so are respect and chances to learn new things.
Bahry et al. (2023) adds an ethical lens. Behavior analysts must write goals that lead to real adult roles, not just easy-to-meet tasks.
Together, these papers form a chain: parents describe meaningful work, self-determination theory explains why it works, and ethics tell us to program for it.
Why it matters
If you write vocational goals, ask: Would this job feel worthy to a parent? Add choice, social contact, and skill steps. Push employers to offer natural supports, not just task bins. A meaningful day at work keeps adults with IDD coming back and grows their status in the community.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Increasing employment outcomes for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) remains an enduring emphasis of research, policy, and practice. Parents are often primary partners in the pursuit of meaningful work for their family members with IDD. This qualitative study examined the views of 55 parents regarding the importance of this pursuit and the features of employment that matter most to them. Participants discussed a range of reasons they valued employment for their family members with IDD, including factors that extended beyond a paycheck. Likewise, they described an array of features that they considered to be important to their family member thriving in the workplace (e.g., inclusivity, match with interests, opportunities for growth). We offer recommendations for promoting integrated employment among families and conceptualizing employment outcomes within future research.
Intellectual and developmental disabilities, 2023 · doi:10.1352/1934-9556-61.2.145