Shelia Black Social Identity Theory

Shelia Black was pregnant with her first child and it was not a typical joy to all of her family. She has a rare case of X-linked hypophosphatemia, also known as XLH: a condition that causes’ dwarfism. Her Aunt once told her that “God would not want you to have children.” Shelia was the first in her family to have the disease, so bringing up her initial fear of passing the disease on was shut down by the genetic counselor. The doctor was right initially and she had a healthy daughter Anabelle. Not long after her next two kids Walter and Eliza were born with XLH. Many think of disability as a misfortune, however, Sheila and her children have learned to fold it into their personal identity.
The Social Identity Theory builds on the theme of self-esteem being boosted by relating with social groups you want to take part in and naturally fall into. “Redefining Disability, Re-imagining the Self: Disability Identification Predicts Self-esteem and Strategic Responses,” a research report collaborated by Michelle R. Nario-Redmond, Jeffrey G. Noel, and Emily Fern uses research to find a connection between self-esteem, self-identification, and disability.
Naturally, people subconsciously stigmatized disabled people, and see them as inferior.
This can be hard for those with …show more content…
Researchers believe that there is a correlation between identifying with a disability and self-esteem. They expect that people who identify with a disability on a personal level rather than those who identify as a part of the disabled community will have lower self-esteem. They also suspect that identifying with the disabled community would differ between those who visible and non-visible. The results hypothesized can also be seen between people with life-long disabilities compared to those who have become disabled later in