How do different aspects of personal disability identity (i.e., disability-related self-worth and personal meaning) relate to life satisfaction, general self-efficacy (e.g., the belief that one can handle problems and affect positive change in one’s life), and anxiety/depression symptoms? To answer this question, researchers surveyed a sample of 1,203 employed adults ages 18–65 who self-reported having diagnoses of learning disability (LD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), or both. Thirty-five percent reported having LD only, 30% ADHD only, and 34% reported having both LD and ADHD. The mean age was 29 years old (SD=6), 67% were white and 64% male. All participants resided in the United States and completed study measures in English. Participants completed questionnaires about themselves, their disability diagnoses, and short, previously developed measures of anxiety and depression symptoms, disability-related self-worth and personal meaning, life satisfaction, and general self-efficacy. All data were collected online at a single point in time. The authors used hierarchical linear regression, which is a statistical method that allows for researchers to see how variables of interest (e.g., disability self-worth) relate to an outcome variable (e.g., life satisfaction) after the relationships between those variables and other variables (e.g., age, race/ethnicity, gender) are accounted for. Hierarchical linear regressions were conducted for all three outcome variables (e.g., general self-efficacy, anxiety and depression symptoms, and life satisfaction). After controlling for demographic and disability-related characteristics by using linear regression, the authors found that higher disability-related self-worth and personal meaning was related to lower levels of anxiety and depression, higher levels of disability-related self-worth were related to higher levels of general self-efficacy, and higher levels of disability-related personal meaning was related to higher levels of life satisfaction.
