Pathways to Belonging: 2018 – 2024

The Pathways to Belonging (P2B) project wanted to learn how young adults with IDD find places of belonging and meaning. The team also wanted to know what paths they take to get to these places, from their perspective and the perspectives of those who support them.

This inclusive research, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), looked at 15 young adults with IDD, 15 parents of young adults with IDD, and 15 service providers of young adults with IDD. These people were from the Greater Toronto Area. The team used a participatory toolkit, which includes visual- and arts-based methods. This project used social participatory mapping to ask young adults, and people that support them, about places of belonging (or not) in their lives. They were asked to describe the paths that connect these places. The goal of this hands-on, arts-based method is to allow people to express their perspectives in a way that is meaningful to them. The team used inclusive methods to involve young adults with IDD, family members, and service providers in our research team.  

Our previous project, Voices of Youths (VOY), highlighted that the paths that youths with IDD would like to take may not match the paths their supporters set out for them. This led to points of tension. The P2B project looked at these roadblocks by talking to young adults, their parents, and service providers. The perspectives of young adults are central within our inclusive research design. To better learn about these points of tension, we felt it was important to learn how these paths are viewed from other sides.