Despite increasing attention to inclusion, loneliness statistics are not improving for people with intellectual disabilities. University lecturer Paul van Trigt will use an ERC Consolidator Grant to conduct research into friendships between people with and without intellectual disabilities. What does it take to make contact successful?
'When it comes to inclusion, people often look at the social position of people with intellectual disabilities,' says Van Trigt. 'I want to know how this works on an interpersonal level. Research shows that people with intellectual disabilities often have fewer friends than people without disabilities, even though friendship can be very valuable when you feel lonely and can also help prevent loneliness. However, friendship is difficult to study, especially from a transnational historical perspective. So it's an interesting challenge.'
Friendships between pairs from all over the world
In his forthcoming ERC research, Van Trigt focuses on the positive: what does it take to make friendships between people with and without disabilities succeed? Several of these pairs of friends will be followed in the Netherlands, France, Canada, India and the Czech Republic. Where possible, the researchers want to interview them, otherwise they will look for other suitable ways to find out how they experience their friendship.
'We already know from previous research that friendship is defined differently in India than it is here,' says Van Trigt. 'Whereas in the West the emphasis is on equality, friendship in India seems to be closer to family relationships, while the Czech Republic has a socialist legacy of brotherhood. We are very curious to see if and how this will be reflected in our research.'
History of friendship
In addition to the global focus on concrete friendships, the research will also examine how international organisations and thinkers do or do not pay attention to friendship. 'People were concerned with friendship between people with and without intellectual disabilities as early as the 1960s. Some of them even argued that friendship is more important than human rights: it is more important to have a friend than to be able to claim your rights. This seems to be primarily a Western discussion, so we will follow how they arrive at these ideas and how they then translate them into a global ambition.'
Mirror of society
Ultimately, Van Trigt hopes that his research will contribute to the understanding of and for marginalised groups: 'Friendships between people with and without disabilities mirror society. In friendship, you take responsibility for each other. That goes beyond just talking about inclusion. Moreover, the bond often arises from the idea that the person without a disability should help the person with a disability, but we regularly see that this later reverses and that a mutual dependence develops. I would love it if this project could make these kinds of processes more visible in research and society.'
