How to Test for Disability

A disability is a problem a person has because of health conditions that affect routine tasks in his everyday life. It can be physical, mental or developmental. Some people are born with a disability, while others occur during a person's lifetime. Both states and charities perform disability tests to determine the extent of a disability and the level of help or support that is needed.

Instructions

• 1

  Check movement capability. Physical disabilities can vary hugely, but largely use the same methods to classify disability. People are asked to perform a series of actions, with their ability to perform an action rated on a scale. Actions may include bending and kneeling, standing without the support of another person or the use of an aid except a walking stick, or lifting and carrying weights or everyday objects. Medical experts will also examine people to determine whether a disability is evident. In some cases it will be apparent that someone has problems walking because of deformed toes, for example, whereas in other cases it's impossible to tell if someone has an impairment without X-rays or MRI scans.

• 2

  Ask the person to perform sit-down tests. Intellectual disability is usually spotted in school by teachers who are concerned about the slow learning rate of children. When they're very young it can be difficult to determine children's ability to learn, but once they are in a classroom with others their own age, a disability quickly becomes apparent. If a teacher identifies a child as possibly having a disability, she usually tells the parents before the child takes a series of tests. Depending on a percentage score the child gets, he is determined as having a disability.

• 3

  Determine abnormalities. A mental disability can be hard to spot through academic testing; with those who suffer from a particular mental problem often excelling in certain subjects. Mental disorders include schizophrenia, paranoia and anxiety-related disorders that need to be tested over a period of time to determine severity. Testing looks at both symptoms and psychiatric signs -- medically demonstrable phenomena that indicate specific psychological abnormalities, e.g., abnormalities of behavior, mood, thought, memory, orientation, development or perception.

• 4

  Conduct hearing and vision tests. Both tests can be carried out in laboratory conditions, with either a series of images or sounds used to determine whether someone is impaired. For vision testing, a series of images is displayed with the person being tested asked to identify what he can see, and also whether bright images that would prompt a reaction from someone with good vision cause alarm. Hearing tests involve assessing the person's response to different pitches.