Supports and Accommodations to Help Peer Supporters Succeed

There are many ways that Research Team Leaders can help Peer Supporters with IDD to succeed in their role. Training and tools to help a peer supporter should be tailored to the individual strengths and areas of need for each peer supporter on a research team. The personal characteristics of a peer supporter and the specific responsibilities they have on a research team will both influence the training and tools that will be most helpful to them. There is an emerging body of literature on peer support that suggests best practices for helping peer supporters. Specifically, literature on inclusive research identifies factors that support key community members’ with IDD involvement in various aspects of the research process. Based on this literature, we have summarized some key supports and accommodations that Research Team Leaders can implement to help peer supporters successfully engage in research.

Individual Supports

The Research Team Lead can identify a specific person to help the peer supporter in their role on the research team. This is often a more experienced person on the research team with or without a disability that provides ongoing support. The literature often identifies this person as peer mentor, professional co-facilitator or co-teacher, or group leader. The support person might work alongside the peer supporter to facilitate groups or activities, provide assistance directly to the peer supporter to enable them to fulfill their role, and/or provide ongoing supervision.

It is important to have consistent and regular supervision for the peer supporter. Supervision of peer supporters provides opportunities to gauge their understanding of and comfort with their role, address potential problems, clarify expectations, and support peer supporter’s self-efficacy. The supervisor and peer supporter can work together to identify areas of needs and supports, strategies, and other accommodations that would benefit the peer supporter (see below).

Environmental Supports and Accommodations

Environmental supports and accommodations focus on aspects of the environment that can be modified or enhanced to support engagement in research. One of the most identified environmental supports is the use of structure and routine. For example, Research Team Leaders can schedule regular meetings with peer supporters to review strategies, answer questions, and provide feedback as one method of providing structure and routine. The research team can meet at the same day and time, and in the same place to establish a familiar learning environment. Other environmental supports include scheduling the optimum length of time for meetings and research activities to complete tasks or cover content without taxing attention or causing cognitive strain. Research Team Leaders can also create meeting rules and expectations that help guide the agenda and participation. It is important to note that while you may establish routines around supervision and group meetings, some peer supporters may benefit from extra time with a supervisor/support person or flexible scheduling.

There are many processes and accommodations that can help peer supporters to fully participate and engage in research activities. Below is a list of non-tangible process types of supports and tangible accommodations identified in the peer support and inclusive research literature.

See the Peer Supporter Roles and Strategies page for examples of how worksheets can be used to provide tangible support to a peer supporter as they fulfill their job responsibilities.

Another example included in this Toolkit is the Strengths and Difficulties Checklist, which can provide a structure for identifying effective accommodations to support the employee to meet their job duties.

It is important to ensure that the implementation of any of the supports or accommodations above are guided by the individual peer supporters' needs.

References

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