Glossary

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Articulation Work(also: Care Articulation, Need Articulation)

The often invisible labor of putting thoughts, needs, and feelings into words, particularly in care relationships. Articulation work involves expressing what support is needed, coordinating care activities, and communicating between care partners. This concept, originating from…

Care Partner(also: Care Dyad, Caregiving Relationship)

A term encompassing both the person providing care (caregiver) and the person receiving care (care receiver), emphasizing the collaborative and reciprocal nature of care relationships rather than a one-directional helper-recipient dynamic. The care partner framework recognizes…

Care Staff(also: Care Worker, Direct Care Worker, Personal Care Aide)

Individuals who provide day-to-day personal care and support to residents in care facilities, including assistance with eating, bathing, dressing, toileting, and mobility. Care staff are distinct from medical professionals such as nurses and doctors; they typically receive basic…

Care Web(also: Care Web in Practice)

A care web is a relational network of overlapping, often reciprocal support that sustains a disabled person's participation in everyday life, described by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha in 'Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice'. Rather than locating support in a single paid…

Caregiver(also: Family Caregiver, Informal Caregiver, Carer)

A person who provides unpaid assistance with daily activities, emotional support, and care coordination for a family member, friend, or neighbor who has a disability, chronic illness, or age-related needs. Caregivers face significant physical, emotional, financial, and time…

Caregiver Burden(also: Carer Burden, Caregiver Stress)

Caregiver burden refers to the physical, emotional, social, and financial strain experienced by individuals who provide ongoing care to a family member or partner with a disability, chronic illness, or age-related condition such as dementia. Caregivers often experience…

Caregiver Interdependence(also: Care Dependency, Caregiver Reliance)

The mutual reliance between a disabled person and their caregivers, encompassing physical assistance, emotional support, and technological mediation. In accessibility contexts, caregiver interdependence highlights that many disabled people rely on caregivers not just for…

Caregiving(also: Carer, Caregiver, Care Partner)

The unpaid or paid work of supporting another person with daily living, health management, social participation, or emotional needs, often in the context of disability, chronic illness, or ageing. In accessibility research, caregiving is usually treated as an interdependent…

Co-Regulation(also: Coregulation)

Co-regulation is the process by which one person helps another manage their emotional or physiological state, through presence, calming behaviours, modelling coping strategies, or environmental adjustment. It is well established in developmental psychology (parent helping a…

Collaborative Memory(also: Distributed Cognition, Shared Memory)

The process by which memory tasks and cognitive load are distributed across multiple people, typically within families or close social groups. In the context of disability and caregiving, collaborative memory refers to how family members collectively manage the memory needs of a…

Collaborative Tracking(also: Collaborative Self-Tracking)

Collaborative tracking is the practice of multiple people - typically a person with a health condition and their caregivers or allies - contributing to and reviewing shared health or behaviour data. It extends personal informatics from individual self-knowledge into…

Dialogue of Care(also: Care Dialogue, Care Communication)

The ongoing exchange of information, observations, and concerns between a person receiving care and their carers — whether professional, familial, or informal. In assistive technology and telecare contexts, the dialogue of care refers to the shared understanding that develops…

Digital Family Portrait

Digital Family Portrait is a 2001 research prototype from Georgia Institute of Technology (Mynatt et al.) that uses an ambient, picture-frame-style display in an adult child's home to represent the daily activity of an older relative living remotely. The portrait's decorative…

Doll Therapy

A nonpharmacological intervention used in dementia care in which a person is given a lifelike doll to hold, dress, and care for. For some people with advanced dementia, engaging with the doll can reduce agitation and distress, promote calm, and provide a sense of purpose and…

Family-based Care(also: Family Caregiving Model, Home-based Care)

Family-based care is the model in which a relative — most often a parent, spouse, adult child, or sibling — is the primary caregiver for a disabled, chronically ill, or ageing family member, typically in the home rather than in an institutional setting. In the context of…

Formal Caregiver(also: Professional Caregiver, Paid Caregiver)

A formal caregiver is a paid, trained professional who provides care — personal, medical, or social — to a disabled, ill, or ageing person, typically through a healthcare organisation, home-care agency, residential facility, or public community-care service. Formal caregivers…

Informal Carer(also: Informal Caregiver, Family Carer, Unpaid Carer)

A person who provides regular care and support to a family member, friend, or neighbour who has a disability, chronic illness, mental health condition, or age-related needs, without being paid as a professional caregiver. Informal carers — most commonly spouses, adult children,…

Joint Awareness

Joint awareness is a shared understanding between two or more people about a condition, situation, or state - for example, a child's sensory triggers known to both the child and their parent, or a chronic illness state visible to a patient and their caregiver. It contrasts with…

Life Story Work(also: Life Story, Biography Work, Digital Biography)

A person-centered approach to care that involves gathering and sharing information about an individual's life history, preferences, relationships, and experiences. In dementia care, life story work helps caregivers see the person behind the condition and supports meaningful…

OCD Accommodation(also: Family Accommodation)

A behavior — typically by family, friends, or clinicians — that participates in or enables a person with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) to complete a compulsion, for example by providing reassurance, hearing a confession, or making a decision on their behalf. Although…

Over-Assistance(also: Over-Helping, Excessive Assistance)

The tendency of caregivers, family members, or support providers to complete tasks for a person with a disability rather than allowing them to perform the tasks independently, even when the person is capable. Over-assistance often stems from time pressure, concern about safety,…

Parents with Visual Impairments(also: PVI, Blind Parents, Visually Impaired Parents)

Parents with visual impairments (PVI) are blind or low-vision adults raising children, who are often sighted. PVI face distinctive parenting challenges that go beyond individual functional compensation: supporting children's visually-driven exploration (pointing, gaze, shared…

Personal Care Assistant(also: PCA, Personal Care Attendant, Personal Support Worker)

A person who provides hands-on assistance with activities of daily living (ADLs) to people with disabilities or older adults who need support with tasks such as bathing, dressing, toileting, grooming, eating, and transferring. PCAs may be formally employed through agencies or…

Repetitive Questioning(also: Perseverative Questioning)

A behavioural symptom of dementia, particularly Alzheimer's disease, in which a person repeatedly asks the same question over and over, often within short time intervals. Repetitive questioning can stem from short-term memory loss (not remembering the answer or having asked),…

Residential Care(also: Care Home, Nursing Home, Long-Term Care Facility)

A facility that provides housing, personal care, and support services for individuals who cannot live independently due to age, disability, or health conditions. Residential care settings range from assisted living facilities offering minimal support to skilled nursing…

Respite Care(also: Respite, Carer Relief)

Temporary care provided to a person with a disability or chronic condition to give their primary caregiver a break from their caregiving responsibilities. Respite care can take many forms, including in-home care, day programs, overnight stays in care facilities, or social…

SHT Liaison(also: Smart Home Technology Liaison)

A role identified in accessibility research where a non-disabled person—often a caregiver, family member, or friend—takes responsibility for researching, setting up, troubleshooting, and maintaining smart home technology on behalf of a disabled user. Unlike the pilot-passenger…

Safety Check-in(also: Wellness Check-in, Check-in Call)

A safety check-in is a brief remote-communication exchange — most often a phone call, text, or app-based 'ping' — whose primary purpose is to confirm the safety and wellbeing of a person at a distance, rather than to exchange substantive information. The pattern is common in…

Support worker(also: Disability support worker, Direct support professional, DSP)

A person employed to provide direct assistance and support to people with disabilities in their daily lives. Support workers help with activities of daily living, skill development, community participation, health monitoring, and personal care. In disability community centres…

Supporting Individual(also: Support Person, Ally)

A person — such as a partner, family member, friend, or caregiver — who provides assistance to someone with a disability and may also seek information and support on their behalf. In online disability communities, supporting individuals often search for guidance on assistive…

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