“The unexpected wheelchair”: Exploring UK university students’ perceptions of dating and physical disability using story completion

Clarke, Victoria; Braun, Virginia

Abstract

The wider culture is rife with negative representations of physically disabled people’s sexuality, with them often constructed as asexual and unfit for relationships. The – predominantly quantitative – literature on perceptions of physically disabled people’s sexuality evidences negative social perceptions in – typically – student samples. But research focused on willingness to date a disabled person (also often with students) suggests more positive attitudes, although the role of social desirability in responses is unclear. We expand existing knowledge by qualitatively exploring how younger adults make sense of a dating scenario involving a clearly “marked” as disabled (wheelchair user) character (Cameron) and an “unmarked” character (Andy). By using the novel story completion (SC) method that explores a hypothetical scenario, we aimed to circumvent social desirability, and gain access to everyday sense-making around disability and dating. Our analysis highlights six themes from the stories: 1) the unexpected wheelchair; 2) Anxious Andy, the good guy; 3) the elephant in the room; 4) disability as personal tragedy; 5) the good disabled person; and 6) love conquers all. Although participants wrote stories about the scenario that framed disability as an obstacle to a successful date, stories were mainly of a successful date. But even “positive” stories conveyed subtle manifestations of ableism. We argue that SC provides a useful method for qualitative psychologists to interrogate social perceptions, particularly when social desirability is a concern.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Aug 7, 2025
• Deposit Date: Aug 13, 2025
• Print ISSN: 2326-3598
• Electronic ISSN: 2326-3601
• Publisher: American Psychological Association
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/14817107