Ep. 9: A World First — Making Research Accessible and Disability Inclusive at the Multisensory Studio, University of Calgary

When you hear the words, “disability inclusion,” what’s the first thing that comes to mind for you? There’s a lot being written these days about accessibility, and disability inclusion in business and employment. But what about something like disability inclusion and accessibility in research? That's not something many of us have thought about.

In this second part of our two-part series on new disability research in Canada, we find out about something innovative being done at the University of Calgary. Multisensory storytelling research — research that’s accessible and inclusive of people who have a disability. If this sounds innovative, it is. It’s a Canadian first. In fact, it’s the first initiative of its kind in the world. It’s adding a whole new dimension to how social research is done.

In this episode, we talk with Dr. Kathleen Sitter, PhD. She runs the Multisensory Studio at the University of Calgary. She’s also Associate Professor in the Faculty of Social Work, and the Canada Research Chair in Multisensory Storytelling in Research and Knowledge Translation.

Listen to this conversation that will rouse all your senses, and get you thinking differently about accessibility and disability inclusion in research.