NRDR: Research Projects
Telling Lives
This pilot project examines narratives by women with spinal cord injury (SCI) who participated in a study called Stress and Coping Over the Life Course: A Perspective on Women with Spinal Cord Injury. For Telling Lives, we emphasized the authority of women’s voices as they shared their rich experiences with disability and in rehabilitation. Simultaneously, we created a new instrument (see the NFIM below) to assist us in the direct transmission of women’s voices deeper and more thoroughly in the scientific method of analyzing their lives for research and clinical purposes. During 2004-2006, we disseminated our findings at the Society for Disability studies, American Spinal Injury Association, American Association for SCI Psychologists and Social Workers, and the Advanced Rehabilitation Research Training Program at the University of Michigan.
Recently published in Spinal Cord Injury Psychosocial Process, an article titled, “Interpreting the Trauma Narratives of African-American Women with Spinal Cord Injury.”
These scientific posters also may be of interest: (documents are in MS Power Point)
- Environmental and Personal Dimensions of Life Trajectories Following Spinal Cord Injuries: A Focus on Caucasian Women
- Environmental and Personal Dimensions of Life Trajectories Following Spinal Cord Injuries: A Focus on African-American Women
- The NFI Matrix: Analyzing Trauma Narratives by Detroit Women with Spinal Cord Injury
- Reflections on My Life: Inner-City African-American Women with Spinal Cord Injury
Deep: Real Life with Spinal Cord Injury
With the University of Michigan’s Model SCI Care System, we developed essays for an accessible book about “real life” with SCI. The monograph probes some of the deepest philosophical and ontological issues related to life with this disability. Dedicated to the memory of our friend, colleague and contributor, Julie Harrison, the book is available for purchase through Model Systems, e-mail: bright@med.umich.edu. Here is an essay excerpt from Deep.
Narrative Form Index and Matrix (NFIM)
Developed by an interdisciplinary team of researchers, including people with disabilities, the Narrative Form Index and Matrix are tools in the analysis of text-data for research and study in the health and medical sciences. Both the Narrative Form Index—Basic Version and the Narrative Form Index—Expanded Version are accessible in PDF Format on these pages. The NFIM User Guide with a Sample of a Simple NFIM may be accessed here free of charge as well. An audio version of the NFI-Basic and the User’s Guide are in production.
