DISABILITY TERMINOLOGY CHART
When referring to people with disabilities, choose words that reflect dignity and respect. Use language that describes the person’s disability without defining the individual as his or her disability. The following are just some examples.
| INAPPROPRIATE | APPROPRIATE |
| The disabled, the handicapped, physically challenged | People with disabilities/ persons with disabilities, the disability community |
| Suffers from, afflicted with, stricken with, victim of, invalid | Has a disability, is a person with a disability |
| Normal person, healthy, whole | People without disabilities, able-bodied, person who is able to walk, person who can see, etc. |
| Visually impaired, Hearing Impaired, deaf and dumb | The Blind, The Deaf, Person who is blind, person who is deaf or hard of hearing |
| Wheelchair bound, confined or restricted to a wheelchair | Person who uses a wheelchair, wheelchair user |
| Handicap parking | Accessible parking, parking for people with disabilities |
| Dumb, mute | Person who cannot speak, has difficulty speaking, uses synthetic speech, is non-vocal, non-verbal |
| Stutterer, tongue-tied | Person with a speech impairment, who has a speech disability, speech disorder, or communication disability |
| CP victim, spastic | Person with cerebral palsy |
| Crippled, lame, deformed | Person with physical disability, a person walks with a cane, uses leg braces, crutches user, wheelchair user |
| Epileptic | Person with epilepsy, person with seizure disorder |
| Fit, attack | Seizure, epileptic episode or event |
| Crazy, maniac, lunatic, insane, nuts, deranged, psycho, demented | People with emotional disorders, mental illness, mental health disability, psychiatric disability |
| Retard, mentally defective, moron, idiot, slow, imbecile, feeble-minded, Down’s person, mongoloid | Person with a developmental disability, person with mental retardation, person with a developmental delay, person with Down syndrome or person who is brain injured, has traumatic brain injury, is brain damaged, with a closed head injury |
| Slow learner, retarded | Person who has a learning disability |
| Dwarf, midget | Short stature, little person |
| Paraplegic, quadriplegic | Person with spinal cord injury, person with physical disability |
| Birth defect | Congenital disability, birth anomaly |
| A post-polio, suffered from polio | Has had polio, experienced polio or polio survivor |
| Homebound | Stay-at-home, hard for the person to get out |
| Senile, demented | Person with Alzheimer’s disease, person who has dementia |
| Albino, Yellow | Person with Albinism |
| Person living with disability/ Persons living with disability | Person with disability/ Persons with disabilities |
| Hunchback person | Person with kyphosis |
| Suffering from Leprosy or Leprosy Victim | Person with Leprosy |
