A Systematic Review of Challenges Faced by Students with Disabilities in Higher Education

Abstract

Background

Students with disabilities often encounter multiple barriers in accessing and succeeding in higher education. These challenges include physical inaccessibility, lack of academic support and social exclusion.

Summary

This systematic research attempts to identify important hurdles to higher education for students with disabilities, as well as examine the lack of accessibility and assistance. It also looks at publishing patterns, emphasising key publications, authors, nations and organisations in the subject.

Methods

The data was collected from Scopus and the Web of Science database and was analysed through a bibliometric approach with R software. The results indicated that students with disabilities in higher education encounter numerous challenges, which this study categorised into 14 major themes.

Key message

This article offers recommendations for creating an inclusive educational environment in which students with disabilities are treated fairly and given equal access to learning opportunities.

Keywords

Challenges higher education university impairment students with disabilities systematic review

Introduction

The topic of special education is currently one that is heavily debated in the educational community. It has consistently been referred to as an element of the global education for all agenda, a new educational paradigm and educational reform objectives to create inclusive societies. One of the main goals of education is to ‘produce responsible, self-sufficient citizens who have the confidence, initiative, skills and wisdom to pursue knowledge and further their own personal growth’. Such an educational concept raises awareness of programmes supporting the self-determination of students with disabilities.¹ The fundamental tenet of inclusive education is that every child and family have the right to be included, respected and valued, to participate, to work toward common objectives and to realise their full potential, with special attention to the most vulnerable. This is a crucial component of high-quality pedagogy.²

For individuals who possess disabilities, higher education is a powerful force for change since it opens doors to employment and enhances working circumstances in the future.³ For instance, studies have indicated that people with disabilities who complete their higher education have around four times as many possibilities for employment as their counterparts who do not pursue higher education.⁴ Consequently, completion of higher education may aid those with disabilities in overcoming challenges, boosting their independence and improving their quality of life.⁵

Equality, diversity and inclusion have received more attention in higher education in recent years. In contrast to their counterparts without disabilities, students with disabilities continue to face systemic disadvantages, even despite an apparent dedication to fostering an inclusive and accessible environment. Students with disabilities could find it more difficult than their colleagues without disabilities to access knowledge during lectures (e.g., taking notes), engage in group projects and finish assessments (e.g., oral presentations, written tests).⁶ In the classroom, students with disabilities deal with mental health issues including sadness, anxiety, loneliness and poor self-esteem. The delayed academic, social and professional development of a challenged student has been pointed out as one of the factors contributing to these psychological problems.^{7, 8} When using resources (such as libraries and IT services), these obstacles to learning arise both within and outside of campus.⁹

Students with disabilities suffer from social realities and endure terrible living conditions. According to numerous studies, children with disabilities are frequently excluded, marginalised, harassed, stigmatised and deprived of their fundamental rights and entitlements, which leads to greater rates of poverty.¹⁰ It is crucial to keep bringing attention to the hurdles that individuals with disabilities encounter in a variety of educational settings if we are to improve their rights.¹¹ The majority of individuals in poor nations, who have been influenced by social taboos, reportedly lack awareness regarding disabilities.

A ‘Bioecological Model of Inclusive Higher Education’ is outlined in Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model of development for humans. The vast array of variables that impact the experience of a disabled student are considered in this model, which is organised into five interconnected systems: the Mesosystem (interactions between and within the various systems, such as those between professors and disabled assistance staff), the Microsystem (factors that directly influence the learner’s experience, such as professors and institution infrastructure) and the Macrosystem (factors external to the HE institution, such as impairment legislation and societal attitudes). The learner, who is viewed as an active actor in learning and growth, is positioned at the core of the paradigm. Bronfenbrenner uses the phrase ‘progressive mutual accommodation’ in his works of literature¹² to see how ‘various factors within and between institutions mutually adapt one another to promote effective inclusion and individual development’.¹³

Therefore, the aim of this study is to use a bibliometric approach to address the challenges faced by students with disabilities in higher education. More specifically, this study aims to address the following objectives:

To assess the number of publications on challenges faced by students with disabilities in higher education.

To identify the most influential authors, keywords and countries contributing to the production of global knowledge.

To examine key journals, influential authors and leading affiliations in research on challenges faced by students with disabilities in higher education.

To explore the specific challenges faced by students with disabilities within the context of higher education.

Methods

Design

To identify the challenges experienced by students with disabilities in higher education, a bibliometric study using scientific mapping and performance indicators (co-citation analysis) has been carried out.¹⁴

Sources of Data and Techniques for Searching

Every relevant article published till Jan 2025 was gathered. For this, terms pertaining to barriers experienced by students with disabilities in higher education were to be extracted. To do this, separate searches were conducted in the Scopus and Web of Science (WoS) databases. To identify the most relevant records, we expanded the scope of our search and the techniques we used. The following examples demonstrate the combination and modification of informatics and keyword searches using operators based on Boolean logic. The search incorporated the article title, including keywords such as ‘Problems’ OR ‘issues’ OR ‘challenges’ OR ‘concerns’ OR ‘obstacles’ OR ‘determinants’ OR ‘barriers’ OR ‘access’ OR ‘education’ OR ‘exclusion’ OR ‘discrimination’ OR ‘hinders inclusivity’ OR ‘empowerment’ OR ‘sufferings’ OR ‘struggle’ AND ‘disabled students’ OR ‘children with disabilities’ OR ‘differently-abled’ OR ‘special children’ OR ‘specially abled’ OR ‘impairment’ OR ‘visually impaired’ OR ‘intellectual disability’ OR ‘physical disability’ OR ‘autism spectrum disorder’ AND ‘educational institute’ OR ‘learning environments’ OR ‘college students’ OR ‘university students’ OR ‘higher education’ OR ‘tertiary education’.

We carefully examined the research titles, keywords, abstracts and full texts of appropriate publications for possible insertion. A total of 322 publications were obtained throughout this time frame (Scopus: 206, Web of Science: 116).

The source data for all 322 articles was extracted. We initially evaluated the Scopus data and then repeated the process using the Web of Science records. Notably, the language, literary genre and publication year of the original search remained unchanged. One day, 5 January 2025, was set aside to finish the process of gathering raw data and retrieving literature.

Data Integration

The researcher exported a CSV (Comma-separated values) file that contained 322 relevant documents. For the purpose of bibliometric evaluation, the complete publication data—which comprised affiliations, nations/regions, citations, reference lists, journal names, author lists, abstracts, publication years and keywords—was incorporated into the dataset. This study has combined data that was retrieved from many databases, including Scopus and Web of Science. R studio bibliometrix was used for transferring the CSV file for integrating data from two distinct databases. A bibliometric analysis programme called Biblioshiny was used for further descriptive data analysis.

Data Analysis

After the information was purified, it was imported into Biblioshiny, which was then used to create a network and generate descriptive statistics by author, association and nation, as well as productivity. Descriptive analysis has also grown in favour as a means of keeping track of the most current advancements in a sector. It is often used in research to identify the best author, identify the most cited journals and discover publishing patterns. The selection of nation, keyword and journal analyses was made in addition to network analysis.

Content Analysis

Large volumes of textual data are systematically categorised and classified using content analysis,¹⁵ which is employed in this study. The method described above combines rigorous quantitative analysis with qualitative processes that maintain rich meaning to enhance bibliometric analysis.¹⁶ The underlying relationships and particular challenges experienced by students with disabilities in higher education could not be extracted from a bibliometric analysis on the subject. Instead, it simply reveals research hotspots and trends. Next, we employed literature content analysis to provide an extensive overview of the barriers faced by students with disabilities pursuing higher education. This study first identifies the hotspots for barriers that students with disabilities encounter in higher education by utilising studies on students with disabilities. Building on this study, we then employed text analysis to provide a more comprehensive summary of the acknowledged barriers encountered by students with disabilities in higher education. Ultimately, 29 articles from the updated dataset that were pertinent to the barriers encountered by students with disabilities in higher education were used for content analysis (Figure 1). We identified particular barriers encountered by students with disabilities pursuing higher education from each article.

Figure 1.

Reporting Items for the Systematic Review. Adapted the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews (PRISMA).

Results

Publication Trend

To address objective 1, which aims to assess the number of publications on challenges faced by students with disabilities in higher education. The analysis examines all of the published works on this topic, arranged in chronological order. A topic’s publication count may show shifts over time in a research hotspot. Furthermore, it may be utilised to forecast future patterns in the field’s expansion, which is very beneficial in determining the direction of future study.

Figure 2 illustrates the publication trend of the articles which are published from 1984 to 2024. In overview, there is an upward trend of publications. Articles showed a gradual rise from 1984 to the early 2000s, but starting in 2009, the number of publications increased substantially. Sixteen articles were published in the year 2011. Periodic fluctuations were seen in the upcoming years. However, by 2024 the publication reached its peak stage with the highest number of publications.

Figure 2.

Publication Trends.

Network Analysis

To address objective 2, which aims to identify the most influential authors, keywords and countries contributing to the production of global knowledge, we performed citation studies as well as co-citation analyses of sources using nations as the analytical units.

The contributions of authors from different nations are shown in Figure 3 using popular keywords like ‘higher education’, ‘inclusion’, ‘disability’, ‘disabled students’, ‘intellectual disability’, ‘college’. The prominent author who contributed in this field is ‘Riddell’. The most important contributions have come from authors from the network countries, especially those from the United States and United Kingdom (Figure 4).

Figure 3.

Three Field Plot/Network of Authors, Keywords and Nations

Figure 4.

Country-specific Production and Corresponding Authors Countries.

Corresponding Author’s Countries

Figure 4 displays the name of the corresponding author’s nation who have contributed in this field. High number of corresponding authors are from the nation United Kingdom and the United States of America.

To address objective 3, which aims to examine the key journals, influential authors and leading affiliations in research on challenges faced by students with disabilities in higher education, a table summarising the number of publications by journal, authors and affiliation has been created through bibliometric analysis.

Statistical Analysis

Table 1 renders information about the journals and their total number of citations. ‘Disability and Society’ Journal has the highest number of citations in this field, particularly 794 citations. ‘Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders’ has a total of 733 citations which is followed by ‘British Journal of Visual Impairment’.

Table 1.

Journal Production Overtime.

Journals Name	TC
Disability and Society	794
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders	733
British Journal of Visual Impairment	86
Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research	79
Career Development and Transition for Exceptional Individuals	78
Disability and Society	134
Studies in Higher Education	175
European Journal of Special Needs Education	120
Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities	27
Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness	61
The British Journal of Visual Impairment	53
Africa Education Review	11
American Journal of Occupational Therapy	45
Disability and Health Journal	19
Eating Disorders	18

Table 2 presents information about the prominent authors and highest number of citations of top 08 research papers in this field. It can be seen that the manuscript titled ‘Disabled students in higher education: perspectives on widening access and changing policy’ authored by ‘Riddel’ has highest number of citations.

Table 2.

Author Production Overtime.

Author	Year	TI	SO	TC	Tcpy
Riddell et al.¹⁷	2005	Disabled students in higher education: perspectives on widening access and changing policy	Disabled Students in Higher Education: Perspectives on Widening Access and Changing Policy	125	6.25
Riddell & Weedon¹⁸	2014	Disabled students in higher education: discourses of disability and the negotiation of identity	International Journal of Educational Research	97	8.818
Seale et al.¹⁹	2015	Not the right kind of ‘digital capital’? An examination of the complex relationship between disabled students, their technologies and higher education institutions	Computers and Education	91	9.1
Tinklin et al.²⁰	2004	Policy and provision for disabled students in higher education in Scotland and England: the current state of play	Studies in Higher Education	72	3.429
Hewett et al.¹³	2017	Developing an inclusive learning environment for students with visual impairment in higher education: progressive mutual accommodation and learner experiences in the United Kingdom	European Journal ofSpecial Needs Education	50	6.25
Lourens & Swartz²¹	2016	Experiences of visually impaired students in higher education: bodily perspectives on inclusive education	Disability and Society	44	4.889
Riddell et al.²²	2005	New labour, social justice and disabled students in higher education	British Educational Research Journal	39	1.95
Butler et al.²³	2016	Does participation in higher education make a difference in life outcomes for students with intellectual disability?	Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation	32	3.556

Notes: TC: Total citation, TI: Title, SO: Source, Tcpy : Total citation per year.

Table 3 illustrates the 10 topmost best admissible affiliations. Highest number of affiliations of articles have been from ‘Vanderbilt University’ with 33 articles followed by ‘University of Kentucky’ with 12 articles and ‘Norwegian University of Science and Technology’ with 8 articles.

Table 3.

Most Relevant Affiliation.

Affiliation	Articles
Vanderbilt University	33
University of Kentucky	12
Norwegian University of Science and Technology	8
Technological Educational Institute of Athens	7
Dublin City University	6
Trinity College Dublin	6
Univ Johannesburg	6
Univ Pittsburgh	6
University College London	6
University of Birmingham	6

To address research objective 4, which aims to explore the specific challenges faced by students with disabilities within the context of higher education, barriers identified in the literature are extracted from 29 selected studies (Table 4).

Table 4.

Evidence Table.

SL No	Authors	Type of Disability	Barriers
1	Karabalaeva et al.²⁴	Physical and intellectual disability	Lack of adaptive infrastructure, special teachers
2	Myers & Smith²⁵	Intellectual disability	Lack of training and expert teachers
3	Pistay et al.²⁶	Visually impaired	Lack of technology
4	Barrera et al.²⁷	Autism spectrum disorder	Teaching practices and lack of teacher training
5	Kisanga²⁸	Sensory impairment	Social barriers
6	Biorneras et al.²⁹	Students with disability	Injustice and fellowship
7	Brewer et al.³⁰	Students with disability	Impact on education, isolation from peers, barriers to assistance and accommodations
8	Abdulkadir et al.³¹	Visually impairment	Lack of assistive resources,Privacy concern and confidentiality of personal information
9	Becker & McGregor³²	Developmental language impairment	Lack of readily available study resources
10	Bell & Swart³³	Hard of hearing	Inflexible curricula, lack of assistive resources, mental, financial and academic difficulties
11	Brewer et al.³⁴	Disabled students	Lack of support services; mental, financial and academic difficulties
12	Croft³⁵	Visual impaired and blind	Attitudinal barriers, lack of funding, physical barriers
13	Davis et al.³⁶	Autism spectrum disorder	Lack of communication skills, lack of support services, mental and academic difficulties, difficulties with self-disclosure of their disability
14	Evans et al.³⁷	Autism spectrum disorder	Difficulties with self-disclosure of disability, lack of support services,
15	Firat³⁸	Visual impairment	Lack of readily available study resources, lack of awareness, attitudinal barriers, built environment barriers
16	Fuller et al.⁹	Disabled students	Lack of readily available study resources
17	Gaurav et al.³⁹	Physical (congenital) disabilities	Environment barriers
18	Hewett et al. ¹³	Visual impairment	Attitudinal barriers, lack of awareness, lack of trained staff, lack of readily available study resources, lack of infrastructure, lack of assistive resources
19	Hewett et al.⁴⁰	Visual impairment	Lack of assistive resources, lack of funding, lack of support services
20	Holloway⁴¹	Disabled students	Lack of funding, mental, financial and academic difficulties, lack of support services, built environment barriers
21	Langørgen & Magnus⁴²	Congenital and acquired impairments	Lack of communication skills, lack of assistive resources, difficulties with self-disclosure of their disability
22	Lourens & Swartz⁴³	Visual impairments	Mental, financial and academic difficulties
23	Malinovskiy et al.⁴⁴	Mobility impairment, visual impairment, hearing impairment and neurological impairment	Lack of communication skills, lack of awareness, lack of readily available study resources
24	McKinney & Swartz⁴⁵	Disabled students	Difficulties with self-disclosure if their disability, attitudinal barriers
25	Nolan et al.⁴⁶	Disabled students	Built environment barrier
26	Ntombela⁴⁷	Physical disability	Built environment barriers
27	Rath⁴⁸	Disabled students	Lack of awareness, built environment barriers, attitudinal barriers
28	Seale et al.¹⁹	Disabled students	Lack of assistive resources
29	Tom et al.⁴⁹	Visually impairment	Attitudinal barriers, lack of trained staff, lack of infrastructure, lack of financial support/fundingLack of support services, lack of assistive resources, lack of self-disclosure of their disability

Environment Barriers to Accessibility

Students with disabilities face barrier due to unsuitable locations⁴¹ of campus with poor lighting and pathways.^{35, 38} Due to mistakes in flooring designs, such as moisture on the floor during the monsoon and slightly different tile colours that increase the risk of accidents, students with disabilities confront seasonal barriers. They face restricted vertical movement in buildings due to lift malfunctions or lack of lifts,⁴⁸ lack of ramps and space constraints within designated areas.^{24, 47} Also, there aren’t enough areas on campus for impaired students to socialise and have fun.³⁹ Environmental obstacles such as noise, dim lighting, crowded spaces, overcrowding and a lack of visual signals make it difficult for impaired students to succeed in higher education.⁴⁶

Social and Attitudinal Barriers

Students with disabilities encounter discrimination from instructors, institutions and other students without disabilities. According to past studies, society views people with disabilities as burdensome and unfit, which causes them to become socially alienated and they face difficulties in forming and maintaining friendships.^{28, 48, 49} For instance, there should be no exploitation of the evaluation deadlines by students based on their limitations, nor should they be misled about independent mobility.¹³ Additionally, peers bully and socially reject handicapped pupils and they encounter discrimination and stereotypes because of their impairment.^{30, 35, 38} One of the main obstacles to enrolling in some courses was negative stereotyping based on the impairment classification. Put differently, students with disabilities are required to enrol in these courses even when they do not want to.⁴⁵

Lack of Communication Skills

Students with disabilities find difficulties in interpersonal relationships³⁶ with their classmates.⁴⁴ Students with disabilities struggle to articulate their requirements and make adjustment requests. Some pupils had trouble communicating how their health problems changed.⁴²

Lack of Awareness

Students and administration are not aware of the issues surrounding disabilities.⁴⁸ Students with disabilities disclosed that they are ignorant about the real obstacles to transfer, the support services provided by colleges and the infrastructure available.⁴⁴ The students with disabilities are unaware of the social activities and opportunities that are available to them³⁸ regarding the liberties students enjoyed while attending higher education.⁴² Students with disabilities don’t know about or are unfamiliar with the Equality Act.¹³

Lack of Adaptive Infrastructure

Many universities don’t even have the bare minimum of resources needed to instruct visually impaired students.⁴⁹ Additional obstacles resulted from inaccessible virtual learning environments: impaired students experienced difficulties accessing their timetable, email, exam results and module choice forms; students were prohibited from accessing course notes.¹³

Lack of Funding

Many educational institutions include disability units specifically designed to support students with disabilities. However, they receive little management support and have little autonomy.^{29, 49} The disabled student allowance removes barriers to education at educational institutions by providing technical gadgets and nonmedical support; nonetheless, there has been a delay⁴¹ in allocating technology to students with disabilities,⁴⁰ There are instances when necessary equipment is not available and supplied equipment is superfluous, damaged or undesired.³⁵

Lack of Support Services

Students with disabilities have lack of access to support services^{30, 40, 49} according to the special needs of students with disabilities.³⁷ The existing academic and nonacademic structures in higher education settings do not provide intellectual, social or emotional assistance for students with impairments.³⁶ Finding experts who can help these individuals is difficult for students at educational institutions.^{25, 34, 42} Higher education institutions refused to provide accommodations for handicapped students on the grounds that the faculty could not or would not support the changes.^{34, 37, 41} The disability support office does not initially recognise the fundamental concept of the condition before developing assistance policies for disabled children.¹³

Accessibility and Availability of the Resources

Students with disabilities often face significant challenges due to the lack of necessary resources. Libraries are often insufficiently stocked with materials to support these students, and they are frequently denied access to lecture notes. Professors often overlook the educational needs of students with disabilities when delivering lessons.^{27, 38} Not all subjects have textbooks that cater to the needs of visually impaired students, and for several months, students with visual impairments were required to convert all their textbooks into Braille.^{26, 44} Additionally, lectures are often delivered at a fast pace, with no adjustments made to visual components and course materials are not provided in accessible formats.^{9, 13} As a result, students with impairments find it difficult to learn effectively, relying solely on listening to lectures.³²

Lack of Trained Staff

Another problem is a lack of skilled personnel. Lecturers said that because they were never educated in teaching visually impaired students, they find it difficult to instruct them.⁴⁹ According to another research, there is not enough personnel to provide appropriate accommodations as required by inclusive learning rules.¹³

Lack of Assistive Resources

Students with disabilities do not have access to the ‘correct’ sort of digital capital necessary for success in higher education settings.¹⁹ The cost of assistive technology is a grievance voiced by educational institutions. Information and communication technology (ICT) resources for students with disabilities are few in educational institutions.⁴⁹ For instance, when there were no technical supports available to impaired students or when certain equipment were malfunctioning, their involvement in class activities decreased.^{13, 42} In order to access educational materials and resources, students with disabilities need assistive technology such as screen readers. However, because university websites lack accessible capabilities, these students face difficulties.⁴⁰ This makes it harder to get study materials and other resources,³³ and even check academic results.³¹

Inflexible Curricula

It also turned out that there had been minimal curriculum modification at the institution to accommodate students with disabilities, and that courses were often rigid.³³

Privacy Concern and Confidentiality of Personal Information

Concerns with the privacy and security of personal information are raised by the need for others to provide access to educational materials and services. Students who are blind or visually impaired show concern about the possibility of sharing private information with others and the potential for unintentional damage³¹

Difficulties with Self-disclosure of Their Disability

Students with disabilities face difficulties in disclosing about their disability.³⁶ It has been shown that students with disabilities neglect their disabilities as they aren’t noticed or unwanted.⁴² Disabled learners tend to hide their issues⁴⁵ so that they are not left out from their counterparts⁴⁹ and should not encounter attitudinal barriers.³⁷

Mental and Academic Difficulties

Students with disabilities face psychological⁴¹ as well as academic difficulties.³⁶ Students with disabilities find it difficult to traverse the social and physical worlds and feel ill-prepared for the rigorous academic requirements of higher education⁴³ which leads to both psychological and academic difficulties.³³ Due to their inability to pay for housing, food and other necessities but lack of funds, students with disabilities end up drowning in debt. In addition, avoiding friends without disabilities creates loneliness, despair, annoyance and anguish.³⁴

Discussion

The study incorporates bibliometric markers to offer a thorough review of research conducted over the previous 40 years on the barriers faced by students with disabilities pursuing higher education. According to previous studies, individuals with disabilities experience social isolation and struggle to make and keep friends because of the society perception that they are incompetent and an added burden. Second, ‘Riddell, S.’ is the top author in this field with the greatest number of papers published together with a high number of citations. Authors from the United States and United Kingdom have contributed the most in this field with keywords like ‘higher education’, ‘inclusion’, ‘disability’, ‘disabled students’, ‘intellectual disability’ and ‘college’. Third, prominent journals with the high number of citations are ‘Disability and Society’ and ‘Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders’. High number of published articles are affiliated with ‘Vanderbilt University’. This study also examined what barriers students with disabilities encounter in higher education. We were able to locate and carefully evaluate 29 documents that were relevant to our investigation. Following a thorough examination of each of these works, the investigators classified the pieces into several barriers using content analysis. Through a thorough analysis of twenty-nine studies, we were able to identify particular barriers that students with disabilities encounter when pursuing higher education.

This study found that numerous barriers are faced by students with disability in higher education. Students with disabilities in educational institutes encounter attitudinal barriers, built environment barriers, infrastructure barriers and a lack of readily available study resources. There is a lack of awareness regarding disability issues, assistive resources, trained staff, support services and funding for students with disabilities. These findings are consistent with the previous researches that students with disabilities struggle at school to execute and manage their daily tasks, and they experience discrimination because of their limitations.⁸ The mechanisms of exclusion by design that marginalise and exclude the poorest of the poor were highly correlated with social exclusion and exclusion by design.^{50, 51} According to research by Stalker et al.⁵¹ there could be significant barriers if the built environment and communication channels are not accessible. Students with disabilities experience challenges in daily activities like daily commuting to and from school, particularly in urban regions where traffic jams, collisions and transit issues are prevalent. Schools in poor nations lack accessibility features like ramps and special restrooms for pupils with disabilities. Plus, the ICT resources available to students with disabilities in rural schools have been minimal.⁵² The disability resource centre lacked resources and had only one manager on staff, hence the level of services provided to students with disabilities was subpar.¹¹

Students with disabilities in higher education report that there are inflexible curricula, students have communication issues, privacy issues, difficulties with self-disclosure of their disability and mental and academic difficulties. Our findings are consistent with previous studies that teachers of general education are qualified to instruct pupils in general education and their BEd curricula do not include any study of topics relating to disabilities.⁵² Differently-abled students face difficulties in areas like communication, interpersonal interactions⁵³ and difficulties in self-disclosure of their disability.⁵⁴ As a secondary reaction to the academic challenges faced by students with disabilities, anxiety arises.⁵⁵ It has been revealed that compared to their classmates, children with disabilities undergo anxiousness.⁵⁶

Conclusion

The study’s findings imply that vulnerable populations who are disproportionately disadvantaged need to get special attention. The following tangible measures could be taken into consideration to get around obstacles that students with disabilities must overcome. First, educational institutes should address physical access barriers by anticipating student requirements, paying close attention to details, facilitating access to off-campus events, as well as being flexible with meeting locations. Second, the government needs to take steps to help people with disabilities, such as providing stipends for students, monthly allowances, microcredit programmes, vocational training and government job quotas. Third, in a similar way, the government should also take more initiative in putting into effect the existing laws, regulations and procedures respecting the rights of disabled individuals to an education. Fourth, the government could not address issues faced by disabled people qualitatively if society perceptions did not alter qualitatively. In order to raise the voices of disabled kids, it is imperative to promote widespread active participation from the general public. Fifth, disabled children should receive empathy from their parents, teachers, companions and community.

Limitations

There are many limitations on the research being conducted. The electronic databases, which were restricted to SCOPUS and Web of Science, carried out a thorough search. The study did not use any other databases, including Medline, PsycINFO and ProQuest. The barriers experienced by students with disabilities were the only topic considered in this study. Subsequent research must to concentrate on addressing the unique obstacles encountered by various categories of impairment. Furthermore, additional funding is required to support basic and applied research on students with disabilities in higher education.

Footnotes

Authors’ Contribution

MG, NK and SEB designed and conceptualised the study.

NK wrote the manuscript.

MG and SEB supervised and analysed the data. All authors approved the final manuscript.

Availability of Data and Materials

Scopus

Web of Science

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Statement of Ethics

The study did not include any human subjects or human materials. Hence ethical approval of the study was thus not required based on guidance from the institutional review board.

ORCID iD

Mubashir Gull

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