Usage of the word "handicapped". Which is correct?

Question

1) Do you say mentally handicapped and physically disabled, or can you also say mentally disabled and physically handicapped. Which is common usage? Or, is both possible?

2) When you hear the word handicapped what does it imply: Physically or mentally?

Answer 1

mentally is brain and physical is rest of the body ie arms legs...

so both are correct but mean different things...

Answer 2

i work in this sector and the word handicapped is by no means used anymore, i for one hate the word, we use physical disabilities or mental disabilities

Answer 3

There are a lot of words that are not acceptable now, learning difficulties cover a lot of people with mental disabilities, wheel chair friendly covers another section, physically disabled covers another set. Hope this helps.

Answer 4

'Handicapped' is now no longer used...my wife is a team leader working with people with a 'learning disability'. When she first started they were called 'mentally handicapped' (as in MENCAP). Everything seems to have gone 'PC'.

Answer 5

It seems to change by the week what is and isn't "acceptable". As long as it isn't obviously offensive, I don't see the problem. A handicap and a disability have very similar definitions in the dictionary. Different people use different words more commonly, depending on your age, upbringing etc. My aunt aged 83 used a word that is now considered massively offensive to a disabled person, but she was talking about her own grandchild so obviously didn't mean anything by it. It was just a word that was considered the norm when she grew up, and is technically still a medical condition so correct.

Answer 6

I ran a pre-school in the UK for 12 years. It was within our regulations enforced by Ofsted and our Local Authority to use the term 'special needs' for both physical and mental disabilities. Other terms that were acceptable were 'visually impaired', 'learning difficulties', 'hard of hearing', 'challenging behaviour', 'communication difficulties' and 'attention deficit disorders'.

A year before I left this profession to have a break from the play-dough, glue, mountains of paperwork and rediculous regulations that just went too far in the end, the rules changed and 'special needs' became 'politically incorrect'. We had to use the term 'additional needs' instead.

To answer your question though, when I was a kid, whenever the term handicapped was used, it would usually refer to a mental disability. If the term disabled was used, it would refer to a physical disability.

Answer 7

Disabled is the socially acceptable word these days.  Personally, I don't understand why one combination of letters is better than the other.

Mentally disabled, physically disables, emotionally disabled.