A produção acadêmica sobre deficiência intelectual: um balanço das teses defendidas entre 1993 e 2015

Abstract

The main objective of this research was to outline the scenario and production trends on intellectual disability (ID) by means of a trend analysis of doctoral theses defended between 1993 and 2015, as well as to identify and analyze the different conceptions about intellectual deficiency expressed by the characterizations elaborated by the authors of these theses, concerning three areas of knowledge: Education, Health and Psychology, according to the classification of the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel Foundation - CAPES, of the Ministry of Education. Therefore, the doctoral theses produced at the federal and state universities of the South and Southeast regions of Brazil were taken as data sources, which analysis was carried out in two stages: 1) trend balance of the whole universe selected through its abstracts and the following indicators: who investigates - university; area of knowledge, guidelines; what is investigated - term used to designate subjects; research topic and annual distribution; how it is investigated - type of research; instruments for data collection and annual distribution, which allowed to compare the institutional authorships, the most investigated themes and the processes by which these researches took place, according to the contributions of Williams (1969, 1979, 2007, 2009 e 2011). Amongst the findings in the trends, these ones stand out: expressive incidence of theses on ID, defended at USP and UNICAMP (2/3 of all production); 60.5% of all localized production belongs to the health area, followed by education (1/3 of total production); "diagnosis" was the most researched topic, followed by "schooling"; there is a balance between qualitative and quantitative research approaches over that period. 2) an exhaustive analysis of nine UNICAMP theses, institution where a significant number of theses was defended (35% of all production), on which the authors' conceptions and characterizations were checked in greater depth. Based on the concept of field coined by Bourdieu (1983, 1990 e 2014), the small sample selected allowed us to consider a strong dispute between Psychology and Medicine, as well as between the currents adopted, but nevertheless in both Health (expressed here by medical theses) and Education areas, there seems to be greater distinctions amongst focuses of interest rather than a theoretical dispute between them