Miriam Heyman is a research scientist at the Lurie Institute for Disability Policy, where she serves as project manager for the National Research Center for Parents with Disabilities. She is the 2025 recipient of Heller’s Early Career Research Investigator Award.
Tell me about your research.
My work focuses on parents with disabilities and their families. The number of disabled parents in the United States is large and growing; however, there has been a significant lack of research on who these parents are and their life circumstances. Due to ableism, stigma and discrimination, there’s a common assumption that people with disabilities can’t or shouldn’t be parents. As a result, these parents experience multiple disparities. For example, they are referred to the child welfare system at disproportionately high rates, and then they encounter discrimination within the system itself.
My research focuses on life experiences of disabled parents, ultimately to inform the creation of relevant supports. We’ve found that disabled parents are more likely than nondisabled parents to lack stable and affordable housing, circumstances that can perpetuate negative outcomes within the child welfare system, including loss of child custody. Additionally, parents with disabilities are more likely than nondisabled parents to experience poverty. Poverty and the lack of stable housing can impact parent and child well-being, so we’re working to identify opportunities to better support disabled parents and hopefully end this cycle of discrimination and marginalization.
How did you become involved in disability research and the more specific avenues you’ve pursued?
Working as a special-education teacher in New York City public schools after I graduated from college, I noticed all the systemic factors that impacted not only my students’ lives, but the lives of their families, like the policies that perpetuate poverty and unstable housing. As a PhD student at the Lynch School of Education and Human Development at Boston College, I focused my dissertation on how patterns of parent-child interaction can facilitate positive development for kids with developmental disabilities. Research has shown the power of parenting: Parenting that is warm, responsive, consistent and stimulating is associated with positive development of social and communication skills. When we can support parents holistically — their mental health and their overall well-being — we are better able to provide the type of optimal parenting that all kids need to thrive.
What projects are you currently focusing on?
I’m working on a project funded by the National Research Consortium on Mental Health in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities examining the positive postpartum experiences of mothers with intellectual and developmental disabilities. We’re talking to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities who have given birth within the past five years, and asking them to tell us about their positive parenting experiences, questions like: How do you celebrate birthdays with your child? What’s something funny that happened with your child? What do you like to do together on weekends? We know that parents with disabilities encounter discrimination and marginalization, and it’s important to document that, but it’s also important to tell the positive stories. The second half of that study is looking at contextual and internal assets that promote positive experiences: How do parents’ positive attributes, like perseverance or their sense of humor, contribute to their parenting? What environmental supports — like extended family, religious communities and neighbors — are helpful to them and their parenting? We want to understand the meaningful support that can facilitate positive outcomes for parents and families.
What is something you’d like policymakers to understand?
It’s vital to educate policymakers about the capabilities of parents with disabilities and also the systems in place that are working against parents with disabilities, like the bias and the stigma within the child welfare system. Supports for parents with disabilities, things like affordable, accessible housing, can not only help parents but also have a very powerful effect on the whole family.
One of our central goals at Lurie is making sure that our findings reach the people who can use them to impact change. We have a new data dashboard, an interactive resource to help visitors learn more about people with disabilities. The purpose is to provide concrete data points that advocates and policymakers can use to design policies that are supportive of parents with disabilities.