Self-determination, social skills and quality of life

The constructs of participation, inclusion and Quality of life make reference, albeit often implicitly, to self-determination. Starting from Wehmeyer and Schwartz’s () reflections, a research was conducted to find out a) to what extent self-determination could predict the QoL experienced by individuals with ID and b) the relationship between self-determination and experienced QoL and social abilities. Method: About  adult individuals with intellectual disability, living mostly in institutions were involved in the research.To collect information about their levels of selfdetermination, social abilities and QoL these instruments were used: ‘Self-determination Scale -for ID Adults’ (Soresi et al. ), ‘Social Ability Evaluation Scale’ (Nota et al. ), and ‘Evaluation of QoL’ (Nota, Soresi & Perry under review). Results: Relationships existing between the variables considered, differences shown by individuals with different levels of disability and living in different settings, as well as the predictive ability of selfdetermination and social abilities as concerns QoL will be presented. Conclusions: Besides illustrating the analysis of our results also in the light of what already existing in the literature, some considerations will be presented on the type of habilitation and rehabilitation intervention that should be carried out in order to strengthen the self-determination.