Professional activity represents an injunction to participate in the collective and sustains our identity. Being deprived of it can lead to social exclusion. At the same time, the injunction to autonomy is prevalent in our society. The disabled person can suffer from social stigmatization and find himself in tension between disability/autonomy/work. Work is then essential to identify oneself as a worker and not as a dependent person.

The participatory research presented has a dual objective: to give a voice to a stigmatized population - disabled workers - and their families; to understand and analyze with them the strategies used to work or remain in employment and the impact of these strategies on health at work and the relationship to risks.

Exchanges between the peer Group and the scientific team enabled us to refine the initial questions, to reformulate analyses, to modify communication supports, to make them more acceptable and accessible. This participatory approach has modified our research practices by guaranteeing that the people concerned by the research become actors in it.

For populations suffering from symbolic domination, participatory research makes it possible to restore the confidence of individuals and the legitimacy of experiential knowledge.