Data Sources Used on this Site

American Community Survey (ACS)

The American Community Survey (ACS) is a continuous data collection effort by the US Census Bureau. The data is used to produce annual estimates at the national, state, and local level on the characteristics of the United States population. The ACS is sent annually to a sample of approximately 3.5 million addresses in the United States. A parallel Puerto Rico Community Survey (PRCS) is sent to 36,000 addresses in Puerto Rico. The ACS is also sent to a sample of Group Quarters.

The survey asks about age, sex, race, family and relationships, housing, employment, income and benefits, health insurance, education, veteran status, disabilities, and more.

The six disability questions asked in the current ACS are:

Hearing Disability (asked of all ages):

Is this person deaf or does he/she have serious difficulty hearing?

Visual Disability (asked of all ages):

Is this person blind or does he/she have serious difficulty seeing even when wearing glasses?

Cognitive Disability (asked of persons ages 5 or older):

Because of a physical, mental, or emotional condition, does this person have serious difficulty concentrating, remembering, or making decisions?

Ambulatory Disability (asked of persons ages 5 or older):

Does this person have serious difficulty walking or climbing stairs?

Self-Care Disability (asked of persons ages 5 or older):

Does this person have difficulty dressing or bathing?

Independent Living Disability (asked of persons ages 15 or older):

Because of a physical, mental, or emotional condition, does this person have difficulty doing errands alone such as visiting a doctor's office or shopping?

A person is identified as having a disability if their response is “yes” to one or more of the six disability questions. People can report having multiple disability types.

Note that the Census Bureau refers to each of the individual types as "difficulty" while on DisabilityStatistics.org the term "disability" is used.

For more general information on the ACS, see the US Census Bureau website.

For more information regarding rationale and testing of the ACS disability questions, see the following Census Bureau document: 2006 American Community Survey Content Test Report P.4 - Evaluation Report Covering Disability