There are two very different but complimentary sources for SDM:
First, SDM comes from our common-sense understanding of how we all make decisions using support from others to do so. People with I/DD may just need more or different kinds of support to make their own decisions.
SDM is also understood as a necessary component of the human right of legal capacity—the right to make one’s own decisions and to have them legally recognized, derived from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities( CRPD).