Implementing Changes in the Traditional Institutional Environment of the Mentally Retarded

Abstract

Historically, institutions for the mentally retarded have been viewed as providing custodial care exclusively. Through recently implemented research, changes have occurred in personnel who are responsible for the development and care of the retarded in institutions. The most noteworthy changes are in attitudes toward maximizing the potential of the retarded child. An intensive inservice training project was carried out through the direction of the author. The objectives of the program included gaining further knowledge of normal growth and development and the opportunity to apply these principles to meet the unique learning needs of the mentally retarded children as assessed by institutional personnel. Through the application of modern learning theory, techniques were implemented whereby residents acquired new skills varying from development of self-help skills, acquiring new communication skills, and developing a more extensive repertoire of social behaviors. The most profitable learning experiences to enhance developmental functioning of the children were judged to be those resulting from the implementation of play sessions. By modifying the staffing pattern of personnel, these sessions became an integral part of the project. With the addition of more personnel and the inclusion of three males on the staff, it became possible to provide not only relationship with males on a one-to-one basis, but models for the father role who could elicit more imitative responses from the children. A unique aspect of this approach was that staff members became more cognizant of the significance of play as a means by which the children acquired socializing skills. By promoting a specialized structured environment which provided a means by which the children’s individual learning needs were met, it was felt that the main objectives of the project were accomplished. A remarkable change in attitudes of personnel toward the institutionalized retardates was produced as a result of successful application of programing methodology, developed from the basic principles of operant learning theory whereby behavior is either weakened or strengthened by the appropriate administration of a positive or negative reinforcer.