Social Problem Solving of Children With and Without Mental Retardation

Abstract

Social skills and social status are important aspects of development that are likely to be influenced by an individual's ability to appropriately solve social problems. In this investigation, children (9–13 year olds) with and without mental retardation were asked to provide solutions to three types of social problems. Students were first asked to respond to open-ended questions and then were presented with three new problems in a forced-choice format. Children were also rated as liked or not liked by their same sex peers. Our findings indicated small but interesting differences between the children with and without retardation. In the open-ended benign situation (peer entry), students with mental retardation provided fewer assertive solutions and more appeal to authority solutions than their peers. In contrast, in the forced-choice hostile situation, children with mental retardation chose more assertive solutions and fewer appeal to authority than their peers. This same pattern of responses was reflected in a comparison of highly accepted children and less well-accepted children. The less accepted children chose more assertive solutions and fewer appeal to authority than their peers. It is possible that the different tendencies in the social problem solving of students with mental retardation could put them at risk for being less well accepted by their peers without mental retardation.