Stimulus Equivalence and Academic Self-Concept Among Mildly Mentally Handicapped and Nonhandicapped Children

Abstract

Twelve mildly mentally handicapped and twelve nonhandicapped children were exposed to two separate stimulus equivalence procedures, one employing neutral, arbitrary stimuli (abstract shapes) and the other employing loaded stimuli (words). The neutral equivalence procedure served as a control measure, and passing the neutral test was a prerequisite for a subject’s inclusion in the study. The loaded equivalence procedure incorporated words pertinent to academic self-concept (“Slow” and “Able”) as B stimuli, and personal names (subject’s own name and a fictional name) as C stimuli. Experimentally induced equivalence relations linked the subjects’ own names to the word Able. A statistically significant difference in performance between mildly mentally handicapped and nonhandicapped subjects was obtained, with mildly mentally handicapped subjects producing significantly lower levels of equivalence responding on this test (i.e., failing to match their own name to the word Able). The results suggest that preexperimentally established relations between the handicapped subjects’ own names and the descriptive term Slow may have disrupted the formation of experimentally induced equivalence relations for some of the handicapped subjects.