EMBEDDING EXTRA STIMULI IN THE TASK DIRECTION - EFFECTS ON LEARNING OF STUDENTS WITH MODERATE MENTAL-RETARDATION

This investigation examined the acquisition of target and nontarget st imuli by 4 students with moderate mental retardation. Students were ta ught to name photographs of foods (target stimuli) using a progressive time delay procedure. In addition, the grocery departments where food s could be found in a local supermarket (nontarget stimuli) were prese nted as part of the discriminative stimulus. A multiple probe design a cross photographs and replicated across students was used to assess ex perimental control of both target and nontarget stimuli. The results i ndicated that (a) progressive time delay was effective in teaching 12 target photographs to 3 students and 6 photographs to 1 student, (b) p resentation of the nontarget grocery department as part of the discrim inative stimulus was effective in increasing the percentages of correc t responding to these stimuli across all students, and (c) some genera lization in the percentage of correct responding to the target and non target stimuli occurred in the natural supermarket setting.