Independent performance among individuals with mental retardation: promoting generalization through self-instruction

Area of Science:

• * Applied Behavior Analysis
• * Special Education
• * Developmental Disabilities

Background:

• * Community participation for individuals with mental retardation necessitates skill generalization to novel situations.
• * Existing instructional strategies often neglect explicit focus on skill generalization.
• * Self-instruction is a promising strategy for fostering independent performance in new contexts.

Purpose of the Study:

• * To evaluate studies on self-instruction for individuals with mental retardation in community settings.
• * To identify factors promoting generalization across people, situations, tasks, and time.
• * To propose a model for enhancing independent community performance.

Main Methods:

• * Review of studies investigating self-instruction use in community settings.
• * Analysis of factors contributing to skill generalization.
• * Development of a six-step model integrating self-instruction and multiple exemplar training.

Main Results:

• * Self-instruction aids individuals with mental retardation in sequencing tasks, increasing production, and problem-solving.
• * Generalization across people, situations, tasks, and time is influenced by specific factors.
• * The proposed model provides a structured approach to skill generalization.

Conclusions:

• * A model combining self-instruction with multiple exemplar training offers best practices for community independence.
• * Explicitly teaching for generalization is crucial for individuals with mental retardation.
• * This approach supports sustained independent functioning in everyday life.