Naturalistic studies of mentally retarded persons: V: The effects of staff instructions on student responding

A naturalistic study, with two purposes, was conducted to evaluate communication between staff and retarded persons in an institutional and in a community setting. The first purpose was to determine the natural rates of attention from staff in the form of instructions. Results showed that verbal instruction was the most prevalent (67%) followed by verbal instruction with physical assistance (12%), nonverbal instruction with physical assistance (10%), nonverbal instruction (6%), and physical assistance (5%). The second purpose was to determine the relative effectiveness of each of these types of instructions. Results showed that although verbal instruction was the most common, it was not the most effective, being surpassed by nonverbal instruction and nonverbal instruction with physical assistance. Results were discussed in terms of (a) their relation to prior research, (b) their use as nomothetic data to provide initial instruction modes, and (c) their use with specific persons on whom individual data have been collected.