Mothers' and graduate trainees' judgements of children: some effects of labeling

Graduate students in a clinical practicum in mental retardation and mothers randomly chosen from a university community were asked to rate retarded and nonretarded children on characteristics reflecting social competence and interpersonal attractiveness and also on a social distance scale. The children rated were viewed on videotape in free-play interactions with their mothers. Each retarded child was shown once as an unlabeled child and once as a child labeled retarded. Mothers rated the retarded children as different from the nonretarded children on six of nine measures, regardless of label. When the retarded children were labeled, they were rated by mothers as significantly higher on items related to attractiveness than when they were unlabeled. Graduate student trainees' ratings did not discriminate between retarded children as a function of labeling, with one exception: like mothers, trainees rated retarded children as more likable when labeled. However, both observer groups placed retarded children, regardless of status, significantly farther from themselves on the social distance scale than they placed nonretarded children. The results were interpreted within the theoretical frameworks of Zigler (1971) and Mercer (1973).