A survey of 300 public residential facilities for the mentally retarded revealed a .06 percent incidence rate for idiot savants, persons of low intelligence who possess an unusually high skill in some special task. (CL)

Inappropriate or inadequately documented medication for patients in mental retardation institutions is a major medical and economic problem. Within a 127-patient ward, 41 patients were treated with anticonvulsants. Of these patients, 24 had no documented indications for usage. (Author)

To compare social versus mechanical presentation of stimulus material under prompted or trial-and-error (confirmation) conditions of learning, institutionalized educable and trainable mentally handicapped children were tested on a discrimination learning task. Results were felt to indicate that social reinforcement may not be as motivating for…

Incidental learning of film content was investigated in two studies involving 61 retarded institutionalized children. (Author/SBH)

The relationship between training history and the distinctiveness of stimulus cues in original learning and in transfer on the learning of intradimensional and extradimensional shifts by 96 adult institutionalized, retarded Ss was investigated. (Author)

Compared were psychomotor test battery scores of 272 institutionalized retarded subjects and 1500 mentally ill institutionalized patients ranging in age from approximately 10 to 60 years. (DB)

Habituation patterns of the galvanic skin response to auditory stimuli were studied in institutionalized retarded children and nonretarded subjects. (Author)