Effects of verbal and physical prompts on external strategy use in children with and without mild mental retardation.

Effects of type of prompt on the use of external strategies were examined. Participants were 7-, 9-, 11-, and 17-year-old children without mental retardation and 11- and 17-year-old children with mental retardation (N = 272). They were given a task requiring memory for object placement and assigned to one of four conditions: no prompt, verbal prompt, physical prompt, verbal and physical prompt. In the physical and verbal prompt condition, 17-year-old children with mental retardation used strategies at the same rate as 17-year-old children without mental retardation. Eleven-year-old children with mental retardation used similar types of strategies as the 7-year-old children without mental retardation. Thus, strategy use of older children with mental retardation may be activated to the same level of children without mental retardation with prompts.