Paper Menu >>
Journal Menu >>
![]() Creative Education 2012. Vol.3, No.7, 1212-1220 Published Online November 2012 in SciRes (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/ce) http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ce.2012.37180 Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1212 Study on Action Skill Feature and Professional Potential of Students with Mental Retardation Qi Dong1, Junming Fang2, Yaoda n Hao3 1Shanghai Academy o f Educational Sciences, Shanghai, China 2Institute of Special Education, East China Normal University, S hanghai, China 3Zhonghua Vocational School, Shanghai, China Email: dongqi945@163.com, talis.bachmann@ut.ee Received September 5th, 2012; revised October 4 th, 2012; accepted October 18th, 2012 A total of 217 mentally retarded people in auxiliary schools and sunshine homes took the action test im- plemented by self-developed testing tools. The results of statistical treatment indicates as follows: there is no significant difference in projects featuring imitation between the moderate or severe and the mild mentally retarded people; The relationship between intelligence quotient (IQ) and open action skills is obvious closer than the relationship between intelligence quotient and closed action skills; The action skills of adult mentally retarded in sunshine homes are better than those of similar IQ level in auxiliary schools. Through exploratory factor analysis of test data, we abstractly put forward three factors: ability to respond, imitate and speed, with the expectation to improve the pertinence of action skills training for the mentally retarded people. In this paper, it is stated that the moderate or severe mentally retarded can adapt themselves to certain professional positions after guided learning and training. Keywords: Mentally Retarded; Action Skills; Professional Potential Introduction Long-term Education Development Plan (2010-2020) states that: we must strive to fully develop the potential and compen- sate for the defects of students with disabilities. It is important to train students with disabilities to live life to its full extent and give them the social awareness needed to fully integrate within society. This includes gaining self-esteem, self-confidence, in- dependence and self-reliance. To strengthen the professional skills and employability of disabled students training to develop their professional potential, we must first understand the diffi- culties presented to mentally retarded people due to their action skills. As of now, China’s existing research has focused pri- marily on studying mentally retarded students intelligence quo- tient and their ability to adapt. For example research has been done in researching the relationship and characteristics of men- tally retarded students’ IQ and adaptive behavior (Chen, Wei, & He, 2005), as well as the analysis of mentally retarded stu- dents’ IQ measurement results and educational stra tegies (Zheng, 2005). However there has been limited research into the char- acteristics of mentally retarded students’ action skills and pro- fessional potential development and also a lack of tools for which to test action skills. This study aims to explore the char- acteristics and structure of the action skills of mentally retarded people and to explore methods and tools of which to test pro- fessional potential. These results will provide a basis at auxil- iary schools for helping find the correct career path for mentally retarded students. Methods Firstly, by conducting questionnaires and surveys on the various department staff and teachers at Sunshine Homes, Sun- shine Factories (both are under the jurisdiction of Shanghai Disabled Persons’ Federation) and all Shanghai districts’ dis- abled persons services and schools, and other department staff and teachers; we determined that there were eight careers that could be used as typical careers for our tests. These were: de- livery workers, manual workers, junior chef, dim sum chef, warehouse keeper, waiter, supermarkets, tally clerks and as- sembly workers. We then used these eight occupations as the basis of our analysis of work, by first finding workers of the above occupations to give a full account of their jobs and as such finding the most important skills needed for the respective jobs. We then used these findings by representing the skills in a series of motor tasks, which could then be used for testing. With these tests we could then test our sample group of men- tally retarded people, with the test results being used for statis- tical analysis and research. Study Sample Sample information: A proportion of the sample were stu- dents of auxiliary school with an IQ of between 29 and 69 (IQ is measured using the Wechsler scale unless where other speci- fied), including severe and mild mentally retarded student s (C hen, 2004). The remainder of the sample was students from “Sun- shine Homes” with similar IQ of between 29 and 69. The sam- pling method used was random sampling. The sample consisted of 146 students in auxiliary schools and 71 students in Sunshine Homes. This consisted of 29 se- verely mentally retarded persons (IQ between 25 and 34), 80 moderately mentally retarded persons (IQ between 35 and 49) and 180 mildly mentally retarded persons (IQ between 50 and 69).This meant that the total sample size was 217 people. ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. Measurement Tools Through literature, research, consultation with those working in the aforementioned occupations, we designed a series of action skills tests and the production of the corresponding test tools and a computer program used to aid with the testing pro- cedure. Test items and the corresponding tools are: Dovetail blocks. They consist of 3D jigsaw pieces with three or four uneven surfaces. The participants were required to assemble the building blocks into a rectangular box; the level of difficult varied depending on whether four, six, nine or fifteen jigsaw pieces were given (shown in Figure 1). Carron stakes. This tool is based upon the work of psycho- logist Carron (Carron, 1967) with an adaptation in that the test items (Pi et al., 2006) were changed. The test items be- came rods made of Plexiglas and plastic. The test required three different diameter rods to be removed from a Plexi- glas board and inserted into another Plexiglas board, mak- ing sure the correct hole was filled by the correct sized rod (shown in Figure 2). Mike pipes. Test required using a doubled headed metal pi- pe, connecting pieces of various angles and other small lin- king pieces to make quadrilaterals, octagons and other geo- metric shapes (shown in Figure 3). Screen figures. Transparent Plexiglas and aluminum were combined to make a wall, which required participants to use Bakelite piece bolts, washers and nuts to fix them onto the “screen” to make a variety of geometrical figures (shown in Figure 4). Colourful silk flowers. The participants were asked to first make fold the silk into flower petal shapes, then use a rub- ber bank to make it into a silk flower (shown in Figure 5). Folding ribbons into flowers. The requirements were for participants to bend the nylon bands into flower petal shapes then use a stapler to steady the flower shape (shown in Figure 6). Figure 1. Dovetail blocks. Figure 2. Carron stakes. Figure 3. Mike pipes. Figure 4. Screen figures. Figure 5. Colourful silk flowers. Figure 6. Folding ribbons into flowers. Morgan Lantern. The device was based on the light experi- ments work of psychologists Shea and Morgan (Shea & Morgan, 1979), by using a programmable controller (the core is a microcomputer)to input information into the ex- ternal control button to control the intensity of the lantern. Participants were asked to press a response button respond- ing to the correct light. The requirement was to press the correct button; otherwise the lantern would not light or would let out the wrong light intensity (shown in Figure 7). Colourful knots. The test required the participant to use red, green and blue ropes and knot them into a shape similar to a hair plait (shown in Figure 8). Linking circuits. The project required the following materi- als: Plexiglas panels, the wiring piles, harpoon lines, button switch, output object (light/music box/fan, etc.). The test re- quired the participant to put the items into a circuit where if the circuit was connected correctly when the button switch was pressed, the load (light/music box/fan) and its corre- sponding reaction (light/sound/rotation) would occur (shown in Figure 9). In order to achieve standardization and automation of the test control design, the testing console micro-computer (program- mable controller) was used as the core to control the testing process, such as start and end of the test, automatic scoring, data transmission and records, test questions, allowing better control and coordination (shown in Figure 10). There are more depth details about the measurement tools in the book of Men- tally Retarded Students Professional Potential Testing (wrote by Qi Dong), China Labor and Social Security Publishing House, published in March 2012. Research Steps The main steps are as follows: Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1213 ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. Figure 7. Morgan Lantern. Figure 8. Colourful Knots. Figure 9. Linking Circuits. Figure 10. The testing process controller. First step: Field test. This was tested in a one-on-one envi- ronment with one participant and one trial staff member. At the beginning of each test, a video was played to demonstrate the testing process; participants were reminded to watch the video. They were required after the end of the video guide to complete the operation task and click on the computer program to begin the test. The main trial began as soon as the “Start” button was clicked on and once the participant completed the test, the main trial was required to press the end button to stop the timer. The main trial was then required to evaluate their performance. Second step: Data processing. SPSS statistical software was used for the statistical analysis of test data, it allowed for analy- sis of results for severely/moderately mentally disabled students and mildly mentally retarded students. This led to the analysis of action skills test results of an independent two-sample T-test; leading to projections of action skills test results and IQ corre- lation analysis; projection of action skills test results for various factor analysis; reliability and validity analysis of the test results. The third step is analysis. By using theories taken from psy- chology and special education, an in-depth study is done on the results, leading to the interpretation and summary of the results, allowing a conclusion to be formed. The fourth step is to write a research report. Results and Analysis Varying Degrees of Mentall y Retarded Students and the Difference in Their Action Skills To explore in-depth the difference in the action skills of varying degrees of mentally retarded students, the statistical software SPSS was used to conduct a two-sample T-test sepa- rating moderate to severe (IQ: 25 to 49) and mildly mentally disabled (IQ > 50). The action skills test scores for the inde- pendent two-sample t-test results show that the total score, “dovetail blocks”, “Carron stakes”, “Mike pipes”, “Screen fig- ures”, “Linking circuits” and “Morgan lantern”, the signifi- cance level (sig. 2-tailed, two-sided test) is far less than .01 and closer to .000, therefore leads to the rejection of the null hy- pothesis H0. This proves there is a significant difference in the action skills needed for these tasks in moderate to severe and mildly mentally retarded participants. However for the three projects: “Folding ribbons into flowers”, “Colorful knots” and “Colorful silk flowers” the test results (as shown in Table 1) shows that each tests’ significance level (sig.2-tailed, two-sided test) are respectively: .085, .693 and .604. These are all greater than .05 which means that the null hypothesis can be accepted and it can be stated that between moderate to severe mentally disabled persons and mild mentally disabled persons, there was no significant difference in score, or action ability on these three tests. Similarly an independent two-sample T-test was used to compare and analyze severely mentally retarded persons and mild to moderate mentally retarded persons action skills scores. The results show that for the total score, dovetail building blocks, Carron stakes, Mike pipes, Screen figures, Connecting circuits and Morgan lantern scores the significance level (for the sig.2-tailed) are .000, .000, .000, .00, .000, .000, which is far less than .01. This leads to the rejection of the null hypothe- sis H0. This indicates that severe and mild to moderate mentally retarded persons in the above projects have a very significant difference in their action skills. However in “Folding ribbons into flowers”, “Colorful knots” and “Colorful silk flowers”, the results give significance levels (sig.2-tailed, two-sided test) of .219, .257 and .209. These are all greater than .05 which means the null hypothesis H0 should be accepted. It can be considered that severe and mild to moderate mentally retarded showed no significant difference in the action skills scores in these three projects. According to psychologists’ classification, the execution of the tests and the skills needed can be predicted and divided into two types, open and closed (Pi et al., 2006). Open action skills are those where the environment is con- stantly changing and unpredictable, it is one where the operator cannot effectively plan for the entire task in advance. Success in open action skill tests depends on individual ability to adapt to a changing environment. Closed action skills are when the test environment is stable or predictable. Research and analysis on the operation of the above measurements and tools and test factors shows that it is not difficult to find that for dovetail building blocks, Mike pipes, Screen figures, Connecting cir- cuits and Morgan lantern are open action skills; whilst Carron stakes, “Folding ribbons into flowers”, “colorful knots” and “colorful silk flower” are examples where the test environment is fixed and are therefore closed action skills. From the above T-test results, it can be seem that mental disability affects the Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1214 ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1215 Table 1. Independent Samples Test (sample: 217). Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means 95% Confidence Interval of the Difference Parameter Project F Sig. t df Sig. (2-tailed)Mean Difference Std. Error Difference Lower Upper Equal variances assumed 19.075 .000 5.507215.000 14.487 2.631 9.302 19.672 Dovetail blocks Equal variances not assumed 5.400174.795.000 14.487 2.683 9.192 19.782 Equal variances assumed .090 .765 4.308215.000 12.086 2.806 6.556 17.617 Carron stakes Equal variances not assumed 4.314213.940.000 12.086 2.801 6.564 17.608 Equal variances assumed 9.389 .002 5.408215.000 12.698 2.348 8.070 17.325 Mike pipes Equal variances not assumed 5.348195.064.000 12.698 2.374 8.015 17.380 Equal variances assumed 15.816 .000 5.239215.000 12.982 2.478 8.098 17.866 Screen figures Equal variances not assumed 5.161186.496.000 12.982 2.515 8.020 17.944 Equal variances assumed 11.084 .001 4.750215.000 13.404 2.822 7.842 18.966 Linking Circuits Equal variances not assumed 4.694193.545.000 13.404 2.856 7.772 19.036 Equal variances assumed 3.731 .055 1.728215.085 4.473 2.588 -.629 9.575 Folding ribbons into flowers Equal varianc es not assumed 1.716202.905.088 4.473 2.607 -.668 9.614 Equal variances assumed .050 .822 .396215.693 1.155 2.918 -4.596 6.906 Colourful Knots Equal variances not assumed .395209.135.694 1.155 2.927 -4.616 6.926 Equal variances assumed .475 .491 .519215.604 1.248 2.404 -3.490 5.986 Colourful Silk flowers Equal variances not assumed .516205.830.606 1.248 2.417 -3.518 6.013 Equal variances assumed 10.613 .001 8.276215.000 21.619 2.612 16.470 26.768 Morgan Lantern Equal variances not assumed 8.164189.704.000 21.619 2.648 16.395 26.843 Equal variances assumed 3.340 .069 6.569216.000 93.673 14.261 65.564 121.782 score Equal variances not assumed 6.496194.820.000 93.673 14.419 65.234 122.112 ability to complete open action skills, whilst closed action skill tests are much less affected. Correlation between Mentally Retarded Students ’ Action Skills and IQ The relationship between IQ and the ability to learn action skills has been discussed and debated by many researchers, with no conclusion being reached. For example, the work of M. L. Mattson et al. does not recognize that there is a relationship between IQ and ability to learn action skills whilst W. R. Hus- bend et al. suggest that there exists some sort of relationship. Japanese psychologists Matsubara attempts to summarize the various views into two main conclusions. When the learner has normal levels of intelligence, the ability to learn small muscle action skills and intelligence shows a small positive correlation. The higher the level of intelligence and higher the academic performance; gross action skills learning and intelligence be- come practically unrelated. After going through psychological- training of action skills, there is still little relationship between ability to learn and intelligence. When the learner has below normal intelligence, the small muscle and gross action skills learning and intelligence have a clear positive correlation. It also showed that the lower the intelligence, the slower the lear- ning progress (Shao & Pi, 1990). To gain a deeper understanding of this problem, we use the results from the 217 participants in the nine action skills tests for correlation analysis. The correlation between IQ and the total score and the seven action skills tests: dovetail building blocks, Carron stakes, Mike pipes, Screen figures, Connecting circuits and Morgan lantern had a very strong correlation, re- spectively: .471, .448, .332, .342, .401, .342 and .521. Of these tests Morgan lantern and IQ had the strongest correlation. This is similar to what was observed at the test site, as severely men- tally disabled students showed a huge difference in their ability to complete the “Morgan lantern” test compared to mildly ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. mentally retarded students. However for “Folding ribbons into flowers”, “Colorful knots” and “Colorful Silk Flowers” the correlation coefficient of these three projects and IQ was .142, .044 and .074 respectively. The correlation is very small, espe- cially for “Colorful knots” and “Colorful silk flowers” and IQ where there is almost no correlation, as shown in Table 2 be- low. Inspection of these test environments shows easily that there is no real relationship between these projects and IQ divi- sion or muscle size. Therefore for those with below average IQ, it is perhaps bet- ter to judge by personal traits to decide what action skills a person has, rather than which part of the muscle type an action skill belonged to, as it has a more causal relationship to IQ. In other words, the conditions behind mentally disabled people successfully learning action skills are based upon whether an action skill is open or closed, as well as its complexity and its ability to be replicated. It matters little therefore which part of the muscles is involved in the operation. Unlike Matsubara “big muscles, small muscles” theory, we believe that for students with intellectual disabilities, to mimic a simple closed action skill has almost no relationship to intelli- gence; whilst complex action skills requiring judgment and are grouped under open action skills have a clear positive link to intelligence, where the lower the IQ the slower the progress of learning such action skills. Action Skills Comparison between Mentally Retarded Students and the Sunshine Home Students In order to investigate the effect vocational skills training had on improving the level of action skills, the two groups (men- tally retarded students and Sunshine home students) went through an independent two-sample T-test. The results showed that the average value for the students was 668.51 and 661.03 respectively. The T test result was .366, significance level sig was .715. This means that the null hypothesis (H0) should be accepted and that there is no difference in the mentally retarded students and the sunshine home students in their action skills. However for IQ, the mentally retarded students had an average IQ of 45.00 whilst Sunshine Home students had an IQ of 41.96. The t-test result was 2.722 and significance level sig was .007. This means that the null hypothesis should be rejected and that there is a significant difference between mentally retarded stu- dents and Sunshine Home students IQ. To conclude, both groups have similar action skills but mentally retarded students have higher average IQ than Sunshine Home students (shown in Table 3). Factor Analysis of the Action Skills Test Data To further explore the relationship between the motor tests and action skills, and to summarize and interpret the test results with fewer variables, exploratory factor analysis (EFA for short) is used. Test results for the nine action skills tests and a total of 217 samples are used for factor analysis. The statistical method used is principal component analysis, factor extraction eigen- values (1 as the limit), the rotation method of the biggest vari- ance, correlation matrix to select the KMO and sphere of Bart- lett’s test value of .798 to meet the conditions of a factor analy- sis (Huang & Guan, 2010). The program analyses and gives re- sults for three components, the cumulative variance of 68.493%, as shown in Table 4; have to factor loadings after factor analy- sis rotation matrix as shown in Table 5. It can be seen from Table 5 that dovetail building blocks, Mike pipes, Screen figures, Connecting circuits and Morgan lantern make up a large composition of component 1. However for component 2 what makes up a larger composition are “Fold- ing ribbons into flowers”, “Colorful knots” and “Colorful Silk Flowers”. For component 3, the load factor is the action skills test Carron stakes. Table 2. Correlations (sample: 217) Project parameter Dovetail blocks Carron stakes Mi ke pipesScreen figures Linking Circuits Folding ribbons into flowers Colorful Knots Colorful Silk flowers Morgan Lantern score IQ Pearson Correlation Sig. (2-tailed) N .448** .000 217 .332** .000 217 .342** .000 217 .401** .000 217 .342** .000 217 .142 .000 217 .044 .000 217 .074 .000 217 .521** .000 217 .471** .000 217 **Correlation is significant at the .01 level (2-tailed). *Correlation is significant at the .05 level (2-tailed). Table 3. Independent Samples Test(sample: 217). Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means 95% Confidence I nterval of the Difference parameter Project F Sig. t df Sig. (2-tailed)Mean DifferenceStd. Error Difference Lower Upper Equal variances assumed 1.785 .184 .366 130 .715 7.478 20.409 –32.899 47.855 Score Equal variances not assumed .367 127.839.714 7.478 20.373 –32.834 47.790 Equal variances assumed .059 .809 2.722 130 .007 3.042 1.118 .831 5.254 IQ Equal variances not assumed 2.733 128.785.007 3.042 1.113 .840 5.244 Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1216 ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. Table 4. Total Variance Explained. Initial Eigenvalues Extraction Sum s of Squa re d Loa din gs Rotation Sum s of Squared Loadings Component Total % of Variance Cumulative %Total % of VarianceCumulative %Total % of Variance Cumulative % 1 3.695 41.053 41.053 3.695 41.053 41.053 2.592 28.800 28.800 2 1.461 16.238 57.292 1.461 16.238 57.292 2.291 25.451 54.251 3 1.008 11.201 68.493 1.008 11.201 68.493 1.282 14.242 68.493 4 .629 6.985 75.477 5 .602 6.692 82.170 6 .501 5.572 87.741 7 .486 5.396 93.138 8 .325 3.610 96.747 9 .293 3.253 100.000 E xtraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. Table 5. Rotated Component Matrix(a). Component 1 2 3 Dovetail blocks .644 –.007 .485 Carron stakes .126 .208 .866 Mike pipes .676 .424 –.087 Screen figures .766 .321 –.036 Linking circuits .757 .160 .108 Folding ri bbons into flowers .168 .761 .335 Colorful knots .185 .800 –.158 Colorful silk flower s .078 .847 .264 Morgan lantern .690 –.061 .263 Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. Rotation Method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. A Rotation converged in 5 iterations. After inspection of the above mentioned action skills tests, it becomes evident that the main factor on the load factor charac- teristics of the larger projects are “open” action skills where its operating environment is ever changing and unpredictable. An example being the dovetail building blocks test where every time the building blocks are dismantled and the initial position of each building block is different. Due to the different combi- nations, a strong ability to adapt, sound judgment and flexibility are needed for the test. Another example would be the Mor- ganlantern test, where the combination of light and dark is com- pletely random; it is impossible to predict what the next com- bination will be and therefore rely on the ability to constantly adapt to changes in the boundary conditions to succeed. Mike pipes, Screen figures and connecting circuits all also reflect these key characteristics. We therefore group these tests as tests of resilience as in these tests it is the constant need to adapt that made them difficult. We name this factor the resilience factor or the “ability to respond” factor. Factor one and two are very different and those tests that factor most for component two are based on closed action skills, tests where the operating environment remain unchanged. For example, tests such as “Folding ribbons into flowers”, “Color- ful knots” and “Colorful silk flowers” are testing the ability to follow the video instructions step by step in folding and creat- ing the correct shape. There are no changes in the boundary conditions and the entire test is the based upon the ability to mimic without the need of the number of response capabilities. This means a lesser need and dependence on intelligence; we therefore group these tests as testing the ability to imitate. Ac- cordingly, we name the factor the imitation factor or the “abil- ity to mimic” factor. There is also a third factor that was completely different from the two mentioned above. A test which shows a larger coeffi- cient for this factor is the Carron stakes test, which tests the participants’ ability to quickly move the stakes. This tests the participants speed and flexibility in a timed test. Therefore, this third group test participants’ speed and we name this the speed factor. Potential professional positions for the mentally retarded such as: cooks, bakers, manual laborers, tally clerks, porters and other such work, after analysis shows that these profes- sional positions and competence to complete the job require action skills. After discussions with people with the above pro- fessions we can basically group the jobs into needing three factors: the ability to respond, the ability to imitate and speed. These three are the basic elements for professional competence. However, for different occupations the proportion of each fac- tor and their importance is different. For example, chefs and bakers need a strong ability to imitate and a lot of speed but with less use for ability to respond to situations. Tally clerks and porters need a lot of speed and resilience whilst ability to imitate is less demanding. Manual laborers need strong resil- ience, the ability to mimic and moderate speed. Waiters need a strong ability to respond to quickening pace and speed but do not need a high requirement in their ability to imitate. This way, students with different aptitudes and strengths will have advan- Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1217 ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. tages for certain occupations due to their professional potential. On the other hand, as long as a mentally retarded person has a certain amount of all three abilities, even if they are severely mentally disabled, with repeated training it is still possible for them to take on repetitive work. Action skills tests and factor analysis provide direction to their potential career paths and training. Correlation between the Three Ability Factors and IQ Doing the factor analysis by the SPSS program, if you select the option of coefficients in correlation Matrix, you will obtain coefficient matrix as Table 6 shows. According to factor analy- sis, the coefficient matrix from which it can be obtained the capability score using the three factors: ability to respond, imi- tate and speed. F11 = .231 × S11 – .134 × S12 + .279 × S13 + .332 × S14 + .329 × S15 – .110 × S16 – .016 × S17 – .156 × S18 + .3 04 × S19 Where: S11, S12······ S 19 are respectively the first partici- pant’s scores in the action skills tests: dovetail building blocks, Carron stakes and all the tests ending with the Morgan lantern test. F11 is the final test score for the first participant. Fi1 = .231 × Si1 – .134 × Si2 + .279 × Si3 + .332 × Si4 + .329 × Si5 – .110 × Si6 – .016 × Si7 – .156 × Si8 + .304 × Si9 Where for Si1, Si2······ Si9 the i is the number of the partici- pant (1 being the first participant) to attempt the tests: dovetail building blocks, Carron stakes ······ Morgan lantern. Fi1 being similar in that i is the number of the participant and being the overall test score. In a similar way test scores are worked out for Fi2, Fi3 (factors two and three). By using the above formulas, it is possible to work out scores for ability to respond (Fi1), ability to imitate (Fi2) and speed (Fi3) and therefore undertake analysis between the correlation be- tween these scores and IQ. The correlation analysis results show that between ability to respond and IQ there was a strong correlation of .522 whilst ability to imitate and IQ showed a correlation score of –0.062, the speed factor and IQ was be- tween these two factors showing a correlation score of .307. The above studies have shown that the ability to imitate is far Table 6. Component Score Coefficient Matrix. Component 1 2 3 Dovetail blocks .231 –.170 .326 Carron stakes –.134 –.009 .747 Mike pipes .279 .120 –.253 Screen figures .332 .043 –.211 Linking circuits .329 –.057 –.060 Folding ri bbons into flowers –.110 .339 .189 Colorful Kn o ts –.016 .413 –.270 Colorful Silk flowe rs –.156 .409 .131 Morgan Lantern .304 –.182 .120 Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis. Rotation Method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. less dependent on IQ compared to the ability to respond whilst action skills that rely on speed shows a correlation in-between the scores for respond and imitate (shown in Table 7). Reliability and Validity Reliability of the test. The statistical analysis of the results shows a retest reliability of .7445; and internal consistency reliability (Cronbach’s alpha) of .915. Validity of the test. After testing students that have already gained vocational qualifications or professional skills test results, the results are then analyzed along with motor test results. As for the method and tool used to analyze these results, the method used is SPSS statistical software. Pro- fessional performance and validity test to test tools and methods, corresponding results obtained using the test re- sults available for chefs and bakers show criterion-related validity of .275; whilst criterion-related validity of test re- sults for those with a tendency towards the occupation tall clerk is .705. Evidence supporting the effectiveness of this case. After go- ing through the motor tests, students are placed into various vocational learning classes. Those that graduated and found work gained good feedback from their employers. This also supports the use and effectiveness of such testing. This is shown in Table 8. Main Conclusion There are still some issues with the testing procedure and the results. These problems are: the specialized nature of the test subject, the degree of standardization in the test being not high enough and a relatively small sample size. However, a prelimi- nary conclusion can still be made, and below are the main aspects. Severely Mentally Retarded People are Shown to Have Better Action Skills than IQ Out of the 217 participants 29 are severely mentally disabled. The subjects’ action skills and IQ statistics show an average IQ of 34.83 (T-scores), whilst their action skills show an average of 40.90 (T-scores). Clearly, the severely mentally retarded students have higher action skills than intelligence. Professor Chen Yunying in her article “Mentally retarded students’ intel- lectual and adaptive behavior characteristics and relationship analysis” (Chen et al., 2005) states that “for severely mentally retarded students there exist difference between operational and verbal IQ. Overall mentally retarded students have significantly higher operational IQ than verbal.” Chen has also conducted research on vocational action skills in mildly, moderate and severely handicapped people. She concluded that there was no significant difference between their action skills and degree of mental disability (F = .641, p > .05). “Mentally retarded stu- Table 7. Correlations (sample: 217). The resilience The abi lity to imitateThe speed IQ Pearson Correlation Sig. (2-tailed) N .522** .000 217 -.062 .363 217 .307** .000 217 **Correlation is significant at the .01 level (2-tailed). Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1218 ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1219 Table 8. The effectiveness case. Name Result Employer Position Evaluation Student Zhu Tendency to become waiter A Hotel Cleaner Did a great job, helpful, got on well with colleagues. Student Yang Tendency to become Chef Restaurant Catering Kitchen WorkerVery active and meticulous. Not afraid of working hard or being tired. Respects other workers, wants to learn. Student Tang Tendency to become waiter. Hotel Chain Waiter Pa ssion for work, good service, good communica tion with patrons Student Ni Tendency to become Chef Hong Zhang Xing M ain restaurant for this group.Kitche n workerGood communic ation skills, w or ks hard and perseveres. Wants to learn Student Wu T endency to be come waiter A hotel Cleaner Qualified for j ob, worked carefully and meticulously. Did not blame things on others faults. Student Zhang Tendency to become waiter A hotel at an airport Worker’s canteen waiter Took on heavy responsibilitie s at work, good interpersonal communication. tudent He Tendenc y to become cook Food and Beverage OutletKitchen WorkerDid get good reviews but n ow u ndertaking military se rv ice dents’ Chinese Wechsler Intelligence Scale results: analysis and education countermeasures “written by a teacher at Shenzhen Yuan Ping Special School Zheng Hong, goes into details about severely mentally retarded students and the difference between their verbal and operational IQ. Hong also states that there is difference between Verbal and operational IQ and that the dif- ference is statistically significant (t = 8.939, p = .000) (Zheng, 2005). However, Hong’s conclusion is completely different to Chen’s conclusion in that she believes that severely mentally disabled students had much better verbal IQ and her data showed this by being also statistically significant (Zheng, 2005). The results of this study are generally consistent with the con- clusions of the study by Professor Chen Yunying. Moderately to Severely Mentally Retarded Students Have Untapped Professional Potential Independent two-sample t-test show that between moderately to severely mentally retarded students and mildly mentally retarded students that for action skills tests that are simple closed tasks that relied on imitation, there is no real difference in their scores. This is shown by a correlation of – .062, which is no real correlation. However, the correlation analysis also showed that for scores of tests that relied on speed and ability to respond and IQ showed strong correlation of .522 and .307. These statistical results show that imitation is much less de- pendent on IQ compared to ability to respond which requires a degree of intelligence. This means that severely mentally re- tarded persons should engage in work that does not require speed but should be engaged in simple tasks that require repeti- tion and imitation. This way, their professional potential is expected to be developed. Life Experience and Training Can Also Help Improve Action Skills Conducting a two-sample T-test using mentally retarded stu- dents and the Sunshine Home students show that although Sunshine Home students had on average a lower IQ, there is no significant difference in their action skills. This shows that with the accumulation of life experience and also training (done at Sunshine Homes), mentally disabled persons action skills can improve. Individual cases from the testing process also show that the accumulation of housework and other life experiences enhances their action skills above their IQ for mentally disabled people. Participants such as Ms Sun who is ranked bottom for IQ out of the 26 students with an IQ of 35 but had an action skills test score that is tied for sixth (3 people tied). Another example is 39 year old Ms Feng who with an IQ of 40 is ranked in that same group as third lowest but who on the action skills tests have the second highest score. According to staff, these two students come from particularly difficult families which mean that heavy domestic work and the training at Sunshine Homes allow them to have action skills beyond their IQ levels. These cases prove that with a suitable amount of training and time, it is possible for mentally disabled people to improve their life skills (Chen, 2004). Summary and Recommendations Studies show that moderate to severely mentally disabled students show no statistically significant differences compared to mildly mentally disabled students in their ability to imitate simple close d action skills. At the sa me time, mentally retarded persons show different vocational potential advantages. From the test results, some mentally retarded students are suitable to become cooks and bakers and other such job while others are more suitable to become tally clerks or waiters. Also, following the accumulation of life experience and tasks such as house- work which can target certain skills and train them, mentally retarded adults can still improve their action skills beyond their intelligence levels. During the test, we also learned that men- tally retarded persons have a strong desire for employment, the desire to integrate into society and the want to be like everyone else in happily leading an independent life living by their own hard work. It is suggested that special vocational schools could test their students’ action skills, and according to their charac- teristics and professional orientation to engage in targeted vo- cational training. This will not only increase the quality and effectiveness of the teaching for the students but also help them improve their employability leading to their integration within society. ![]() Q. DONG ET AL. REFERENCES Chen, Y. Y. (2004) The foundation of special education in China (p. 198). Beijing: Educational Science Press. Chen, Y. Y. et al. (2005). Mentally retarded students’ intellectual and adaptive behavior characteristics and relationship analysis. Chinese Special Education, 12, 27. Chen, Y. Y. (2004). The foundation of special education in China (p. 199). Beijing: Educational Science Press. Dong Qi’s (2012) Mentally retarded students professional potential testing. Beijing: China Labor and Social Security Publishing House. Huang, R. L., & Guan Y. H. (2010). Statistical analysis of data-SPSS principles and applica t i on (p. 281). Beijing: Higher Education Press. Pi, L. S. et al. (2006). Psychology of learning and education (4th ed., p. 135). Shanghai: Ea s t China Normal University Press. Pi, L. S. et al. (2006). Psychology of learning and education (4th ed., p. 128). Shanghai: Ea s t China Normal University Press. Shao, R. Z., & Pi, L. S. (1990). Psychology of learni ng and teaching (p. 143). Shanghai: Ea s t China Normal University Press. Zheng, H. (2005). Students with intellectual disabilities, Wechsler in- telligence scale results, analysis and educational countermeasures. Journal of Chinese Specia l Education, 2, 42. Zheng, H. (2005) Mentally retarded students, Wechsler intelligence scale for results analysis and educational countermeasures. Journal of Chinese Special Ed u c a t i on , 2, 43. Copyright © 2012 SciRe s . 1220 |