Mentally retarded adolescents: evaluation of communication strategies in different settings.

The present project aims to evaluate communication strategies used by mentally retarded adolescents in different types of verbal interaction. The study was carried out on 17 subjects and notably shows that their language content is mostly informative and that the control of conversation varies according to the interlocutor's status. Moreover, the global developmental age of the subjects appears to be a significant factor in the use of communication strategies. This could have pedagogical implications.