Parents teaching their young mentally handicapped children.

This paper reports a fine-grained analysis of interaction between 21 mothers and fathers and their young mentally handicapped children. Parent-child dyads were videotaped at home on two occasions with a 'roundabout' toy. The sessions were analysed by means of a detailed coding system which reflected the reciprocal nature of interaction and which attended to sequences of behaviour. Results are reported on short-term stability of various features of communication and comparisons of dyads involving mothers and fathers. Implications of the results are outlined for interventions designed to help parents to teach their young mentally handicapped children.