Differential analysis of selected prompts and neurological variables in motor assessment of moderately mentally retarded children.

The purpose of this study was to elevate the specificity of gross-motor assessment strategies presently used with moderately mentally retarded children by measuring voluntary motor performance as a function of level of reflex development, level of orthopedic functioning, and type of prompts used in test instructions. After clinically assessing subjects' levels of reflex and orthopedic functioning, we randomly assigned subjects to multisensory-, physical-, modeling-, and verbal-prompt treatment groups. Multisensory prompts and differential use of selected prompts were effective with younger and older children, respectively. A significant interrelationship was found between subjects' levels of reflex development and voluntary motor performance.