The Effect of a Period of Regular Exercise Activity on the Improvement of Adaptive Behavior in Educable Mentally Retarded Students

Psychological findings show that a lower IQ score than the normal level is not enough to recognize someone as mentally retarded. In addition they have visible and specific difficulties in their adaptive behaviors. Research on adaptive behaviors is useful for those with specific needs and if mentally retarded children want to adapt themselves to social life، they should improve their adaptive behaviors. The current study aimed at determining the effect of a period of regular exercise activity on the improvement of adaptive behavior in 9-15-year-old educable mentally retarded students in Lordegan city. From 156 educable mentally retarded students، 28 students were selected randomly and divided into two groups of experimental (7 boys and 7 girls) and control (7 boys and 7 girls). Vinland adaptive behavior Scale (1965) was used as the pretest. Then، the experimental group took part in a period of exercise activity as an intervention program for 2 months، 3 sessions every week، 45 minutes per session. The data were analyzed by covariance using SPSS software (P˂0. 05). The results showed a significant difference between the performance of the two groups in adaptive behavior and sub-skills of socialization، communication، locomotion، dressing self-help، general self-help and eating self-help (P<0. 05) while there was no significant difference in sub-skills of occupation and self-direction which showed that a period of regular exercise activity had an effect on the improvement of some sub-skills of adaptive behavior in experimental group. This approach can be used in rehabilitation and instruction of mentally retarded children.