| Conservation development in retarded persons has become an area of increased research interest. Previous research indicated that retarded persons perform at the same level as MA matched nonretarded persons. The relationship of language and primary mental abilities to verbal and nonverbal conservation development needed further exploration.;It was hypothesized that language would be related to verbal conservation and unrelated to nonverbal conservation. Additional hypotheses included a positive relationship between nonverbal conservation and primary mental abilities; a higher level of conservation functioning on the nonverbal procedure; and, a higher level of functioning on all measures by the nonretarded group.;Language was measured by the Dailey Language Facility Test (LFT), primary mental abilities by the Primary Mental Abilities Test (PMA), verbal conservation by the standard Piagetian procedure, and nonverbal conservation by requiring the subject to select the answer from four pictures. All instruments were administered to 40 nonretarded kindergarten - first grade students and 40 educable mentally retarded students matched on MA 5 to 7.;Analysis of the results indicates that language is a factor in conservation development. Primary mental abilities were also found to correlate significantly with all conservation measures within the total sample. These results were attributed to a general intelligence factor which influenced conservation development. The retarded students performed significantly higher on the PMA, LFT, conservation explanations, and nonverbal conservation. Failure to replicate past research of similar performance by retarded and nonretarded subjects matched on MA was attributed to the educational experiences of the retarded group. The conservation findings indicated a sequence of number, weight, and quantity. There was no relationship found between the PMA and LFT. |
