Effects of perceptual-motor training program on social development in Children Aged 6-11 Years with Mental Retarded

mentally retarded children have variety of problems in their social life, so the purpose of this study was to assess the effectiveness of eight weeks of perceptual-motor training on social development of mentally retarded children.

this study was a semi-experimental pre-test-post-test along with control group. And participants were thirty educable mentally retarded students with average age of 10.07±1.25. social development analysed by Vineland Social Maturity before and after perceptual-motor training which its validity was equals to 0.81 and its stability was equals to 0/73. Exercise course was eight weeks, three times a week and each session was forty five minutes. So that the components of social development was desired (more than one variable), data analysed by multivariate analysis of covariance.

results showed that all subscales of social growth including Self Help General, Self Help Eating, Self Help Dress Self Direction, Occupation, Locomotion and Sociability, except in case of Communication, were significantly improved by the mean of perceptual-motor training.

it can be said that the applied perceptual-motor exercise in this study can have an optimal effect on improving mentally retarded children's social life efficiency.