Abstract

TURINI, Flávia Almeida  and  RODRIGUES, Maria Margarida Pereira. Pro social behaviors of elementary school students with mental retardation. Arq. bras. psicol. [online]. 2008, vol.60, n.2, pp. 90-100. ISSN 1809-5267.

Pro social behaviors (PSB) are voluntary actions with the aim of benefiting another individual. This study identified the PSB in 12 children with mental retardation (MR), 6 boys and 6 girls with a mean age of 11 years and 3 months who attended from first to forth grade at two schools in Vitória-ES. The participants were observed for 5 minutes during 6 school breaks (30 minutes for each participant). The analysis categories were: activities related to the object, place or privilege: helping; empathy and cooperation. There was a correlation between producing PSB and being benefited from these behaviors. There was no significant difference between boys and girls in the total amount and categories of PSB. Most of PSB did not involve requesting and all the consequent events came from a positive source. The PSB were good indicators of students’ interactions with MR especially the ones involving peers with typical development.

Keywords : Comportamentos pró-sociais; Deficiência mental; Ensino Fundamental; Pro social behaviors; Mental retardation; Elementary education.

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