A plea for consideration of ecological validity in the experimental psychology of mental retardation: a guest editorial.

The point was raised that, despite considerable experimental effort, laboratory research concerning learning, memory, and cognition, more generally, has not produced a very remarkable increase in our understanding of retarded behavior. Our principal contention in this paper is that the experimental psychology of mental retardation, while basically seeking causal relations between theoretical constructs and retarded behavior, is suffering from some metatheoretical and methodological shortcomings. These include, basically, a prevalent failure to consider the ecological aspects of the phenomenon of mental retardation. Implications of ecological validity are important with respect to the basis upon which subjects are selected for experimentation, the rationale underlying manipulation of independent variables, the choice of dependent variables, and the definition of the boundaries that limit generalizations. Some suggestions were offered for the purpose of guiding experimental research toward more meaningful and socially relevant goals.