When 59 institutionalized mildly retarded persons evaluated a target person labeled as institutionalized or unlabeled, the institutionalized person was rated as favorably as the noninstitutionalized person on all of the adjective traits. However, all Ss showed a preference for the noninstitutionalized person on two social-distance items.…

The effects of labeling on mentally retarded individuals were studied using 80 psychology students as Ss. Ss reviewed transcripts of two bogus interviews and evaluated the interviewees--one was presented as retarded and institutionalized, one was presented as normal. Ss tended to rate the stigmatized person more favorably, a pattern termed…

Two studies attempted to assess the effect of the mental retardation label on the formation of social impressions in mentally retarded (MR) adults. In the first study, 123 mildly retarded students, half of whom were institutionalized were interviewed and asked to respond to questions about individuals pictured (some of whom were labeled as MR).…

The effects of labels, "mentally retarded" and "institutionalized" on the evaluations and causal attributions of nonretarded persons, and on the social distance preferences of EMR persons, were assessed. In addition, each group was asked to predict the likelihood of a labeled (mentally retarded) or a nonlabeled target person achieving success at a…