Effects of maternal mental retardation and poverty on intellectual, academic, and behavioral status of school-age children

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Effects of maternal mental retardation and poverty on intellectual, academic,
and behavioral status of school-age children
Article in American journal of mental retardation: AJMR · February 1997
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Maternal Mental Retardation and Poverty:
Intellectual, Academic, and Behavioral Status of School-Age Children
Maurice A. Feldman
Queen's University and Ogwanada Hospital
Kingston, Ontario, Canada
and
Nicole Walton-Allen
Chedoke-McMaster Hospitals
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Address: Maurice Feldman, Ph.D., Dept. of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario
Canada K7L 3N6.
Key Terms: CHILD DEVELOPMENT, MATERNAL MENTAL RETARDATION, POVERTY
Running Head: MATERNAL MENTAL RETARDATION

Maternal Mental Retardation 2
ABSTRACT
This study examined the impact of low maternal IQ on children living in poverty by comparing
WISC-R, WRAT-R, and Ontario Child Behavior Checklist scores of 27 school-age children of
mothers with mild mental retardation to 25 similarly impoverished children whose mothers did
not have mental retardation. The children of mothers with mental retardation had lower IQ and
academic achievement, and more behavior problems than the low income children of parents
without mental retardation. Not one child with a mother with mental retardation was free of
problems and boys were affected more severely than girls. The quality of the home environment
and maternal social supports were also lower in the group with maternal mental retardation; both
of these measures were negatively correlated with child behavior disorders in this group. This
study shows that being raised by mothers with mental retardation can have detrimental effects on
child development and behavior that cannot be attributed to poverty alone.

The relationship between maternal and child IQ is well-established (Reed & Reed, 1965)
and low parental IQ is related to child intellectual and language delays (Feldman, Case, Towns,
& Betel, 1985; Feldman, Sparks, & Case, 1993; Gillberg & Geijer-Karlsson, 1983; Ramey &
Ramey, 1992). Poverty is also implicated as a risk factor in child development and academic
achievement (Campbell & Ramey, 1994; Parker, Greer, & Zuckerman, 1988; Zigler, 1967). Most
parents with mild mental retardation also have low income (Fotheringham, 1971; Garber, 1988).
Given the paucity of studies that directly compare development of children raised by low income
parents with versus without mental retardation, it is not clear to what extent child problems are a
function of variables related to low maternal IQ or poverty.
In addition to the possible genetic transmission of low intelligence, parents with low IQ
often exhibit deficits in basic child-care, nourishment, and positive interactions which may
jeopardize their children's well being and development (Feldman, Case, & Sparks, 1992;
Feldman et al., 1993; Keltner, 1992). Child maltreatment studies have found a disproportionate
number of parents with mental retardation to be incompetent or abusive (Schilling, Schinke,
Blythe, & Barth, 1982; Seagull & Scheurer, 1986; Taylor et al., 1991). This over-representation
in child custody cases may to some extent reflect society's bias against these parents, but their
interactions with their children nonetheless resemble that of known neglectful parents who did
not have mental retardation (Crittenden & Bonvillian, 1984).

There is likely to be an increasing number of parents with low IQ. Courts are banning
involuntary sterilization of persons with disabilities and are upholding parenting as a basic right
of all adult citizens (Hayman, 1990; Vogel, 1987). With virtually all persons with mild mental
retardation now raised and socialized in the community, more of them may exercise their
parenting rights.
Despite concerns about the parenting abilities of persons with mental retardation and the
demands that these families are placing on the social service system (Tymchuk & Feldman,
1991), relatively little is known about the development of their children. To complicate matters,
studies of these parents have used varying definitions of mental retardation; some researchers
(e.g., Reed & Reed, 1965) included only those with IQs less than 70, some used a cut-off of 75
(Garber, 1988; Keltner, 1994), while others (Feldman et al., 1985; Tymchuk, Andron, &
Tymchuk, 1990), used a social system perspective (Mercer, 1973) and accepted parents with IQs
between 70-80. Nevertheless, most studies have reported that children of parents labelled as
having mental retardation have lower mean IQ scores and more of them have scores in the range
of intellectual retardation than would be expected from a random, but not necessarily an
economically disadvantaged, sample of the general population (Bass, l963; Feldman et al., 1985;
Garber, 1988; Gillberg & Geijer-Karlsson, 1983; Mickelson, l947; Reed & Reed, l965; Scally,
l973). Other studies reported significantly less vocalizations and speech in young children of
mothers with mental retardation as compared to peers of low and middle SES whose parents did
not have mental retardation (Feldman, Case, Rincover, Towns, & Betel, 1989; Feldman et al.,
1986, 1993).

Most studies of children raised by parents with mental retardation have focused on
intellectual and language deficits (e.g., Feldman et al., 1985; Reed & Reed, 1965). In one study
which assessed behavioral adjustment, O'Neill (1985), using interviews and projective tests,
found behavior problems (e.g., oppositional behaviors, pseudo-retardation) in approximately
50% of 19 "normal" or "bright" children of parents with mental retardation. Likewise, a
retrospective study of 41 offspring of 15 mothers with mental retardation in Sweden found that
58% of the children had required psychiatric services (Gillberg & Geijer-Karlsson, 1983).
Few studies of parents with mental retardation have examined factors that may predict
child development such as the quality of the home environment and familial variables. Feldman
et al. (1985) found a significant positive correlation between total Caldwell HOME Inventory
(Caldwell & Bradley, 1984) scores and Mental Development Index scores on the Bayley Scales
of Infant Development (Bayley, 1969) in 12, 2 year old children of parents with mental
retardation. Keltner (1994) reported that mothers with IQs less than 75 had significantly lower
HOME scores than a low income comparison group of parents with IQs > 85. According to the
results of Feldman et al. (1985), Keltner's findings suggested a greater risk of developmental
delay for the infants of the parents with low IQs, but she did not provide developmental test data.
Maternal social isolation/support is another predictor variable that has not been adequately
studied in parents with intellectual disabilities. Social support has been shown to be related to
child outcomes in families from low SES backgrounds (Bee, Hammond, Eyres, Barnard, &
Snyder, 1986) and in families of parents without mental retardation raising children with
disabilities (Dunst, Trivette, & Cross, 1986).

We are aware of no study that has simultaneously evaluated the intellectual, academic,
and behavioral status of school-age children raised by parents with mental retardation. Few
studies of these children examined predictor variables and incorporated a low income
comparison group of parents who do not have mental retardation to control for the impact of
poverty per se on child development. To fill significant gaps in knowledge, the present study
investigated the effects of low maternal intelligence and poverty on several crucial areas of child
development by comparing the performance of children raised in poverty by mothers with and
without mild mental retardation on a battery of standardized measures of intelligence, academic
performance, and behavioral adjustment. We also explored the relationship of child outcome to
the quality of the home environment and maternal social isolation/support.
METHOD
Subjects
Two groups of families with children between the ages of 6 and 12 years participated.
Although there were no restrictions regarding ethnicity of the families, all of the 34 families
referred to this study were Caucasian. Referrals came from 10 community agencies providing
advocacy and support services to adults with mental retardation in Southern and Eastern Ontario
(where Caucasians are the substantial majority). We avoided referrals from child welfare
agencies so as to not over-represent the sample with known maltreating parents with mental
retardation (however, we did not exclude parents whom we subsequently found to be involved
with a child protection agency). Agency workers initially contacted their clients who met the
eligiblity requirements of this study (see below) and referred interested parties to us. Although

we do not know the exact number of parents who said they were not interested in participating,
the workers told us that most of the eligible parents agreed to allow us to contact them; no parent
we contacted subsequently refused to participate or dropped out. To address the possibility that
the parents with mild mental retardation may have had difficulty giving informed consent, their
workers accompanied us on the first visit, witnessed our explanation to the parents, and had the
opportunity to express any reservations about the parents' ability to give informed consent (this
was never an issue with any of the participants).
Criteria for inclusion in the mental retardation group required a current maternal full-
scale WAIS-R IQ < 70 (the accepted cut-off at the time of the study - Grossman, 1983) and
previous independent diagnosis of mental retardation with no known biological conditions
associated with cognitive deficits (e.g., Down syndrome, brain damage). Total family income had
to be below the Statistics Canada urban poverty level (Ross & Shillington, 1989). Seven families
were excluded because maternal IQ was greater than 70 (despite a diagnosis of mental
retardation), leaving a total of 27 in the group with maternal mental retardation.
The second group was recruited by placing flyers in community resource and drop-in
centers located in low income neighborhoods in the same Ontario communities in which the
target parents with mental retardation resided. Resource and drop-in centers are used quite
frequently in these communities as they offer a variety of free recreational and educational
programs, advice, and support for children, families, and adults. The first 25 mothers who
responded to the flyers and did not have mental retardation or a history of special education
placement participated and none dropped out.

Table 1 provides a comparison of group demographics. For the most part, mothers in both
groups were between 30-35 years old, more than 50% were married (or in a conjugal
relationship), total family incomes were below the poverty level, a majority were receiving
welfare, and few were employed. Eighteen comparison mothers agreed to take an IQ test and all
had WAIS-R IQ > 80. The seven low income mothers who refused to take an IQ test were
included in the study as comparison subjects because their backgrounds suggested at least
average intellectual development (highschool and community college diplomas; previously or
currently employed in the secretarial or accounting fields). There were no significant differences
between the seven who refused to take an IQ test and the remaining 18 comparison families on
any of the measures reported in Tables 1 or 2.
None of the children in either group had known disabilities which could affect their
development. Both sets of families were eligible for services for economically disadvantaged
families such as regular home visits by a public health nurse and access to community resource
centers. Mothers with intellectual disabilities were also eligible for advocacy services. When the
children were younger, early intervention programs for children living in poverty (or for children
of parents with intellectual disabilities) were not as readily available as they are today. In fact,
only one mother (who was in the group with maternal mental retardation) received specialized
early intervention services for the target child in this study (another mother with low IQ received
similar services for a subsequent child not included in this study).

--------------------------
INSERT TABLE 1 ABOUT HERE
--------------------------
Dependent measures
Intelligence. The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children - Revised (WISC-R:
Wechsler, l974) was used. The WISC-III was not as yet available when this study was
conducted.
Academic achievement. Reading, spelling, and arithmetic achievement were assessed
using the Wide Range Achievement Test-Revised (WRAT-R: Jastak & Jastak, l984). The
educational placements of the children were also noted.
Behavior disorders. Behavioral adjustment was measured using the Ontario version of
the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL: Statistics Canada, 1987) which was validated and normed
on 3294 children as part of a well-documented Ontario Child Health Study (Offord et al., 1987).
It is an augmented version of the original CBCL (Achenbach & Edelbrook, 1981) and is divided
into four behavior disorders: conduct, hyperactivity, emotional, and somatization (the latter scale
was not used as there were no subjects over the required age of 12 years). The mothers were
asked to judge her child's behavior over the last 6 months. To determine whether the mothers
with mental retardation were consistent in reporting on their children's behavior problems, we
also asked them to complete the Parent Attitude Test (PAT: Cowen, Huser, Beach, & Rappaport,
1970). The PAT asks similar questions to the CBCL about the child's behavior. Significant
Spearman Rank correlation coefficients were found between the PAT total score and the three

CBCL subscales (conduct: r = .59, p < .001; hyperactivity: r = .40, p < .05; emotional: r = .33, p
= .05).
Quality of the home environment. The elementary school-age version of the HOME
Inventory (Caldwell & Bradley, 1984) was used.
Maternal social isolation/support. We devised a measure of the mother's social
isolation/support by adding the raw scores on the Social Isolation and Marital Satisfaction
subscales of the Parenting Stress Index (PSI: Abidin, 1990). Items in these scales measure the
degree of the mother's social and spousal support (e.g., "I have a lot of people to whom I can talk,
get help or advice." "My spouse has not given me as much help and support as I expected."). The
mother's perception of support on the PSI subscales was partially corroborated by the listing of
all services received by the family on the demographics form. As per the directions of the PSI,
mothers who were not married were asked to respond based on their closest friend.
Design and procedure
A nonequivalent between-group design was used to compare the children of low income
mothers with mental retardation to similar aged children of low income mothers without mental
retardation. The tests were given in the family home by one of two experienced testers, who were
not naive to the study purpose and design, or group classification of the family. The child
received the WISC-R and the WRAT-R in a quiet room free from distractions with only the
tester present (the same conditions applied when the WAIS-R was administered to the mothers).
As many of the mothers with mental retardation had poor reading skills, the questionnaires (e.g.,
CBCL, Social Isolation/Support) were administered orally to all of these mothers; none of the

mothers had any problems understanding and responding to the verbal questions and their
responses were consistent with other similar measures (e.g., PAT, demographic questionnaire).
RESULTS
The scores of all the primary dependent measures in the group with maternal mental
retardation failed the test of normalacy even when subjected to several logarithmic
transformations (i.e., base 10, 1/2 log, and arcsine). Thus, we were obliged to use nonparametric
statistical tests such as the two-tailed Mann-Whitney U (z scores were used for n > 20, see
Daniel, 1978), Wilcoxon Signed-Rank, and Chi-Square tests for between group comparisons and
the Spearman Sign-Rank Coefficient for correlational analyses. Table 2 presents the total group,
boy's, and girl's means and standard deviations of the nine dependent measures for both groups.
--------------------------
INSERT TABLE 2 ABOUT HERE
--------------------------
Demographics
As can be seen in Table 1, in addition to differences due to subject selection criteria (the
first four variables), the two groups differed significantly on the percentage of families: (a)
involved with child protection agencies and (b) where the mother reported the father as having
mental retardation or special education experience.
Home Environment
Table 2 shows the Caldwell HOME Inventory mean total scores. The group with maternal
mental retardation was significantly lower than that of the comparison group (z = 6.94; p <

.001). Note, however, that the mean total scores of both groups were within one standard
deviation of the school-age HOME Inventory normative group reported in Bradley, Rock,
Caldwell, and Brisby (1989). As seen in Table 2, in the group with maternal mental retardation
(but not in the comparison group), the boys' HOME total scores were significantly lower than
those of the girls (z = 2.74, p < .01); this finding should be interpreted cautiously due to the
disproportionate number of boys to girls in this group.
Social Isolation
The mean maternal social isolation score (see Table 2) of the mothers with mental
retardation was significantly higher than the comparison mothers without mental retardation (z =
10.4, p < .001). In the group with maternal mental retardation (but not in the comparison group),
there was significantly more social isolation amongst the mothers of the boys than the mothers of
the girls (z = 10.63, p < .001); again, these gender differences should be interpreted
conservatively.
Child IQ
Table 2 presents the group WISC-R IQ means and standard deviations and Figure 1
compares the IQ distributions of the children of mothers with and without mental retardation. A
Mann-Whitney U test revealed that the children's IQ scores in the group with maternal mental
retardation were significantly lower than in the low income comparison group (z = 4.27, p <
.001). The group difference upheld for both boys (z = 3.33, p < .001) and girls (z = 2.78, p < .01).
Note that the children in both groups had higher mean IQ scores than their mothers (see Table 1),
perhaps reflecting regression to the mean. A Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test revealed that these

mother-child IQ differences were significant in both the group with maternal mental retardation
(z = -3.81, p < .001) and the low income group (z = -1.99, p < .05).
---------------------------------
INSERT FIGURES 1 AND 2 ABOUT HERE
---------------------------------
Academic Achievement
Table 2 presents the group WRAT-R means and standard deviations and Figure 2
illustrates the distributions of scores of the children of mothers with and without mental
retardation. As expected, the academic achievement of the comparison group children was lower
than the norm, but to a lesser degree than the children whose mothers had mental retardation.
Two-tailed Mann-Whitney U tests revealed that the children of mothers with mental retardation
scored significantly lower than the children of mothers without mental retardation on reading (z
= 3.58, p < .001), spelling (z = 3.04, p < .003), and math (z = 3.96, p < .001). Between-group
differences were significant for boys (reading - z = 2.79. p < .006; spelling - z = 3.06, p < .003;
math - z = 2.95, p < .004); the girls showed marginally significant differences in reading (z =
1.78, p < .08) and math (z = 1.87, p < .07) and no statistically significant difference in spelling (z
= .48, p > .6) (because the relatively small number of girls increases the risk of Type II error,
their marginally significant results are reported for the WRAT-R above, and the CBCL, below).
Using the local school board's diagnostic criteria for learning disabilities (i.e., having a
normal IQ with a 15 point split between performance and verbal WISC-R scores, and at least one
year behind in either reading, spelling, or math achievement test scores), we found that more

(36.4%) of the children of mothers with mental retardation than the children of parents without
mental retardation (4.5%) met the criteria (X2
= 5.8, p < .02). Also, 59.3% of the children of
mothers with mental retardation were receiving various special education services for children
identified as having "mental retardation," "learning disabilities," or "behavioral maladjustment"
(e.g., full- or part-day self-contained classes, specialized curriculum and instruction, availability
of an Education Aide in the regular classroom, tutoring) compared to 12% of the children of
parents without mental retardation; this difference was also statistically significant (X2
= 11.5, p
< .001).
Behavior Disorders
Figure 3 shows that the group with maternal mental retardation had a higher percentage of
children scoring above the CBCL clinical thresholds for behavioral disorders than the low
income comparison and the Ontario normative groups. Table 2 shows that the children of
mothers with mental retardation had significantly higher scores than the low income comparison
children in conduct disorders (z = 2.80, p < .005), hyperactivity (z = 3.30, p < .001), and
emotional disorders (z = 2.20, p < .03). Between-group CBCL differences for boys were
significant on all three scales (conduct and emotional - both zs = 2.47, ps < .02; hyperactivity - z
= 2.70, p < .007); the girls showed marginally significant differences in hyperactivity (z = 1.76, p
< .08), but differences on the other two scales did not approach significance for the girls (conduct
- z = 0.48; emotional - z = 0.66, ps > .5).
We tested the hypothesis (O'Neill, 1985) that more competent children of slow parents
would have more social maladjustment by examining the percentage of children with clinically

significant behavior problems (as determined by CBCL cut-off scores) with each group
subdivided into child IQ below 85 or equal/above 85. In the group with maternal mental
retardation, a greater percentage of children with IQs> 85 (n = 11) had at least one behavior
problem (63.6% vs. 43.8%). Although this numerical difference was not statistically significant,
an examination of children with multiple behavior problems revealed that while no children with
low IQ scored above the clinical threshold on all three scales of the CBCL, 27.3% of the children
with IQ > 85 did; this difference was significant (z = 2.22, p< .02), but did not hold for the low
income comparison children as none of these children had all three behavior problems. Thus, the
children who met criteria for multiple behavior problems had IQs > 85 and mothers with mental
retardation (IQs < 70).
--------------------------------------
INSERT FIGURE 3 AND TABLE 3 ABOUT HERE
--------------------------------------
Correlations
As the above results indicated that children of mothers with mental retardation apparently
were not all affected in the same way -- despite being raised by mothers with similar IQs -- we
ran a series of simple correlations using the Spearman Sign-Rank coefficient, appropriate for
non-normal distributions. We correlated the child outcome measures with maternal WAIS-R,
Social Isolation/Support, and Caldwell HOME Inventory scores. These variables have been
shown in the literature to be related to child development in low income families (Parker et al.,

1988), and they were significantly different between the groups in this study. The coefficients are
presented in Table 3.
In the group of children of mothers with mental retardation, maternal IQ was not
significantly correlated with any child measure. Maternal social isolation was significantly
positively correlated, and HOME total scores were significantly negatively correlated with child
conduct and hyperactivity disorders; HOME total score was also significantly correlated with
WRAT-R math scores.
With respect to the low income mothers without mental retardation, maternal IQ was
significantly correlated with WRAT-R math scores. Maternal social isolation was significantly
related to child hyperactivity and emotional disorders; the HOME total score was significantly
correlated with WISC-R and WRAT-R reading and math scores. Thus, both groups share in
common significant correlations between maternal social isolation and child behavior problems,
as well as HOME scores and math achievement.
DISCUSSION
This study reveals the risk status of school-age children of mothers with mental
retardation across intellectual, academic, behavioral, and family environment domains. There
was no child in the group with maternal mental retardation who was completely free of problems.
Close to 60% had IQs below 85 and even those children who had normal intelligence met the
criteria for either a behavior disorder or a learning disability. These problems cannot be attributed
solely to being raised in poverty because the children of mothers with mental retardation had
significantly more deficits than similar aged children of parents without mental retardation from

comparably impoverished families in the same communities. In addition to the child outcomes,
the mothers with mental retardation were providing less stimulating home environments and
were more socially isolated than the comparison mothers without mental retardation.
Maternal mental retardation did not affect boys and girls in the same manner. While both
the boys and girls of mothers with mental retardation had significantly lower IQs than their low
income counterparts raised by mothers without mental retardation, only the boys had
significantly lower academic achievement and significantly higher behavior problem scores.
These gender differences may be partly related to the boys' significantly lower quality of the
home environment and the significantly greater social isolation of their mothers; no other
variables (listed in Table 1) were significantly different between the boys and girls. Further
research is needed with a larger sample to explore possible gender differences in this population.
Given the finding that the boys in the group with maternal mental retardation were
generally more negatively affected than the girls, it is conceivable that the between-group
differences on the dependent measures may have been influenced by the group disparities in the
proportion of boys to girls. To ascertain this potential confound, we reformed the two groups so
that they had the same number of boys (n = 12) and girls (n = 9). This was accomplished by
randomly selecting 12 boys from the original pool of 18 in the group with maternal mental
retardation and then adding them to the original 9 girls in this group. In the low income
comparison group, we randomly chose 9 girls from the pool of 13 and added them to the original
12 boys in this group. Between-group Mann-Whitney U tests on all the dependent measures
were still highly significant (zs <.001). Nevertheless, between-gender differences in this study

should be viewed conservatively because of the relatively small number of girls in the group with
maternal mental retardation.
The results of this study suggest that there may be two distinct types of school-age
Caucasian children raised in poverty who can be differentiated by their mothers' intelligence.
While these findings await replication with more subjects and naive testers, the differences in the
children found here suggest that research examining the impact of poverty on child development
should more closely examine parental IQ as a contributing factor in the variable and often
adverse child outcomes seen in economically disadvantaged families (Garber, 1988; Garner,
Carson Jones, & Miner, 1994; Ramey & Ramey, 1992).
The children's intellectual problems were also reflected in their poor academic
achievement, especially for the boys. Besides having significantly lower WRAT-R scores than
the comparison children, the children of mothers with mental retardation were eight times more
likely to meet the local school board's criterion for a diagnosis of learning disabilities, and five
times more likely to receive special education services. The special education placements
provided some independent corroboration of our test scores.
The boys of mothers with mental retardation were also at considerable risk for behavior
problems as measured by the Ontario CBCL. More data are needed with a larger sample to
determine if child behavior problems may be related to inadequate knowledge and skills in basic
child management strategies such as positive reinforcement, supervision, limit-setting, and
consistent discipline seen in parents with mental retardation (Fantuzzo, Wray, Hall, Goins, &
Azar, 1986; Tymchuk et al., 1990).

In the group with maternal mental retardation, the children with average intelligence were
more likely to have multiple behavior problems than the children whose IQs were below 85. A
substantiated explanation of this result is presently lacking. One can speculate that conflicts may
arise when the parents fail to set reasonable limits and comprehend their (average IQ) children's
more abstract communications. These children may quickly learn to take advantage of, and rebel
against less competent parents. Early anti-social acts directed at their parents (e.g., disobedience,
stealing) may subsequently generalize to other authority figures (O'Neill, 1985). Further research
with more subjects is needed to determine why and how the combination of having normal
intelligence and parents with mental retardation places children at-risk for behavioral
maladjustment.
Not all the children of mothers with mental retardation were adversely affected in the
same way. On the WISC-R, 37% of the children had IQs <70 (i.e., mental retardation range),
while 40.7% had IQs > 85. Moreover, 26% of the children of mothers with mental retardation
were at or close to expected grade level in reading, spelling, and arithmetic, and about 36% did
not exhibit clinically significant behavior problems.
Correlational analyses of key variables likely related to differential outcomes revealed
that for the group with maternal mental retardation, maternal social isolation/support and the
quality of the home environment were related to child behavioral, but not intellectual outcomes.
It may be the case that factors other than the ones we examined in this study may also be
implicated in the development of school-age children of parents with mental retardation. For
example, maternal depression has been shown to be related to negative child outcomes

(Hammen, Burge, & Stansbury, 1990) and the prevalence of depression is relatively high in
adults with mild mental retardation (Eaton & Menolascino, 1982). Perhaps, a measure of
depression in the mothers with mental retardation in this study would also have been
significantly related to child developmental and behavioral outcomes.
A transactional approach (Sameroff & Chandler, 1975) which describes the interaction of
organismic and environmental variables on child outcome could be utilized to help identify
variables affecting the vulnerability and resiliency of these children (Crittenden, 1985). Future
research should try to differentiate children of parents with mental retardation who are at greater
risk of subsequent problems. Following the transactional model, it is important to examine the
accumulating impact of adverse preconceptual genetic influences (e.g., Fragile X), prenatal (e.g.,
maternal nutrition, smoking, stress) and perinatal factors (e.g., low birthweight, congenital
cytomegalovirus infection) in conjunction with subsequent environmental, nutritional,
personality, and mother-child interactional variables (Bee et al., 1982; Breitmayer & Ramey,
1986; Parker et al., 1988).
Given the results of this study in the context of an increasing societal trend to both protect
parenting rights and provide supports and services to try to keep the natural family intact, further
attention should be paid to the development and evaluation of specialized services for these
families (Feldman, 1994; Walton-Allen & Feldman, 1991). Several studies have shown that
child language and cognitive delays can be reduced either by teaching mothers with mental
retardation to interact in a more sensitive, reinforcing, and responsive manner with their children
(Feldman et al., 1993; Slater, 1986) or enrolling the child in a specialized preschool (Garber,

1988; Ramey & Ramey, 1992). In the present study, the one child in the group with maternal
mental retardation whose mother received interaction training when he was an infant had an IQ
of 97. Future early intervention efforts should focus on the prevention of not only intellectual
and academic deficits but also behavioral and psychiatric disorders in these children.
Considerable work is still needed in first identifying, and then preventing, eliminating or
compensating for factors which promote the intergenerational recurrence of child developmental
and other problems in these families (Ramey, 1992; Zigler, 1967).

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Table 1
Demographic information
Family Variables Parents with Parents without
Mental Retardation Mental Retardation
(n = 27) (n = 25)
Subject-Selection Variables
Mean Maternal IQ (WAIS-R) 63.6 (5.5) 93.8 (11.2)**
Percent of Mothers Who Received Special Ed. Services 48.1% 0**
Mean No. of Social Service Agencies Involved
Per Family 2.27 (1.44) 0
Median Range of Annual Family Incomea
$7K - 10.5K $7K - 10.5K
Other variables
Mean Maternal Age (years) 35.1 (4.7) 33.7 (6.1)
Percent Single Mothers 44.4% 44.0%
Percent of Mothers Institutionalized 3.7% 0
Percent Mothers Receiving Welfare 88.9% 68.0%
Percent Mothers Employed 11.1% 24.0%
Percent Living in Subsidized Housing 63.0% 48.0%
Mean Crowding Ratiob
1.62 (0.6) 1.49 (0.4)
Percent with Father Reported to
be MR or Received Special Ed. Services 66.7% 8%**

Table 1 (Con't)
Demographic information
Family Variables Parents with Parents without
Mental Retardation Mental Retardation
(n = 27) (n = 25)
Percent with Target
Child's Sibling Removed
14.8%
0
Percent with Child Welfare Supervision 22.2% 0*
Mean Child Age 9.7 (2.2) 10.2 (2.3)
Mean Birth Order of Target Child 1.1 (0.4) 1.3 (0.5)
Proportion of Boys to Girls 19/8 12/13
*
p< .05; **
p< .01; the numbers in brackets are standard deviations.
a
Exact incomes are not available as parents were asked to indicate income within C$5K intervals from 0-
C$5K to > C$25K (converted here to US funds).
b
Crowding Ratio = total number of persons living at home divided by the total number of rooms.

Table 2
Means and standard deviations of dependent measures
Parents with Mental Retardation Parents without Mental Retardation
MEASURES TOTAL BOYS GIRLS TOTAL BOYS GIRLS
HOME 36.52
(8.07)
34.11
(7.71)
41.33
(6.80)
44.64
(6.34)
46.18
(6.14)
43.09
(6.43)
SOCIAL
ISOLATIONa
39.85
(6.00)
41.33
(6.15)
36.89
(4.65)
33.75
(7.16)
33.33
(6.73)
34.17
(7.84)
WISC-R 80.54
(14.32)
80.11
(15.13)
81.50
(13.22)
102.88
(14.25)
103.58
(16.66)
102.23
(12.28)
WRAT-R
READING
73.20
(19.10)
71.05
(19.49)
77.75
(18.65)
94.25
(16.80)
97.18
(23.34)
91.77
(8.50)
WRAT-R
SPELLING
71.56
(21.38)
66.88
(21.42)
81.50
(18.77)
89.54
(17.50)
93.09
(20.34)
86.54
(14.86)
WRAT-R
MATH
69.68
(14.68)
68.12
(14.06)
73.00
(16.38)
89.21
(13.12)
89.27
(16.80)
89.15
(9.75)
CBCL
CONDUCT
6.30
(5.43)
7.28
(5.62)
4.33
(4.69)
2.36
(2.06)
2.75
(2.14)
2.00
(2.00)
CBCL
HYPERACT.
5.44
(2.71)
6.17
(2.71)
4.00
(2.18)
2.76
(2.50)
3.17
(2.33)
2.38
(2.69)
CBCL
EMOTIONAL
5.93
(2.56)
6.06
(2.26)
5.67
(3.20)
4.44
(3.50)
3.50
(2.61)
5.31
(4.07)
a
Social Isolation: higher scores indicate more maternal social isolation and less social support

Table 3
Spearman sign-rank correlation coefficents of parental IQ, social isolation, and home environment scores
with child IQ, academic achievement, and behavior problem scores
Parents with Mental Retardation Parents without Mental Retardation
WAIS-R SOC. ISOL. HOME WAIS-R SOC. ISOL. HOME
WISC-R -.30 .20 .22 .10 .13 .51**
WRAT-READ .17 .09 .25 -.04 .04 .47*
WRAT-SPELL -.20 -.09 .30 -.27 .09 .27
WRAT-MATH -.14 .08 .45*
.42*
.07 .60**
CBCL-CON. -.30 .48*
-.43*
.04 .18 -.04
CBCL-HYP. -.08 .47*
-.39*
.29 .45*
-.21
CBCL-EMOT. .10 .30 .14 .09 .37*
-.11
*
p< .05; **
p< 01

Figure Captions
Figure 1. Distribution of WISC-R full scale IQ scores for children of parents with mental
retardation and low income comparison children of parents without mental retardation.
Figure 2. Distribution of WRAT-R Reading, Spelling, and Arithmetic standard scores for
children of parents with mental retardation and low income comparison children of parents
without mental retardation.
Figure 3. Percentage of children of parents with mental retardation, low income comparison
children of parents without mental retardation, and Ontario norms for CBCL scores above the
threshold for clinically significant behavior disorders.

MATERNAL MENTAL RETARDATION 33
Authors' Notes
This research was sponsored by the Ontario Mental Health Foundation and the Ontario Ministry
of Community and Social Services Research Grants Program (administered by the Research and
Program Evaluation Unit). We thank: J. Carnwell, L. Case, M. Garrick, W. MacIntyre-Grande,
and R. Malik for their assistance in collecting the data; Drs. J. Berg, and D. Yu for their feedback
on earlier versions of the manuscript; and Dr. L. Atkinson for his statistical advice and insightful
commentary. Requests for reprints should be sent to Maurice Feldman, Ph.D., Dept. of
Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario Canada K7L 3N6; email:
feldman@pavlov.psyc.queensu.ca.

Key Terms: CHILD DEVELOPMENT, MATERNAL MENTAL RETARDATION, POVERTY
Running Head: MATERNAL MENTAL RETARDATION
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