ABSTRACT
The psychological and educational literature over the past 40 years regarding the personality and motivational characteristics of individuals with mental retardation has swelled. Ironically very little of the knowledge contained in that literature has been communicated to researchers, practitioners, educators, families, and others who are concerned with improving the quality of life of persons with mental retardation. Personality and motivational self-system processes are the energizing forces that drive all other psychological, learning, and selfregulatory processes underpinning the performance of persons with mental retardation. Personality and motivational self-system processes influence what information gets stored in the long-term memory system, how that information is organized, and what information is retrieved to enable persons with mental retardation to perform in an adaptive and functional manner. This chapter allows both practitioners and researchers to become better acquainted with the theory of motivational orientation and motivational self-system processes in persons with mental retardation so that they may be energized by the knowledge and to redirect their theories and practices to improve the quality of life of persons with mental retardation.
