The problem of flow and heat transfer of an incompressible homogeneous second grade fluid over a non-isothermal stretching sheet in the presence of non-uniform internal heat generation/absorption is investigated. The governing partial differential equations are converted into ordinary differential equations by a similarity transformation. The effects of viscous dissipation, work due to deformation, internal heat generation/absorption and thermal radiation are considered in the energy equation and the variations of dimensionless surface temperature as well as the heat transfer characteristics with various values of non-dimensional viscoelastic parameter k(l), Prandtl number alpha, Eckert number E-c(E-c'), radiation parameter N-R, and the coefficients of space-dependent (A*) and temperature-dependent (B*) internal heat generation/absorption are graphed and tabulated. Two cases are studied, namely, (i) the sheet with prescribed surface temperature (PST case) and (ii) the sheet with prescribed heat flux (PHF case). (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.