Implementation of the Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relational Skills (PEERS®) Social Skills Intervention in a University-Based Communication Sciences and Disorders Clinic

Abstract

Purpose This article reviews an evidence-based treatment, the Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relational Skills (PEERS®; Laugeson & Frankel, 2010), and describes its implementation and success in a university-based communication sciences and disorders (CSD) clinic. It is intended to serve as a guide for speech-language pathologists, especially those who are university based, who wish to implement a similar program. PEERS is an evidence-based, parent-assisted group intervention targeting friendship-related social skills for adolescents. We describe the program and briefly review research demonstrating its effectiveness. Method We ran a pilot implementation of a slightly modified version of this program in a university-based speech clinic over 14 sessions. We enrolled a total of 18 college-bound adolescents with social communication difficulties across four semesters. Results Our data show significant improvements in social skills knowledge and friendship closeness over the treatment period. Conclusions Our findings indicate that there is preliminary evidence that PEERS, with our minor modifications, can be effective in university-based CSD clinics. We discuss the benefits of implementing PEERS programs in university-based CSD clinics and provide guidance that may be useful to speech-language pathologists who are interested in doing so.