Reducing Inappropriate Behaviors and Enhancing Social Skills in Children with ASD Through Social Stories

Abstract

Teaching social skills is a challenging process due to the fact that each skill is difficult to motivate and reward and to the sheer number of skills that can be considered social skills and the infinite ways in which changes in the environment affect the perception of each skill. The most important step in the development of the social skills repertoire in children diagnosed with ASD consists in the occurrence of social desire. Therefore, the social environment must be implemented in a way that is attractive to the child. Many social skills are learned automatically in typical ABA/VB programs. Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) seem to lack a desire to search for deeper causal links in their understanding of the world. Instead, they remember predictable routines (for example, brushing their teeth) and processing information at the surface level. This leads to a fragmented and superficial understanding of the environment, although they can remember much about it. Children with ASD face difficulties in achieving social contexts in the sense of other people's behavior, because it relies on understanding their intentions. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of a Social Story as an intervention used to reduce maladaptive behavior and to enhance social skills in 3 children diagnosed with ASD.