This step-by-step plan contains 150 teacher-tested activities in social skills for all students in grades 4-12. The emphasis is on helping students to develop self-control, evaluation techniques, the ability to make better choices, & foresightedness. Their problem-solving skills, observation skills, & communication skills are addressed. Students learn how to act responsibly, set goals, change their own behavior, become more sensitive to the needs of others & more willing to change. Out-of-school practice activities, easy-to-follow lesson plans, & clear, concise directions on how to use them are included. Ready-to-copy activities & worksheets, plus a guide that tells you how to adapt for 4- to 18-week sessions are also provided.
Originally published in 1984, one of the few facts that emerged clearly in the beleaguered field of psychology and mental health at the time was the extent of poor social skills in psychiatric patients, the mentally handicapped and problem adolescents. As a result, during the 1970s, social skills training espoused as a form of behaviour therapy seemed to offer great promise, based on the notion that social skills, like any other skills, are learnt and can be taught if lacking. However, in evaluating social skills training, many investigators found that skills did not endure and generalise. This book attempts a major re-assessment of social skills training. It examines the underlying paradigms, which are shown to be fundamentally behaviourist. Such paradigms, it is argued, severely constrain the aims and method of current types of training. Thus the book develops what is termed an agency approach, based on man as a social agent who actively constructs his own experiences and generates his own goal-directed behaviour on the basis of those constructs. This new model is developed in both theoretical and practical ways in the main body of the book and should, even today, be of great interest to all those involved with social skills training.
This practical guidebook is designed to help practitioners use proven techniques of structured learning to teach essential social skills that will help their clients function more effectively and independently at home, at work and in group settings. 27 specific topics are covered in detail and a transcript of an actual meeting is included.
This scholarly yet highly readable and practical text systematically covers the importance, development, assessment, and treatment of social skills of children and adolescents. Combining scientific rigor with a highly approachable and readable style of writing to create a practical and unique book, this volume provides a comprehensive overview of the increasingly important topic of child and adolescent social skills. A wide variety of tables, figures, and practical step-by-step guides enhance the material presented, making it particularly useful for practitioners while offering an extensive array of recent research and models of interest to researchers. The authors present a solid foundation of scientific knowledge written in a manner accessible to nonscientists and having ample practical implications and examples for educational and clinical practice. The book is divided into two parts--the first features a foundation for conceptualizing and assessing child and adolescent social skills, whereas the second focuses on the arena of intervention. An up-to-date and unique addition to the literature, this volume will be of interest to professionals who work with or study children across several disciplines including school and clinical child psychology, special education, counseling, and social work. Although many books and other professional materials on the social competence of children and adolescents are presently available, the knowledge regarding these social skills is expanding rapidly, and there is a tremendous need to keep it current. This book helps meet this need by not only synthesizing a great deal of recent work in the field, but also by providing new information and evidence that has not yet been published. It also bridges an important gap that sometimes exists between research and practice. For instance, some books on child and adolescent social skills are clearly written for the academician or researcher, and may have little apparent application for the clinician or practitioner. Other materials are written as practical assessment or intervention guides for the clinician/practitioner, yet sometimes lack supporting evidence and rationale. This book is aimed at both arenas.
The first up-to-date, comprehensive handbook covering the pactical approaches to social skills training (SST)--a relatively new concept encompassing a broad range of treatment and counseling approaches designed to help people conduct their social lives more effectively. Leading experts summarize the applications of SST and research to special populations, special problems, couples and families, individuals, parents, and professionals in the United States and Europe. Incorporates both behavioral and humanistic approaches.
It is perhaps trite to refer to human beings as social animals, but never theless it is true. A substantial portion of our lives is spent in interactions with other people. Moreover, the nature, quality, and quantity of those interactions have a tremendous impact on behavior, mood, and the adequacy of adjustment. Faulty interpersonal relationship patterns have reliably been associated with a wide variety of behavioral-psychological dysfunctions ranging from simple loneliness to schizophrenia. Most "traditional" analyses of interpersonal failures have viewed them as consequences or by-products of other difficulties, such as anx iety, depression, intrapsychic conflict, or thought disorder. Con sequently, remediational efforts have rarely been directed to interper sonal behavior per se. Rather, it has been expected that interpersonal relationships would improve when the source disorder was eliminated. While this model does account for some interpersonal dysfunctions (e.g., social anxiety can inhibit interpersonal behavior), it is not adequate to account for the vast majority of interpersonal difficulties. In fact, in many cases those difficulties either are independent of or underlie other dysfunctions (e.g., repeated social failure may produce depression or social anxiety).
In this volume the application of the social skills training (SST) model to specific clinical conditions is discussed. Its uses with schizophrenia, social anxiety, depression, mental handicap, and substance abuse are reviewed in depth and practical recommendations for the future are given. Advances in social psychology and linguistics have implications for the future development of SST and their contributions to the field are presented in the final section.
