Social Stories and ASD
What is ASD?
ASD is shorthand for autism spectrum disorders. ASDs are a
group of disorders that have an effect on a person’s social and behavioral
skills. ASDs are a wide category of disorders that effect people in a variance
from mild to severe. ASDs can be placed
into three categories. First is autistic disorder which is what most people
think of when they hear the word autism. Those that are diagnosed with Autistic
Disorder usually have social problems and have unusual behavior and interests.
They also can have intellectual disabilities. Second is Asperger Syndrome where
people tend to have social challenges in not being able to pick up common
social cues or “fit in”. But, otherwise those diagnosed with Asperger syndrome
are high functioning and do not have language or intellectual disabilities. The
final category is Pervasive Development Disorder – Not Otherwise Specified.
This category is a catch-all for people that show signs of autism, but do not
fit under Autistic Disorder or Asperger Syndrome.
Based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC), all of the causes for ASDs are not known, but there are
environmental, biological and genetic factors that all play a part. ASD affects
all types of people and does not discriminate based on race, ethnicity, or
socioeconomic status. However, ASD is more common among boys than girls and
diagnosed in 1 of 88 children. Most
importantly, there are no cures for ASDs. Through early intervention and
continued services, a child’s development
can be greatly improved. So then the question becomes , What can we do to
specifically help those diagnosed with an ASD?
Social Stories and What They Are?
One intervention that has been showing promise for people
diagnosed with an ASD is Social Stories. Social Stories are a program that uses
short, personalized stories in order to teach a person with an ASD different
cues and responses for important and common situations and concepts. Created by Carol Gray, social stories are
ways to provide personalized instruction and modeling of what acceptable
behavior is. These behaviors and skills can be things such as personal hygiene
and behavior in the classroom such as raising hand and how to ask for items and
permission in the classroom. Social Stories were developed specifically for
students with ASD in order to teach them specific behaviors that they can then
reenact and learn to do.
Social Stories are age and developmental appropriate stories
written in short and concise sentences. A routine is developed for a skill or concept
that the student is to learn. An outline is made of the routine with each step
being distilled into one sentence. With each sentence there will be a picture depicting
the action. Once the story is complete, the social story is reviewed with the
student daily. After some time learning the social story, the student is taught
to recreate the story. The student continues to review the story until the
student has completely learned the skill or concept.
What are the pros? What are the cons?
There are many reasons to use social stories with ASD
students. A study by Adams, Guovousis, VanLue, & Waldron (2004) showed that
social stories are a useful tool in decreasing inappropriate behavior (p. 93).
Why is this? Because social stories does many positive things such as create
routine and reinforce positive behavior.
Social Stories provide visuals along with the text of the story. The story is personalized for the student and
can even include the student by making the story about them as they learn the
proper behavior or skill. Most importantly, it can be used for social skills
(such as how to interact with other students, manners, and protocol) and behavioral
skills (such as how to act in the classroom and hallways, etc). Social stories
are also simple, portable, and inexpensive. Social stories can be written about
practically any situation and have immediate effects ( Quirmbach, Lincoln,
Feinberg-Gizzo, Ingersoll, & Andrews 2008).
One negative is that according to a study by Sansosti,
Powell-Smith, & Kincaid (2004) found that research that shows the benefits
of social stories could be misleading. Their study showed that the improvements
that students should could simply be from the extra time and attention the
students receive and not specifically from the social stories. There are
studies that show that social stories specifically have an effect on ASD
students. One study by Kuoch and Mirenda (2003) showed that social stories did
have specific effects on the student when all of Carol Gray’s guidelines for
social stories.
What Else?
Social Stories are an exceptional way to teach social and
behavioral skills to students with ASDs. Additionally, they can be used to
teach students that do not have ASDs, but need instruction in these same
skills. Due to their simplicity and cost-effectiveness, social stories are a
tool that anyone can use. Teachers and parents can use these social stories to
teach these students so that there is cooperation and reinforcement both at
school and home. Whether the impact of the social stories is solely due to the
social stories themselves or due to the extra attention the students receive is
almost a moot point. The data shows improvement when students use social
stories and that they learn how to use these social and behavioral skills.
Social Stories are effective tools for teachers and parents to use with ASD
students and should be an integral part of education, not merely an
intervention.
Resources
All information gathered from:
Adams, L., Gouvousis, A., VanLue, M., & Waldron, C.
(2004). Social Story Intervention: Improving Communication Skills in a Child
with an Autism Spectrum Disorder. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental
Disabilities. 19. 87-94.
Kuoch, H., & Mirenda, P. (2003). Social Story Interventions
for Young children with Austism Spectrum Disorders. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities. 18. 219-227.
Sansosti, F., Powell-Smith, K., Kincaid, D. (2004). A
research synthesis of social story interventions for children with autism
spectrum disorder. Focus on Autism and
Other Developmental Disabilities. 19. 194-204.
Quirmbach, L., Lincoln, A., Feinberg-Gizzo, M., Ingersoll,
B., & Andrews, S. (2008). Social Stories: Mechanisms of effectiveness in
increasing game play skills in children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder
using a pretest posttest repeated measures randomized control group design. Journal of Autism & Devopmental
Disorders. 39. 299-321.
