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A Case Series of Social Thinking Training of Mainstreamed Secondary School Students with High-Functioning Autism
Hong Kong Journal of Mental Health (2009, 35, 10-17)
© The Mental Health Association of Hong Kong 2009
"...The results from the four-case series demonstrate that the program is effective in promoting the social communication skills of teenagers with high-functioning autism... To further investigate the effectiveness of the program in the local setting, 44 teenagers from 14 mainstreamed secondary schools were recruited into a follow-up program.
Although detailed analysis is still underway, the enhanced program was generally well-received by the teachers, parents and students. The program was extended to 12 sessions with an improved focus on the local culture and language. The basic concepts of social thinking together with suggested training sessions were also collected into a handbook...[which] has been distributed to all normal secondary schools in Hong Kong to promote the training of those students in need."
From the research article (full PDF below)
"....The study of social thinking requires investigation of how people process information through encoding, storage, retrieval, and application to social situations. Social thinking is a dynamic, constantly adapting and ongoing process that requires cognitive problem-solving abilities. Students with pervasive developmental disorders such as Asperger syndrome and autism are often associated with deficits in social thinking...
The social thinking ILAUGH model (Winner, 2000, 2002, 2005) was used as a reference. I LAUGH is an acronym for 1) Initiation, 2) Listening, 3) Abstracting information 4) Understanding perspectives 5) Gestalt, and 6) Humor appreciation. The study's objective was to assess the effectiveness of the social thinking program on mainstreamed secondary school students...
The training sessions mainly pinpointed weaknesses in the six areas highlighted in the ILAUGH model (Winner, 2002, 2005):
1) Initiation: the ability to initiate communication or action appropriately;
2) Listening: the ability to listen actively with eyes and brain;
3) Abstracting: the ability to infer meaning from social cues or work out meanings from words;
4) Understanding perspectives: the ability to incorporate the perspectives of other people into the regulation of social relationships;
5) Gestalt: the ability to obtain holistic picture of the communication process
6) Humor: the ability to appreciate humor and use it when relating to others...
Conclusion
The essence of the social thinking program is that the learning of content is not based on skill, but rather on cognition. Social rules are highly abstract and cannot be learned effectively through a stimulus-response approach... the results from the four-case series demonstrate that the program is effective in promoting the social communication skills of teenagers with high-functioning autism... To further investigate the effectiveness of the program in the local setting, 44 teenagers from 14 mainstreamed secondary schools were recruited into a follow-up program. Although detailed analysis is still underway, the enhanced program was generally well-received by the teachers, parents and students. The program was extended to 12 sessions with an improved focus on the local culture and language. The basic concepts of social thinking together with suggested training sessions were also collected into a handbook...[which] has been distributed to all normal secondary schools in Hong Kong to promote the training of those students in need."
A Case Series of Social Thinking Training of Mainstreamed
Secondary School Students with High-Functioning Autism
(click to download PDF)
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