4.
Social Communication
Without an understanding of unspoken social rules, the world turns into a minefield. "I said something and people started laughing - are they mocking me or did it sound like I was making a joke?" "This person seemed perfectly fine and then they started yelling at me! Where did that come from?" "The teacher seemed angry and told me to 'watch my tone' when I was talking to her. What did I do wrong? What is my tone even supposed to be?"
However, when therapists and teachers actually do work on "social skills" it almost always has one or more of these problems.
1. It leads neurodivergent learners to feel ashamed for interacting in ways that don't fit the norm. That is rarely the intention, but when the unspoken (or spoken) message is "there's something wrong with the way you do things naturally", it's pretty hard to avoid inducing shame.
2. It chooses topics to teach based on teaching the learner to change the way they act so they don't a) do things that the adults don't like, and b) seem different from others. Apart from the inherent problems with that, this also means very critical safety skills are often not addressed, as they don't fall into either of those categories. In a population that is many times more likely to be bullied, mistreated, or even abused than the general population, failure to address safety skills has very real consequences. It also means that skills that would help with quality of life from the learner's perspective (receptive understanding of social skills, self advocacy, etc) don't get addressed fully or at all.
3. It teaches masking (also known as "camouflaging"), which is hiding neurodivergent traits because they make someone look different. Autistic adults have been saying for years how hard it is on their mental health, and now we have studies demonstrating that impact on mental health in both children and adults. Teaching social skills can be empowering when done right - teaching people that they have to hide who they are, however, can be truly damaging.
If that's wrong, then what does social skills therapy done right look like?
1. Helps kids value themselves and their social communication as it is - no masking!
2. Emphasizes safety related social communication
3. Teaches self advocacy
4. Uses the perspective of cultural differences to view neurotypical social norms
5. Focuses on empowering kids to understand neurotypical social communication, not on how they can make their social communication sound more neurotypical.
6. Guides learners through understanding where their boundaries are and what to do when those boundaries are crossed.
I could wax on about each of these points, but these are the key ones that I incorporate into all my social skills work.