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: www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/facts-html http://thegraycenter.org/social-stories http://www.pbisworld.com/tier-2/social-stories/ 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.