Comparison of Social Stories and Teaching Interaction Procedures for Teaching Social Skills to Children and Adolescents With a Pervasive Developmental Disorder

Abstract

This study compared social stories to the teaching interaction procedure for teaching social skills to six children and adolescents diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder. Using a parallel treatment design, researchers taught 18 social skills with social stories and 18 social skills with teaching interaction procedures. The teaching interaction procedure was effective in teaching all 18 skills across the six participants. Social stories, within the same amount of teaching sessions, however, were effective in teaching 4 of the 18 social skills across the six participants. Also participants had greater generalization of social skills to adults and to peers when the skills were taught with the teaching interaction procedure. When the participants were allowed to choose whether they would be taught with the teaching interaction procedure or social stories, they had a slight preference for social stories.