Social Skills

Children with ADHD often have lower social status than their peers and are often rejected. Once they feel that they will be rejected, they often set out to antagonise others to justify the rejection they are sure will occur. Perhaps, they might try to control the situation to avoid rejection.

Social interaction patterns are affected by ADHD behaviours. Impulsivity often results in off-putting behaviour as it is difficult for the child with ADHD to think about their behaviour before acting. Children with ADHD may be rejected by peers because of their active, demanding, and intrusive behaviours, off-task, disruptive behaviour, non-compliance, achievement problems, learning disabilities, aggression and hyperactivity.

Children with ADHD often misinterpret social situations. They have difficulty in reading the non-verbal cues and they fail to act as others expect. They are more likely to attribute negative intentions to others when this is not appropriate. They are also more likely to arouse negative feelings in others because of their social awkwardness. Just as they fail to correctly interpret the speech and body language of others, other children often mis-interpret their behaviours.

Because they often fail to react appropriately, children with ADHD are often the victims of teasing and bullying. Because of their inappropriate responses these children are often punished by the adults who are responsible for them.

STRATEGIES

Teachers and parents often tend to focus on social skills that facilitate compliance and self-control whereas children are more interested in the quality of their social relationships. Interventions should aim to improve social competence and to reduce difficulties in per relationships.

Social skills training may be allied with reinforcement system. The child should be reinforced, either verbally or with tokens, etc whenever he/she is observed to be responding appropriately. The reinforcement should be frequent, immediate and specific so that the child knows exactly what he/she did that was considered appropriate.

Positive behaviours encouraged and reinforced. Positive reinforcement should occur twice as often as criticism.

Competition should be minimised and coopeerative behaviour encouraged. Children with ADHD believe that they won't win the competition and that is frustrating for them. On the other hand, they can often be made to feel that they are valued members of a team.

It is useful to reframe a behaviour into a positive behaviour. For example, saying that the child has left a social situation when he has become upset because that helps him to calm down, is more effective that accusing the child of going off in a fit of temper. It is important to reinforce the child's "good" intention.

Social skills should taught and practised in natural classroom settings. Useful techniques include role play, modelling, rehearsal, corrective feedback, and problem solving to encourage children to stop and think before they act. (A difficult task for ADHD children) It is necessary to teach the skills in natural settings and to reinforce them in those same settings. Skills taught in isolation will not generalise to natural settings.

Target skills are reinforced by all adults in the classroom, in the playground, and at home. Unless these skills are reinforced, they will not be developed. Reinforcement must be specifically connected to the desired behaviour. "I like the way you did -----", rather than "You're a good boy."

Teachers and parents need to focus on and reinforce skills involved in non-aggressive interactions and in increasing self-control. Actively look for appropriate behaviours and reinforce them.

Teach the child how to deal with teasing. Teach all children that teasing is a form of bullying and that it is not to be condoned.

Teach conflict resolution skills..

Teach skills for social entry, conversation, anger control, and conflict resolution.

Better results in social skills training will be achieved if peers are included in the social training program. This avoids stigmatising one child and gives all children a better understanding of social skills.

Generalisation and maintenance are problems in social skills instruction. Results may be slow, and require on-going prompting and reinforcement. Such prompting should not be aversive or punitive in nature.

Copyright Dr Stephen Dossel, and the ADD Association Queensland. This article may be reprinted but should not be modified in any way. Any such use should be acknowledged in the normal manner and must include the author's name and the source of the article.