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1985 18: 588J Learn DisabilSharon Vaughn

Why Teach Social Skills to Learning Disabled Students?  

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Why Teach Social Skills to Learning Disabled Students?

Sharon Vaughn, PhD

The learning difficulties of LD stu-dents do not make them a very ho-

mogenous group. Some LD students have difficulties in reading, some in math, and some in written or spoken language. Their learning problems may be charac-terized by difficulty processing, organiz-ing, retrieving, or expressing informa-tion. While LD students are very different from each other in most ways, there seems to be one exception. Peers and adults perceive many LD students as so-cially unappealing. This paper will re-view the interpersonal social difficulties of LD students, discuss possible explana-tions for why social skills are not taught to LD students, and address the need to teach social skills to LD students.

Perceptions of Others

Learning disabled students are less ac-cepted and more frequently rejected than their nonleaming disabled peers (T.H. Bryan, 1974). LD students when com-pared with their non LD peers are less popular (T.H. Bryan & J.H. Bryan, 1978; Siperstein, Bopp & Bak, 1978), less fre-quently selected to play (Hutton & Polo, 1976), perceived as having lower social status (Garret & Crump, 1980), and receive lower sociometric ratings from their peers (Hutton & Polo, 1976). More-over, the negative reaction of peers to-wards the LD student continues even when the LD student is integrated into a new setting (T.H. Bryan, 1976).

LD students' lowered social status not only reflects perceptions of peers but of teachers. Although the learning disabled student approaches the teacher and in-teracts with the teacher more frequently than nonleaming disabled students (Dor-val, McKinney, & Feagans, 1982; Feagans

& McKinney, 1981; McKinney, McClure, & Feagans, 1982), the interactions LD students have with the teacher are more often inappropriate for the situation (Dor-val, et al., 1982). While teachers initiate conversations more frequently with LD students, the majority of those initiations involve some form of behavior manage-ment (Dorval, et al., 1982). While the overall interaction level between LD stu-dent and teacher is high, the quality of the interaction is low (Siperstein & Goding, 1985), with most of the interac-tions involving some type of negative feedback. In addition, teachers perceive LD students as less desirable to have in the classroom (Garrett & Crump, 1980; Keogh, Tchir, Windeguth-Behn, 1974). Since teachers respond differently to chil-dren with different achievement levels (e.g., Brophy, 1979; Brophy & Good, 1974), it could be that teachers are re-sponding to the academic difficulties pre-sented by the LD student in ways which lower the social status of the student in the classroom, thus affecting how the student is responded to by peers. Re-search, however, suggests that LD stu-dents are not merely rejected because of academic difficulties but because of their social interactions. After a few minutes of observing students on videotapes, un-aware of which students are LD and non LD, strangers are more likely to perceive LD students more neatively than non LD students (J.H. Bryan, T.H. Bryan, & Sonnefeld, 1982; J. H. Bryan & Perl-mutter, 1979; J.H. Bryan & Sherman, 1980). This suggests that LD students are rejected because of how they interact with others and not because of their aca-demic difficulties nor because classmates are aware of teachers' negative percep-tions of their LD peers.

Learning Disabled Students' So-cial Behavior

What do LD students do to warrant such rejection by peers and teachers? Research is just beginning to evaluate how the social behaviors of LD students differ from those of their nonleaming disabled peers.

An analysis of LD students verbal com-munication in social situations indicates they initiate more competitive statements (T.H. Bryan, Wheeler, Felcan, & Henek, 1976), more nasty statements (T.H. Bryan & J.H. Bryan, 1978), are less imaginative, and make verbal statements which revolve more around themselves (Soenksen, Flagg, & Schmits, 1981). Torgesen (1982) has described LD stu-dents as inactive learners in academic tasks. They appear to be inactive during the communication process as well. They are less likely than their nonleaming dis-abled peers to code switch, that is, adapt their communication style to the needs of the listener (Soenksen et al., 1981). In one study (T.H. Bryan & Pflaum, 1978), learning disabled students failed to mod-ify their communication when giving di-rections to much younger students. In fact, they used more complex language when interacting with younger students. In addition, LD students are less likely to request more information when given am-biguous information (Donahue, Pearl, & T. Bryan, 1980). LD students do not use the verbal responses of others to adjust what they are going to say and thus respond in ways which appear as though they have not heard the other. In much the same way that they often do not question written text which is incomplete or ambiguous (Bos & Filip, 1984), they do not question ambiguous verbal infor-mation. The result is they either do not respond appropriately or appear to be insensitive to the responses of others. They respond as inactive members of the communication process. Their communi-cation style results in an uncooperative listening partner whom few willingly se-lect as a social partner.

In addition to difficulties interpreting verbal communications, learning disabled students are less able than their peers to interpret social situations from pictures (Bruno, 1981). They appear to be more egocentric than their peers and less able

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to take the role of the other in a social situation (Dickstein & Warren, 1980). LD students have difficulty stepping out-side of their own perspective to take the perspective of the other (B.Y.L. Wong & R. Wong, 1980). Learning disabled stu-dents' difficulty with social perspective taking may contribute to their problems of successfully communicating with others. LD students inability to take on the role of another may be interpreted as an ego-centric communication style which pre-vents them from identifying with what the other is really saying. This may in part explain LD students' problems in adjusting their verbal communication to the speaker and focusing verbal commu-nication on their own personal interests. The results may be a speaker feeling as though the listener is merely waiting un-til they are finished and not really listen-ing or responding to what they are saying.

In addition to verbal social difficulties the nonverbal behavior of LD students leads to a negative immediate impression (J.H. Bryan & Perlmutter, 1979). By videotaping their social interactions (J.H. Bryan & Sherman, 1980; J.H. Bryan, Sherman, & Fisher, 1980) the non-verbal behaviors of learning disabled and nonlearning disabled students were eval-uated. Results indicate that LD students spend significantly less time looking and smiling at the conversational partner while speaking with them. Schumaker, Wildgen, & Sherman (1982), found 35% of junior high LD students exhibited some problem in grooming, neatness of clothing, posture, and general attractive-ness in contrast to 6% of the non LD students (Schumaker et ah, 1982). Since physical appearance is a significant indi-cator of popularity with peers (Siperstein et al., 1978) many LD students could benefit from feedback and suggestions regarding their physical appearance.

There have been a number of explana-tions of LD students' social difficulties. It has been hypothesized that the social difficulties of LD students are part of a disorder in one or more of the psycholog-ical processes (T.H. Bryan & Pflaum, 1978). It has also been suggested that learning disabled students have deficits in social perception and social cognition which inhibits their ability to interact successfully with others (Johnson & Myklebust, 1967; Mattis, French, &

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Rapin, 1975; Wiener, 1980). Other skills deficits such as lack of consequential thinking (Bruno, 1981), inability to take the perspective of another (B.Y.L. Wong & R. Wong, 1980), failure to understand and inact the role of the listener in a social situation (Donahue et al., 1980), and difficulty perceiving themselves as able to control or affect the outcome of a social situation and therefore unwilling to act on the situation to influence the out-come (Sobol, Earn, Bennet, & Humphries, 1982), have been discussed as indicators of why learning disabled students are more frequently rejected by their peers and others.

Why Interpersonal Social Skills are not Being Taught

Since interpersonal social difficulties are a serious problem with many learning disabled students, and social skills are such an important prerequisite to success in life, why is it that few teachers di-rectly teach interpersonal social skills?

There are a variety of possible expla-nations for why interpersonal social skills are not being taught.

It may be that teachers do not target interpersonal social skills as a desirable skill to teach LD students. Teachers may be aware that LD students have social difficulties but may not perceive teaching social skills as important as teaching aca-demic skills, and therefore, do not focus on teaching social skills.

Perhaps teachers and parents feel teach-ing social skills is very important, but academically oriented IEP's do not make them feel legitimate about setting aside time to work with those students who need help in developing more appropriate social skills or general coping strategies. Writing IEP goals and objectives for teaching social skills is difficult. Teach-ers and parents may feel uncomfortable about including such things as increasing smiling behavior and increasing the fre-quency of greeting peers positively as goals within the IEP.

A faulty assumption may be operating about how children acquire social skills (Gresham, 1982). Teachers may assume that LD students who do not display appropriate social behaviors will acquire these behaviors by being mainstreamed with students who display them. Since

most LD students spend at least part of their day with non LD students the as-sumption is that by merely being around other students who exhibit appropriate social interactions LD students will learn the desired social behaviors. This may be referred to as the osmosis theory of learn-ing social skills. Somehow appropriate behaviors and skills will pass from the non LD student into the LD student. Even assuming the complex skills LD students need to learn could be acquired through modeling, Bandura (1971) dem-onstrates that placing a child with an-other child who exhibits a targeted be-havior does not assure the target child will attend to and imitate the desired behavior.

While it is generally assumed if a student is going to acquire reading, writ-ing, and math skills, some form of direct instruction needs to occur, educators may feel social skills are acquired just in the process of growing up. Fortunately, many children learn appropriate social behavior without direct instruction. However, in-terpersonal social skills can be increased for all students, most particularly LD students, through direct instruction.

Perhaps teachers do not know how to teach interpersonal social skills and or feel uncomfortable teaching them. Teacher preparation programs devote a great deal of attention to training teachers how to assess and remediate academic problems with LD students, while little if any at-tention is devoted to how to assess and remediate social problems. Teachers may be aware that students lack social skills but may not have the knowledge and ex-perience to teach them.

Another possible explanation for why interpersonal social skills are not taught is that educators feel as though it is not their responsibility to teach them. Teach-ing social skills is often thought to be a family responsibility and not the respon-sibility of the schools.

While there are a number of possible explanations for why interpersonal social skills are not directly taught to LD stu-dents, research suggests they are not ac-quiring appropriate social skills without direct instruction. There is a need and responsibility for teaching social skills to learning disabled students (Bruininks, 1978; T.H. Bryan & J.H. Bryan, 1978; Cartledge & Milburn, 1978; Garrett &

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Crump, 1980; Gresham, 1982; Horowitz, 1981; Madden & Slavin, 1983).

Teaching Social Skills to Learn-ing Disabled Students

The specific social skills LD students are missing need to be identified. Gresham (1984) is developing a norm referenced social skills criterion checklist which lists the social skills that are appropriate for a given age group and assists teachers in identifying those skills which need to be taught.

"While the literature on assessing in-terpersonal skills is confusing and in-complete, the literature on teaching those skills is virtually nonexistent" (Bernstein, 1981, p. 73). Gresham (1982), drawing from Bandura's work on Social Learning Theory (1969, 1977), identifies three di-mensions for conceptualizing the teach-ing of social skills. The first dimension refers to whether or not the students possess the necessary social skill in their behavioral repertoire. The second dimen-sion, a performance dimension, classifies those social behaviors the student pos-sesses but is not using at the desired rate. The third dimension classifies those so-cial behaviors not adquately displayed because the students' lack of self-control interrupts their ability to demonstrate the desired behavior. Depending upon the dimension in which the student's social behavior falls, the teacher would either model and teach the desired behavior, manipulate antecedents and consequences to solicit the appropriate rate for the behavior, or teach the student self-instructional techniques.

Vaughn & Lancelotta (in progress) have evaluated the efficacy of an inter-personal problem solving training pro-gram on the social skills and social status of learning disabled second, third, and fourth graders. This program is based on a model which has been successfully evaluated with other populations includ-ing aggressive young children and stu-dents with mental retardation (Vaughn & Ridley, 1983; Vaughn, Ridley, & Bul-lock, 1984; Vaughn, Ridley & Co. 1983). The program teaches the following core components: alternative thinking, empa-thy, cue sensitivity, predicting conse-quences, short and long term goal identi-fication and integrating the problem

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solving process and has made extensive use of peer counselors.

Madden & Slavin (1983) review the ways in which social skills have been taught. These include coaching, teaching specific social skills to an individual stu-dent and providing feedback; modeling, teaching through some form of guided example; reinforcement, managing ante-cedents, consequences, and group con-tingencies; cognitive behavior modifica-tion, managing behaviors by teaching self-monitoring techniques; and coopera-tive intervention, developing projects which require cooperative, not competi-tive interaction between LD and non LD students.

In addition to procedures which are frequently used to teach social skills, several curricula have been developed to teach social skills. At the early childhood level, McCarthy, Lund, Bos & Vaughn (1984) have developed a social skills cur-riculum to teach specific social skills such as greeting others, playing coopera-tively, sharing, and making transitions from one learning center to the next. These social skills are taught through individual and group programming to young children with special needs. So-cial skills curricula developed for teach-ing adolescent mildly handicapped stu-dents include The Marathon Program, developed by ABT Associates, The So-cial Solutions Curriculum by the Ameri-can Institute for Research, and The So-cial Skills Curriculum, developed by the University of Kansas Institute for Re-search in Learning Disabilities (Schu-maker, Pederson, Hazel, & Meyen, 1983). All three of these curricula include in-structor's manuals, workbooks, and ac-tivities for teaching social skills to ado-lescents across various settings. Stephen's (1978) social skills training curriculum describes specific techniques for teaching 136 social skills which fall into four categories, (a) behaviors related to the environment, (b) behaviors related to in-terpersonal skills, (c) behaviors related to task, and (d) self-related behaviors.

While materials which assist in identi-fying and teaching social skills to learn-ing disabled students are necessary, they are not sufficient. Understanding social-emotional development and how social skills are and can be acquired is essen-tial. While a curriculum can provide

guidelines for teaching social skills, a curriculum in and of itself is always inad-equate. Understanding the development and acquisition of social skills is as im-portant as understanding the acquisition and development of academic learning. Teacher education programs need to raise social skills instruction to a place where it is considered a necessary skill to be acquired for success in life. This requires including social skills in assessment, methods, practicums, and other courses which focus on educating teachers to work successfully with learning disabled students. In addition, as part of the so-cialization process, it is important for teachers to acquire and use interpersonal social skills when interacting with oth-ers, most importantly students, and to create a classroom climate which facili-tates peer friendships, cooperation, shar-ing, and a sense of working together.

Learning disabled students are at risk for being social rejects and isolates. They are frequently uninvolved and ignored. Their social relationships with peers and with adults produces frustration, lowered self-concept, and loneliness. Social skill acquisition must become part of our teacher education programs and our di-rect instruction to learning disabled stu-dents. What greater skill can we teach students than the ability to make and maintain positive relationships with others?

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Dr. Vaughn is Assistant Professor of Education. Address: School of Education and Allied Profes-sions, PO Box 248065, Coral Gables, FL 33124.

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