Sansosti, F.J., Powell-Smith, K.A., and Kincaid, D. (2004). A research synthesis of social story interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities. 19 (4): 194-204.

This article reviews all of the research that has been done regarding Social Stories, a technique for teaching social skills to children on the autism spectrum. The method involves a therapist, educator, or some other trained professional who is working with the child writing a detailed story about a specific social situation with which the child has had difficulty in the past and is expected to have to face again. The story ends with the child demonstrating the positive behavior that is being taught and a successful outcome ensuing, and the story is read to or by the child on a regular basis in the hope that s/he will be able to refer back to it when in the given social situation. Social Stories are generally regarded in professional communities as effective social skills interventions for children with Autism and Asperger Syndrome, but little research has been done to validate these beliefs.

The authors found a total of ten peer-reviewed and published research studies on Social Stories, only eight of which actually documented outcomes that occurred after the technique was used. Virtually all of those outcome-related studies had some potential drawbacks in terms of methods: Many were single-subject studies (meaning that only one child was studied). Some used an AB research design (meaning that they only looked at what happened before and after the Social Stories were used, which in and of itself does not prove that the Social Stories were the cause of any changes). In fact, some of the studies included participants who were receiving other types of behavioral interventions while the study was going on, and some were pre-experimental (meaning that whatever was being evaluated after the Social Stories intervention – such as the number of times the child exhibited a targeted behavior during a class period – was not assessed before the intervention began). Many of these and other drawbacks discussed in the article, of course, reflect the multiple variables and outside necessities that so often come into play when doing behavioral research in general and, in particular, such intensive research on autistic children who are at a critical point to receive whatever interventions are available. Nevertheless, they are significant limitations.

The findings of the more well-structured of the studies do provide preliminary evidence that Social Stories may have some substantial benefit for children on the spectrum, although clearly more research with much wider samples are needed to confirm that. However, none of the studies addressed programming for generalization (meaning whether or not using Social Stories to teach about one behavior would have any affect on any others) and the research that did look at programming for maintenance (meaning whether or not any improvements that were observed continued after the use of Social Stories was phased out) was not extremely encouraging. The studies cited also seem to reflect a kind of piecemeal, non-collaborative approach to Autism research, with different studies not necessarily building sequentially upon one another’s findings (for example, a study on whether musical Social Stories are more effective than traditional written or spoken versions seems premature). It is also worth noting that the research that was discussed focused predominantly on interventions for specific problem behaviors, even though Social Stories are also thought to be effective in teaching more nuanced social skills to higher-functioning children.

Recommendations for future research and application of the Social Stories technique until more research is conducted are also discussed in the article.

- John Cavanagh

Asperger Foundation International
501 Madison Avenue, 18th Floor
New York, NY 10022
Phone: 212-371-7755
www.aspfi.org