Is social skills training unfair?

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I've been having this thought for ages. So we don't naturally have social instincts and have to learn them the hard way. Being an aspie means you CAN learn them, so people expect you to communicate like a normal person. I keep thinking it's rather unfair. We have to put in the extra effort to act a mediocre version of "normal". It's exhausting and yet the performance is still below-expectations. Why can't we just be ourselves and be accepted? At least by those who have known us for a long time. (Just had a frustrating session with my mom on the phone, spending nearly an hour not understanding each other, and this happen frequently.)

I'm decently articulate and slightly outgoing. You'd think I can handle this social interaction things. Well I can handle a moderate dose at a time, if the person is predictable. But even if I was talking beautifully with someone, one unexpected question or response then I'm stumped. What did they mean? How did they come up with that? What am I suppose to say? My brain's searching frantically in my mental rules book for answers. Then they get upset with me due to the lack of proper response, and I'm even more stumped. If I tell them (honestly) I don't really understand them, they'd think I'm acting stupid and being insulting, because "anybody" could understand. NT people seem to take everything as personal insult.

I've been reluctant to push my children into more social skills trainings. I love them the way they are and don't want the to put on an act all the time. Besides they aren't as high functioning as I am so they don't even have any hope of putting on a good act. Sometimes I think it's all futile to try to fit in. It's causing me much stress and I'm still a weirdo to everyone. Why bother? It's not like associating with these people feel rewarding or anything.

I agree with you on the premise that it is unfair that one is expected to do something that exhausts and pains them and that they do not enjoy doing simply due to the fact that they have the capacity to do it. People with joint pain have the physical capacity to run a mile, for example, but nobody would expect said person to put themselves through that much pain. In the case of socializing, most people do not realize that the effort is just as draining and often as painful as with a physical disability; the public sees many more example of joint pains and of chest pains than of social pains.

The intention of social skills training, though, is to "level the playing field" in favor of those with social difficulties; communicating in a manner that can be construed as empathetic and that is on the same "wave-length" as the majority of people can make transactions with that majority go a bit soother. Much like learning a second language when traveling abroad, learning some social abilities may make interaction with the "locals" a bit easier and help the "foreigner" to obtain things that they need and want, but, much like with traveling abroad, the "locals" should be forgiving of the "foreigner" and their eccentricities, as learning a second language is never easy. The point of that metaphor is that social skills training is a nice thing to have but that it should be treated as an "extra" skill that one has learned and is still learning and not as something that is innate.

Can you explain what this "fair" word means?

Social skills training isn't only about making people fit in.

There is making people more capable autistic people, by allowing them to communicate better as who they are, without them offending people, and without them getting into situations which are unsafe.

And there is trying to force them into pretending to being neurotypical.

Both of these can be social skills training.

They are drastically different from each other, in terms of what the pressure it puts on the person are.

I won't pretend to be NT. I'm an autistic person.

But I've had times when I've seen 4 different therapists a week (between sensory, social, executive functioning), by my choice.

But while I won't go through and do "you do this sort of greeting" because that takes too much out of me, being able to eat food that I'd like to, instead of not interacting with people at all, would be nice.


I'd say overall, you need to look at who is it helping - is it helping the individual, or is it helping others by them not needing to deal with the individual being different.

Sometimes its good, usually its just saying don't be yourself.

I went on social skills therapy-- started with 'assertive ' skills, helped a bit as in say what I mean but without hurting others, coping with being 'loner' but then my therapist wanted me to go out once a week with my peers- ran through that door and never came back. Just like in any type of therapy, it depends who is the therapist and how he does his job..

I think it would have helped me in my childhood. I think I had it in my childhood like in speech therapy. Does learning to stay on topic count or turn taking or trying to not interrupt or sit still in my seat and keep my feet and legs still? Back then I didn't know any difference so it never bothered me and you got speech bucks for performing the right behavior the teacher wanted. Then you trade the fake money in for prizes. In fact my speech therapist was the one who suspected after knowing me for three years I may have Asperger's when I was in fifth grade. We also used to play a board game and it taught you skills too like hygiene and it had stories in the game. My speech therapist would change the names in the story and use our names instead to make it more fun. But when she left my school and went somewhere else because she didn't like the work politics there and got sick of it, I hated my new speech therapist. We didn't get along and I could never do anything right and she had no prizes. So my parents dropped that class for me because I was unhappy and it wasn't helping me anymore.


I don't know if this was also social skills training but I was encouraged to join a group and we learned passive aggressive and assertive behavior. That class also had prizes and we got poker chips for participating and we would trade them in for prizes. Then I was forced to be in another group and it sucked, no prizes and it was work sheets and I always got stuck in traffic on the way home and miss my TV show or the first half of it.


Social skills training isn't only for kids with ASDs.

There are some kids who may not care or want to fit in when young, but have a burning need for it later on, especially when puberty hits and a physical interest in another may develop. Some will never care, but some might. You have to prepare for that eventuality otherwise I think you do your child(ren) a disservice. It will just be that much harder for them later on if and when you are not around to support them.

I do believe it is always best to equip kids with as many tools as you can, in order for them to have at their disposal if they ever need them. They can choose not to use them later on, but that would be their choice. I do think it is a parent's responsibilities to equip their children as best they can to function or succeed in life, and I use the term "succeed" very loosely, meaning whatever manifestation each person chooses to use as a measure of their success. Happiness is key but only partly so. If a kid is only happy playing videogames all day, by indulging that and not teaching any tools toward self-sufficiency, that is neglectful, even though the kid may feel perfectly happy doing that 24/7. Teaching social skills expands their worlds a little more, so that they develop and have access to resources to help them survive--and yes, that could mean knowing how to ask for or get help from other people, obtain employment, or anything else.

I agree with Tuttle's analysis and I think of it this way--there are two very different activities that carry the same name.

One of these is all about conformity and appearances and the goal is to make the autistic person less noticeably different.

The other is about equipping the autistic person with a set of techniques for more effectively getting what they want and need from their environment. I thought the PEERS program stuff in Alex's videos was a great example of this.

Too much of what we have seen as "social skills" training is really the first and I don't want to make my kids go through that. When they can get the other kind, I am all for it. I wish I had seen the PEERS video about bullying before my kids went to school. I wish I had the same kind of training for the things I have been through at work in the last few years.

Seems like social skills training would be no different than for example teaching deaf kids to lip read.

the ultimate goal is just to help them get on better in the interactions they have with other people.