Social Skills: do you think they can be learned?

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I think they can, at least, from what I am told by some of my peers. Over the year I have become more calm, focused, and able to keep on track in a conversation. Granted I still get bullied, but I think that's part of highschool life. With the clubs I am in, a job, and the weekly gaming I do with friends at the game-shop it seems that I am becoming more and more of a people person. Some others even tell me because of my cheery nature I am quite fun to have around~

I think the people skills that some may lack can be improved with practice, so long as you try~

I agree. I think my social skills can improve, they have been over the years. It takes a lot of hard work still. I feel like I am more comfortable in public and in conversations, I can even speak up in class sometimes (I usually start drifting on different subjects or object to some inconsequential detail). The thing is that it feels more like I'm better at pretending than actually improving.
The only time I actually feel comfortable is when I'm in a position of authority or expertise and I treat the people I talk to as mere peasants who should consider themselves lucky to be allowed the honour of my presence. Yet, I still come off and strange and spacey.
Being a mother also forces me to interact a lot more and in a lot more different situations. When I have no choice, I step up and get over myself, but it's always difficult and can never pull off the 'normal' look.

There are so many things to learn with social skills, nobody always get them right either, even NT's.
I think it is a really positive thing for people to try and improve their social skills, but don't get upset if things don't always go quite right.

ya, gotta b receptive to it, then learn it, ive done way better over the years, first u have to know yourself that its a problem, and hat usually happens around the teen years. I got pretty decent in highschool myself. Things have still improved over the years, just takes alot of observation, and willingness to get out their.

You can learn pretty good, but the problem is... it's never exactly going to be instinct. And when the rules change, you have to be quick enough with your mind to adapt on the fly.

The best way, is to just go out there and interact and make mistakes. Take a note of what you are doing that isn't work, and adapt. Try to think about social skills in terms of how other people will perceive you.

Yes you definately can learn social skills - I've learnt such skills within 2 years of being in the right place.

Aspergers is described as an inability to understand how to interact socially. That is what it says on the homepage of WrongPlanet.

Last edited by thyme on 26 Aug 2007, 12:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

But one can overcome the inability, yes?

I don't think you can learn "social skills" and I also think you shouldn't even try. In this matter it's all instinct and sincerity.

Hmm? Not try to be social? I think it's worth trying to overcome whatever setbacks you have instead of giving up on it.

I know from personal experience that I cannot learn social skills. I've tried and people have tried to help me but it doesn't do any good. I'll think i've made allot of progress and then some NT or group of Nt's will point out the fact that i'm weird, bizarre, strange, odd, blah, blah blah, yadda, yadda, yadda. So I have stopped trying to be like an NT or non-aspie person.

In some ways yes, in some ways no.

In essence some things are learnable, some things simply aren't. Some changes are easy to adapt to, some will have you begging for mercy at the hands of fate. Just don't take it to the point of harming/killing yourself.

A good example is learning how to cope with extreme changes, which many aspies other than me have had trouble with. I am now at the point that i can handle some, i still cannot handle all though. In fact i am guessing i seem more Neurotypical to some of you than most Aspies are. Do not think that, I still have major problems in my life. I cannot land a job for the life of me, I lost all motivation to because of the hundreds of unreplied applications i have put out. I also have trouble socializng still even. In fact i have odd social fears too, such as answering the phone or even simply going around without a shirt or going without shoes on.

Well, all i can say is we all just simply have to try our best and give it our all to make changes in our life for the better. From one Aspie to many others, do me a favor and do not lose hope, I have done so with so many things that i simply regret everything. I don't need other people making the same mistakes, both NTs and Non-Neurotypicals alike.

Absolutely! I've learned many social skills over the years, and even though I'm still far from perfect, I am always learning! Sometimes the learning is difficult, but I am blessed with a family that keeps pushing me to try again..and who is not hesitant to correct me when I screw up!

My theoretical knowledge is much above average because all normal people behave the same so everything you need is a set of rules you must use because people can be compared to machines and they generally react to the same set of rules. I have a good knowledge of psychology and thanks to it I know how to manipulate people. But in spite of this I don't like spending time with people and said knowledge is only theoretical because when among people I don't know how to behave when I'm with them. People are generally boring and predictable; I get bored with them very quickly. I described this here.

Even if one overcomes said inability it's like acquiring a new language - you can be even a fluent speaker but semantic subtleties will not be understood by such a person just like in case of his own, native language.

My social skills r gud but could b improved i have come over sum barriers as i do have quite a few friends who also have aspergers syndrome n i regularly play cricket which means i particpate n it improves my ability n decreases my disability.

Yep! Just like learning a second language. You may always have an accent, but with enough practice you'll be understandable.