SOCIAL STORIES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL COMPETENCE AND COMMUNICATION SKILLS IN THE AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER (ASD) CHILD
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Abstract
Social competence and communication skills are weakened among autistic children in comparison to the typically developing children. Hence, this research was conducted to look at how Social Stories (Gray, 1996) act as an
intervention technique that could enable an autistic child get a sense of social interactions and to understand the hidden rules that govern behaviours. The instruments used to collect data are: three social stories, interview questions and social interaction checklist. The objectives of this research are; 1) to discuss the development of spoken discourse in a Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) child and 2) to use the Theory of Mind (ToM) by Premack & Woodruff (1978) to explain the situation. The sample consisted of one child with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) who is 3 years old when the first observation started. The observations were done for two years. The location of the research was in Semenyih Selangor, Malaysia. The findings of the research showed that the autistic child displayed very minimum social interactions towards the social stories read to him. He did not understand other people’s intentions but he could acquire the language. The absence of ToM has made him unable to understand the indirect instructions. For future research, researchers in Malaysia could look for more interventions that would help ASD children to correct their responses to situations in a non-threatening manner.
