Teaching job-related social skills to learning disabled adolescents

Little information is available on the use of social skills by persons with disabilities in work settings. Positive styles of interaction in the workplace might include the job-related social skills of explaining a problem to a supervisor, providing constructive criticism, accepting criticism, accepting a compliment, accepting an instruction, and providing a compliment. The effects of training procedures for these social skills were evaluated with two learning disabled adolescents. The results showed the procedures to be effective in increasing the level of job-related social skills performed by the participants in analogue situations. Direct observations of performance taken at the adolescents' place of employment suggest some generalization of training effects to actual work environments.