Children who are neurodivergent can sometimes struggle to make and sustain meaningful social connections with their peers. This can be due to difficulties understanding nonverbal cues, ability (or lack thereof) to tolerate playing the way a peer wants to play an activity or have conversations about what the peer is interested in, or even unfamiliarity with activities/topics that their peers are interested in.
Here are several ways caregivers and clinicians can assist a child to become more successful in their social interactions, leading to more reinforcing interactions and greater ability to connect with their peers.
1. Model social skills for your child
Children learn from watching others’ behavior. You have likely seen your child sing songs or imitate the actions of characters. Consider modeling when it comes to social skills.
There are dozens of videos showing children interacting together that can help demonstrate appropriate social skills, but consider how you can model in play with your child, such as with dolls/action figures (demonstrating greetings, play, and basic conversational skills).
2. Prime your child for a social situation
Priming (or preparing) your child for a social situation can be a helpful way to set expectations in advance. This can look like discussing who your child is going to play with, what the activities will be, and where the playdate will take place. Especially if your child struggles with unpredictability, this preparation can be key!
A helpful way to use this strategy for visual learners is by the use of social stories. Social stories are stories that are written in first person and discuss expectations for an upcoming activity in a prosocial way (that is, what a child should be doing instead of what not to do). You can even simply write out a quick social story on a piece of paper for your child (stick figures work great!).
3. Prompt your child during the social interaction
Help your child by giving them the words to respond to a peer if they are struggling (for example, quietly offering, “You can say…” in response to something a peer has said to the child). Using gestural (pointing) or model (demonstrating an action) prompts to help the child attend to the activity or to the peer can be a helpful way to assist the child with understanding where the focus of the social interaction is. Fade back when the child is successfully interacting with the peer so the social interaction is more natural and not impacted by your presence (you can remain nearby and step in as needed).
4. Practice! Practice! Practice!
Like any skill, social skills require practice. The more opportunities to practice your child’s new skills, the better! It can be helpful to keep interactions brief initially (for instance, 30 minute playdate before extending to long social interactions) to keep your child successful and avoid burn out (it’s tiring practicing a new skill!).
It can also be helpful to practice one-on-one (for example, a playdate with one other child) many times before proceeding to group playdates (such as birthday parties, play spaces, etc.).
5. Debrief with your child after the social interaction
It can be helpful to debrief with your child (if they have the language/ability to do so) after a social interaction. This can be an opportunity for your child to share any part of the activity where what the other child said or did was confusing to your child (to assist in interpreting nonverbal cues, the other child’s potential perspective of a situation, etc.).
It can also be an opportunity to praise your child for what went well during the social interaction so they can continue to learn appropriate interactions going forward and ensure future social interactions become more and more successful in creating friendships for your child.
Building foundational social skills in children and adolescents is important to help your child build self-esteem and confidence in their social connections, so they will be better prepared for making friendships throughout their lives.
