Social Competence and Social Skills: A Theoretical and Practical Guide

182 Pages·2021·5.086 MB·English

by  Zilda A. P. Del Prette, Almir Del Prette

Zilda A. P. Del Prette
Almir Del Prette
Social
Competence
and Social
Skills
A Theoretical and Practical Guide
Social Competence and Social Skills
Zilda A. P. Del Prette • Almir Del Prette
Social Competence
and Social Skills
A Theoretical and Practical Guide
Zilda A. P. Del Prette Almir Del Prette
Department of Psychology Department of Psychology
Federal University of São Carlos Federal University of São Carlos
São Carlos, São Paulo, Brazil São Carlos, São Paulo, Brazil
ISBN 978-3-030-70126-0 ISBN 978-3-030-70127-7 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70127-7
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Preface
Social skills, which are required for successful interactions, have been considered as
a protective factor for development, health, and well-being, and on the contrary,
interpersonal problems are recognized as risk factors for this. Evidence concerning
these relationships seems to be the main interest regarding the topic of interpersonal
relationships.
Coinciding with this interest, we have observed a growing movement of theoreti-
cal, practical, and research fields concerning social skills in Brazil over the last two
decades. Theoretical, because any scientific discipline requires theories that explain
the human functioning within the scope of the topics it privileges. Practical and
research, because applying available knowledge is supported by advances in scien-
tific research.
This manual is part of this movement and is the result of knowledge accumulated
in recent years about social skills and social competence. It is divided into three
parts, sequentially organized to: (I) address the theoretical basis that guides and
justifies decisions of interventions in this area; (II) provide information on proce-
dures, techniques, and intervention resources regarding the logic of social compe-
tence requirements; and (III) present practical guidelines for planning and
conducting programs to promote social skills and social competence in both group
and individual formats.
In Part I, Chap. 1, after briefly describing the field of social skills, contextualiz-
ing the concepts of social skills and social competence, we aim to define social
skills and their main classes and subclasses, as well as their nonverbal and paralin-
guistic components (NVPC). This is followed by a proposal of a social skills port-
folio (including these components) aiming to organize deficits and resources as the
basis for defining intervention objectives that meet clients´ needs.
In Chap. 2, the focus is on the renewed analysis of the concept of social compe-
tence, understood as strategically central in relation to the others. Criteria are
defined to evaluate social competence, highlighting the instrumental and ethical
dimensions of this construct and its implications for interpersonal relationships.
Thus, a social competence model is proposed that includes four components: (1)
v
vi Preface
variability in social skills, (2) self-monitoring and contingency analysis, (3) knowl-
edge and self-knowledge, and (4) ethics and values of coexistence.
Chapter 3 addresses the notions of interpersonal tasks, social roles, and cultural
practices as contexts relevant to understanding social skills, social competence, and
also client deficits and resources to deal with interpersonal demands. The aim of this
discussion is to highlight the possible contribution of social competence to outline
new cultural practices in different sectors of human coexistence.
Chapter 4 presents the rationale for social skills training (SST) programs based
on the positive correlations and problems associated with social skills deficits and
other requirements of social competence. Regarding these considerations, a brief
presentation is made on preventive, therapeutic, and professional programs, as well
as on the possibilities of interventions in group and individual formats. At the end
of this chapter, we present the rationale of the experiential method, defining experi-
ential activities and their use for promoting social skills and social competence.
Part II presents guidelines for promoting social competence and its requirements.
Chapter 5 focuses on the evaluation (initial, process, continuous, and final), high-
lighting the importance of evaluating the follow-up of the results obtained. From
this perspective, the evaluation instruments and procedures usually used in Brazil
are briefly presented. In Chap. 6, practical guidelines are presented to use experien-
tial activities and other procedures, techniques, and resources involved in promoting
social competence. Chapter 7 addresses, one by one, the requirements of social
competence, providing guidelines on how to promote them, using the intervention
conditions described in the previous chapter.
Part III deals with planning and conducting programs to promote social compe-
tence and its requirements in group and individual formats. In order to do this, after
considering structural and formal aspects of a program, we highlight the special
care taken and guidelines to define the relevant objectives of intervention with cli-
ents, organization throughout sessions, and the planning of each session.
Based on previous analyses and information, Chap. 9 presents an intervention
plan through an SST program. This plan is organized into files including sugges-
tions of different activities, for example, homework, experiential activities of lead-
ins to sessions, action plans for the three phases of each session (initial, intermediate,
and final), and different procedures. Readers will also note that the group and indi-
vidual formats are considered, each of them exemplified with a case study.
Chapter 10 includes 27 activities (experiential activities and practical exercises),
tested for SST programs and referred to in the files presented in the previous chap-
ter. Each one is described in detail, considering: (a) objectives, (b) materials, (c)
procedure, (d) observations, and (e) variations. They are experiences and new activ-
ities in relation to others already published by the authors.
São Carlos, São Paulo, Brazil Zilda A. P. Del Prette
Almir Del Prette
Acknowledgments
This manual is the result of many years of study and research. We would like to take
the opportunity to thank colleagues as well as graduate and undergraduate students
for their valuable collaboration, not only in psychology, but also in psychopeda-
gogy, education, and other areas.
We are grateful for the valuable contribution from our peers in the field of social
skills who, in response to our request, have suggested various contents of a manual
for a country still lacking in this type of publication. Suggestions from these col-
leagues were important so that the final result would cover, if not all, at least the
main contents expected of a manual. Therefore, we would like to thank Ana Carolina
Braz, Daniele Carolina Lopes, Camila Negreiros Comodo, Camila Pereira-Guizzo,
Carolina Severino Lopes, Elizabeth Joan Barham, Sheila Giardini Murta, and Talita
Pereira Dias. We would especially like to thank our colleagues Camila Negreiros
Comodo, Shirley Simeão, and Talita Pereira Dias for reading Chap. 9 and making
suggestions. We are still grateful to Jane Godwin Coury and Anik Setti for the care-
ful translation of our book (original in Portuguese) into English.
As in other books, we would also like to affirm that this product is part of our
commitments to the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development
(CNPq), which supports us with productivity grants. We would like to mention our
affiliation to the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), as senior full profes-
sors, as well as the Graduate Program in Psychology (Zilda and Almir), Graduate
Program in Special Education (Almir) and to the National Institute of Science and
Technology on Behavior, Cognition and Teaching (INCT-ECCE, Zilda).
We would be grateful if readers could send us any comments about the book to
the following e-mail addresses: [email protected] and [email protected]. Readers
will be able to find articles on the topic addressed in this book at our website: http://
www.rihs.ufscar.br, available for downloading, as well as summaries and reviews of
our books.
vii
Contents
Part I Conceptual Basis
1 Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1 Social Skills as a Theoretical and Practical Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 Social Skills as a Concept . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 Definition of Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.4 Classes and Subclasses of Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.4.1 General Social Skills Portfolio. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.4.2 Basic Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
1.5 Social Skills: Topography and Functionality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.6 Learning Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2 Social Competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.1 Definition of Social Competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.1.1 Social Competence: Private and Public Behaviors . . . . . . . 18
2.1.2 Social Competence Evaluation Criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.1.3 Ethical Dimension and Basic Criterion
of Social Competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.1.4 Social Competence and Reciprocal Exchanges . . . . . . . . . . 23
2.2 Social Competence Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.2.1 Social Skills and Behavioral Variability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
2.2.2 Self-Monitoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.2.3 Knowledge and Self-Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.2.4 Ethics and Values of Coexistence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3 Interpersonal Tasks and Cultural Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3.1 The Concept of Interpersonal Tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3.2 Social Skills and Social Roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
3.3 Social Skills Deficits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3.4 Social Competence and Cultural Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
ix
x Contents
4 Programs and the Experiential Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4.1 Positive Correlations of Good Social Skills Repertoires . . . . . . . . . 45
4.2 Problems Associated with Social Skills Deficits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
4.3 Social Skills Training (SST) Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.4 SST Program Applications and Clientele . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
4.4.1 Social Skills Programs in Individual Intervention . . . . . . . . 50
4.5 The Experiential Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
4.5.1 What Is an Experiential Activity? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
4.5.2 Analogous and Symbolic Experiential Activities . . . . . . . . 53
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Part II G uidelines for Practice
5 Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
5.1 Initial Evaluation: Why and What to Evaluate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
5.1.1 How to Assess . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
5.2 Process Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
5.3 Continuous Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
5.4 Final Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
5.4.1 Reporting Progress to Client . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
5.5 Follow-Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
5.6 Generalization Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
6 Techniques, Procedures, and Resources Associated
with Experiential Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
6.1 Main Techniques and Procedures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
6.2 Describing Some Techniques and Procedures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
6.2.1 Interpersonal Homework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
6.2.2 Using Multimedia Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
6.2.3 Instructional Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
7 How to Promote Social Competence Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
7.1 Variability of Social Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
7.2 Self-Monitoring and Contingency Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
7.3 Knowledge About the Social Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
7.4 Values of Coexistence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
7.5 Self-Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Part III P lanning and Conducting Practice
8 Planning a Social Skills Program Targeted at Social Competence . . . 87
8.1 Structure of SST Experiential Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
8.1.1 Number of Participants and Their Characteristics . . . . . . . . 88
8.1.2 Physical Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Contents xi
8.1.3 Initial Contract . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
8.1.4 Program Length and Sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
8.1.5 Participation of Co-therapist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
8.2 Defining the Objectives of the Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
8.3 Pacing Objectives in Program Sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
8.4 Planning Each Session . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
8.5 The Question of Generalization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
8.6 From Planning to Conducting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
9 Conducting a Social Skills Program Oriented Toward
Social Competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
9.1 Conducting Experiential Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
9.2 Conducting Interpersonal Homework (IH) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
9.3 Organizing and Conducting the Program’s Group Sessions . . . . . . 100
9.3.1 Initial Sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
9.3.2 Intermediate Sessions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
9.3.3 Final Sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
9.3.4 Illustrative Case of SST in Group Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
9.4 Organizing and Conducting SST in Individual Intervention . . . . . . 111
9.4.1 How to Use Experiential Activities in Individual
Intervention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
9.4.2 Using Other Techniques, Procedures, and Resources . . . . . 112
9.4.3 Illustrative Case of SST in Individual Format . . . . . . . . . . . 113
9.5 Therapist’s Final Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
10 Experiential Activities and Other Procedures and Techniques
for Social Skills Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
10.1 Experiential Activities for the Beginning
and End of a Session . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
10.1.1 Name Tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
10.1.2 Praising Is Good, and I Like It . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
10.1.3 Observing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
10.1.4 Dancing to the Tune . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
10.1.5 Eye Contact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
10.1.6 Bonding with Your Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
10.1.7 In Someone Else’s Shoes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
10.1.8 Doing Good Is Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
10.1.9 Watch Where You Step . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
10.2 Experiential Activities for the Key Part of the Session . . . . . . . . . 120
10.2.1 Self-Monitoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
10.2.2 Self-Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
10.2.3 Self-Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
10.2.4 Dealing with Preoccupation and Stress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
10.2.5 The Silence Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127