Summarizes research on whether individuals with learning disabilities exhibit social deficits characteristic of their population and whether instructional time should be spent teaching social skills conducted over 14 years by University of Kansas Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities (KU-IRLD). Describes commonalities across KU-IRLD…

Explores attitudes, values, and behavior needed to be an effective member of an action learning team, including group process skills and problem-solving approaches. (SK)

Describes helping business students prepare for job interviews and other business events by learning and practicing business etiquette at a dinner set up by business-communication instructors and the university food service. (SR)

Professionals in aging services (n=70) rated practice competence in interpersonal interactions and accountability as highly important for entry-level professionals. Financial and personnel management ranked lowest. Competencies were changing to reflect changes in the environment and in the needs of older adults and service providers. (SK)

Examines the relative influences of family functioning (general) and family members' sense of competence (specific) on the community adaptation of 180 seriously mentally-ill adults. Although both variables were significantly associated with the ill family member's level of adaptation, sense of competence was the more powerful influence.…

Interviews with 48 participants aged 7-8, 9-10, 11-12, and 13-14 and with 159 aged 5-6, 9-10, 15-16, and 18-29 showed that younger children have different definitions of bullying and lack social and assertiveness skills, which may explain the age decline in bullying reports. (SK)

Eight low-functioning and non-verbal children with autism were presented with a modified version of the "still face" paradigm in an investigation of their expectancies concerning human social behavior. Results indicated the children were unable to form a generalized expectancy for social contingency in human beings with whom they have not yet had…

Systematic naturalistic observations of imitation, theory of mind, play, and social contact were conducted with children with autism, adults with autism, children with learning disabilities, and normally developing young children. Although little imitation was observed in any but the normal young children, the autistic subjects showed less…

Examines the effects of emotional openness and other potential predictors of attitudes toward seeking psychological help in a sample of college students. Results indicate that gender (male), perception of stigma, discomfort with emotions, and lower psychological distress accounted for 25% of variance in attitudes toward seeking psychological…

Discussion of strategies for improving the social integration of children with Asperger syndrome covers characteristic difficulties in social integration and specific strategies, such as providing opportunities to interact with normal children, providing knowledge of the nature of Asperger syndrome, teaching theory of mind skills, use of social…

Seeks to determine the kinds of communicative knowledge and skills that are most associated with communicatively competent members of Thai organizations. Suggests that Thais who are perceived to be communicatively competent know how to avoid conflicts with others; control their emotions; display respect, tactfulness, modesty, and politeness; and…

Indicates the importance of interpersonal skills in the workplace and suggests that the business curricula offers many opportunities for incorporation of group activities. Offers steps for planning student group activities. (JOW)

Lovell and Richardson discuss how, through the family and consumer sciences curriculum, preventing acts of school violence can be presented to students as early as the sixth grade. They suggest that incidents of school and family violence can be reduced by teaching relationship skills. Davis describes STOP the Violence, a program that uses peer…

This study compared four systems for diagnosis of autism (Diagnostic and Statistical Manuals of Mental Disorders III, III-R, and IV, and the International Classification of Disabilities-10) with 2 empirically derived taxa and 3 social subgroups (aloof, passive, and active but odd) in 194 preschool children with social impairment. Findings support…

This study, with 15 individuals having intellectual disabilities, found that each participant's social skills moderately predicted the average social stability achieved by all of his/her social network members, but poorly predicted average social stability achieved by the participant's three most stable social network members. Social network…