Social stories are a popular intervention technique utilized to teach appropriate social skills to individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). While there is an abundant amount of research asserting the effectiveness of social stories as a social intervention strategy for children with ASD, there are also limitations of that previous research. The current study identifies three limitations of existing social story research, including: a lack of adherence to the social story guidelines published by Carol Gray (the creator of social stories), limited information reported on participants with predominant use of elementary school aged and seemingly higher functioning participants, and the inability to exhibit a causal relationship between an independent and dependent variable. In order to address these three limitations, a social story intervention aimed at increasing appropriate social behaviors was implemented using three pre-school age children with ASD. All social stories utilized throughout the study fully adhered to Carol Gray's guidelines and acted as a sole independent variable. A withdrawal design was employed and provided no evidence of an increase in appropriate behavior displayed by any of the three participants. Keywords: social story, autism, behavioral intervention, pre-school age children.
Read
