Telling people that they have to act a certain way in order to make people like them is what cults do, and it's what abusers do. I get what the intention of this is, but that doesn't make it okay to condition people to want to please everyone. People who are conditioned like that are more likely to become victims of awful manipulative people. Definitely not okay.
@@simplyvince1744 It's teaching you how to be part of something greater than your individual self. For example, my ethnicity is English, so my socialisation was supposed to nurture me into my identity. I'm autistic and used to think i shouldn't try to change.
I'm over 40 now, recently diagnosed with ASD and in treatment for clinical depression since my teenage years. I'll just add that, yes, learning and understanding conventional social skills is essential to live a meaningful and fulfilling life in a society where we are not "the norm". But if this becomes the central task of your everyday life - to conform to society, without regard to your natural state of being, you will eventually end up drained, burned out, fundamentally unhappy, potentially even suicidal. I believe that to some degree, society will have to change, especially if more and more people have difficulties "functioning" as is required in order to live a decent and dignified life.
I've been suspecting I might be autistic for years and I mentally freaked OUT when you got to the part where they were teaching that people care more about how you make them feel than what you say! I asked my mom about it and she was like "Yeah, didn't you know that?" and then thought I was joking when I said I had no idea! I feel like I just discovered the rosetta stone of human interaction I have been missing all of my life. This is as big of a discovery as when I found out I have to fake looking people in the eye or they think I am being rude or that I'm abused or something. I didn't realize that until I was a teenager.
Me too I freaked out about that sentence. It explaines so much. For example when I feel bad, I never liked the feeling of people trying to comfort me with empty words. They would say things like "don't worry, everything will be fine...", thinking that it would make me feel better. I never understood the point of that. First of all: I like honnesty and facts, so stop pretending to know the outcome of this situation. And second: those empty words don't mean anything, neighter do they make me feel better...like why would they? I would rather have someone allowing me to feel bad, even if that completely kills the athmosphere. Someone who helps me digging into why something is making me feel bad, with clever insights. This is just one example. It so represents a big part of the clash between autistics and neurotypicals. I can see this difference totally appearing when an autistic person is having a discussion with a neurotypical person. The autistic getting upset about incorrect/unlogical statements/information being used, or opinions that they find unethical/immoral. Those things affect autistics often so much more and are more important to autistics than keeping a fake nice athmosphere. Then probably the autistic person getting upset and the neurotypical being like "let's keep the athmosphere nice". But in that moment the autistic is very likely to give more importance to what is being said than how the social interaction is making them feel.
People DON'T actually care what you're saying to them usually. Not in direct conversation from my personal experience, unless they're talking about themselves. Dale Carnegie's book How to Win Friends and Influence People really focuses on this fact and has been a worldwide classic for decades for this very reason. People are self-interested by nature and generally only care about how you make them feel. It's why I don't bother trying to make friends and my friends are my close family. Even my parents didn't usually care what I had to say. Remember that old saying "kids are to be seen and not heard"? That was what I grew up with. I used to dream about growing old enough that my "elders" would finally listen to my ideas and consider them. I'm 40 years old, and that magical day still hasn't happened. EXCEPT on the internet where you can occasionally find small groups of people to debate ideas with and they don't care who you are or how old you are (unless you sound like an immature kid). Thank god for the internet!
I took a dale carnegie class when I was 17, and I do think it helped me in life. I got 'most improved' since I was a gibbering mess at the start. What I learned and 'got permission' to do was treat people like fuckin idiots, lol! That's what I took away from Dale's philosophy. I always suspected people were shallow and only liked to hear about themselves, but I had faith in humanity that this wasn't true. But then, this whole class was designed to teach me that everyone is shallow and vapid. So I 'let' myself just go full on with that and, like I said, got most improved. IDK what the point of this post is, but it was my experience. From my perspective, All the 'help' for socially anxious or autistic people just seems to be NTs trying to say "Yea, we're sucky idiots just like you suspected! Treat us as such!". It always feels like they're trying to teach us THEIR worldview where they hold EVERYONE who isn't themselves as 'below' them in hierarchical rank. Like the 'imagine everyone in their underwear' advice. Assuming that would make you feel powerful since you're 'above' the naked people. When in reality, that just makes me feel embarrassed and out of place.
This is how I was raised. Whenever I was mad at neurotypicals it was my fault because I showed signs of individualality and when NTs were mad at me it was my fault because I showed signs of individuality. Also, I was often told that it wasn't everyone's job to change for me, while insisting that I change for everyone else.
I was in therapy ever since the fall of 1969. So much of the training was very simular to the stuff in today's video. Baisicly "COMPLY" "CONFORM"... ETC or Compel me to employ deep masking 24 / 7 in public. You are only allowed to be yourself in private. This is extremely exausting. I was able to comply fairly well up to my late 20s or early 30s then I started using booze and drugs to help me pretend. By my late 40s I couldn't do it any more I could no longer muster enough energy for such things. I'm so greatful that you are putting these things out there for our young people to have more to work with than we had. Thank you bunches baby Christa Ж
I don't act like my true self around my parents because when I do I'm "disrespectful." So I just behave in a way I know they won't yell at me for. But it doesn't make me feel good about myself in the slightest. It just makes me feel ignored and unseen. I have good self esteem and self love but pretending to be something I'm not definitely doesn't make me feel good about myself. My advice to anyone reading this is be who you really are and not what people want you to be.
This is something I've learned on my own to do. Before I was diagnosed I thought something was very wrong with me and I was the problem. So I changed myself to get along with those around me. I suffer from depression and anxiety because I thought like that. Now after being diagnosed I am coming to peace with all the past mistakes I've made and am learning to not be so guarded about my feelings and likes.
People Like me because i’m different, BECAUSE I don’t act like Everyone Else, This mindset is Crap, And Hurts everyone involved, makes everyone look bad. I fell into that mindset of everything Is my fault, and It has taken years of Therapy to Break that... so, that’s a thing...
This social thinking approach very much triggered the trauma I have from years and years of heavily masking. (Till age 25, now 30 and still in the process of changing old habbits and thinking patterns). What they seem to teach basicly looks like everything I am working on to let go of. I'm kind of shocked, are they seriously teaching this to vulnerable children?! Thank u for the video! I love hearing your views on things, I relate to your way of thinking, it's also just nice to recognize myself in how deeply touched u are by things and how big of a deal they seem to u. That's how I feel about so many things in life and often look around me and feel like "whyyy do I seem to care so much more deeply about certain things than other people?"😟 Haha I guess that's a state of being many autistics experience.
@@garyfrancis5015 I also feel this, the new rules really fit my autism. I like when shops are less bussy. I like staying at home a lot (I have a big garden, so now already 4 weeks not leaving the house was no problem for me at all). I'm used to having desinfecting gel with me, even before Corona (OCD). No social contact for long, also used to that. No kissing or shaking hands...no problemo😋When I hear people talking about living in fear, I feel like "welcome to my life"😅 Is it the similar for u?
Thank you SO much Stephanie. I'm an instructional aide for special education and one of the teachers whose class I support uses the social thinking curriculum, and pressures me to use the same language/guidance with students. You've perfectly summed up my issues with it. I have an issue with how often special education becomes "Conformity 101."
This just sounds like they want people to not be themselves and to just mask/conform. It just take me back to school where we were told to "act this way" to fit into classes and stuff. I think this is where I get my fears of really hating getting things wrong from honestly. I guess to some degree that being aware of how we present ourselves might be helpful. But it really should be on our terms and we shouldn't have to fit into what others expect because that to me is suppression on individuality and suppression of what makes us who we are. This really got me thinking so thank you Stephanie as always for your great videos and great topic choices :)
"This just sounds like they want people to not be themselves and to just mask/conform." In my 32 years of life, all I found is... YES THIS IS 100% WHAT 'NORMIE' CULTURE IS! It's ALLLLLLL one big bullying mechanism, and some people are responsive to that and develop the 'right' way, and other people need more emotional or physical beatings to comply. That's what an autism diagnoses indicates. The NTs will never admit it or view it this way, but I cannot see an argument otherwise based purely on the facts and reality I've seen. A bunch of people that can't stand when things aren't the way they expect. And THEY call US the "rigid" ones! >:( This whole social thinking scam is a huge trigger for me, lol. I've had this opinion since I was literally a child and I have never once been proven wrong... unless it's someone with autism, ADHD, bipolar, etc. I really have a hard time thinking that "neurotypical" isn't it's own type of diagnoses...
It feels like making this situation to be ok: "OMG, Look what you made me do, making me having to punch and strangle you. If you only could've been normal..." Sure teach people to be abusers. I feel with you... *sigh*
Literally just watching this and realising this is exactly what my old SLP used.. she even called it “social thinking” at one point. Now I legit have trauma and nightmares about this therapist. She taught me to mask so hard, to suppress my stimming and at FIVE FRICKING YEARS OLD scolded me for “going on and on too much”. SIGH.
I can agree, I'm a non allic person with an autistic partner, and this seems like masking with a HIGHLY manipulative twist. I would never wish this on my partner. I love them for who they are. I hope one day everyone can be loved that way and love everyone that way. The people who love you won't expect you to mask. They will do the work to understand.
I refuse to be an unpaid actor for the rest of my life. I don't get involved with people, though I do say Good Morning to my neighbours. I think I must give off "don't bother me" vibes as people don't speak to me first, they tend to respond when I speak to them. I think perhaps I've shut myself off from people so successfully that I'm doing it on autopilot. In college my sense of humour won me many friends, which I discovered by accident after one joke worked very well, so I kept on doing it (in 1987). The only social currency I have is the fact I can sing and write songs. This drew people to me in a way they never did before, and this was helpful I suppose, but I still didn't feel accepted by a social circle, they just noticed me more. Today I walk around minding my own business and living a quiet life, I have no friends or relationship (thank God), and I'm happy in my own space.
I never heard of this before, but on the surface it sounds kind of like the old 'how to win friends and influence people' type stuff, but as you kept explaining it, yea got kind of not good. and yea I agree 100% on your position of that 'social fake' thing!
I refuse to consider what other people think of me - it’s not my responsibility . My work is to discover who I am by exploring life & see what I like to learn more about, etc. - It is inappropriate for me to develop esp skills to figure out what other people like so I can arrange myself around them .. Mind blowing ! No wonder there’s so much confusion in the world ! PS - I don’t like staring into people’s eyes when I talk to them. It’s culturally inappropriate for me..
Hi there. I am an autistic speech language pathologist. I have very mixed thoughts on the Social Thinking Curriculum. Is it teaching masking? Pretty much, yes. It is exhausting to go through the think about what other people are thinking about me process. She has a Zones of Regulation part of the Curriculum, basically like meltdown, excited/anxious, neutral, tired, and falling sleep. Being able to identify "where" you are is important, and there is some good research coming out that an interaception based therapy program can be effective in helping emotional regulation. However, she has a component of the program that is being able to match the feeling and intensity of that feeling to the severity of the situation, and so you can visualize the disconnect. Those of us without intellectual disabilities can probably easily know that these two things are mismatched. Then what? I know I am overreacting--its hard for me to tell by how much, but I know I am. Can I stop crying? No. My feelings are still there. The intensity is still there. Her program is based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy principles. But the issue it that is takes so so much mental energy to try to think through, use my cognitive processes, to troubleshoot my emotions and make sense of them. I attended a talk of hers a year ago. A lot of her "target" client base seems to be the undiagnosed autistic kid in class who keeps pissing off his classmates by trying to outsmart the teacher and correct them and who ends up being bullied. Or, conversely, the kid in class who says some pretty shitty things to peers and doesn't see what the big deal is. These are populations where parts of the Social Thinking Curriculum could be beneficial, as you have autistic kids either being bullied or being bullies themselves.
It sounds like a formalized curriculum of the ways people have been treating autistic kids forever and the things we have to learn by trial and error, and then if we're lucky spend a lot of effort unlearning. I don't think it would have helped me to have a structured explanation of all the ways my behavior was defective so I could get started on fixing it ASAP. In any other context telling someone they're responsible for the thoughts you have about them is a type of emotional abuse.
What would you think about this as an approach? a) Teach them positive self-affirmations (since others tend to be drawn to confidence) b) Social stories c) Teaching them the golden rule. d) Teaching them boundaries, so if they're doing harmless autistic things, it's okay to say, "Don't bully me." "Don't treat me that way." "Don't make fun of me." Social interaction has always been a challenge, especially because I have mental health issues along with ADHD and autism (which I don't consider to be mental illnesses). Social skills training has always been triggering, and I have hard time using principles in high-stress situations where I'm on sensory overload to the point I'm dissociating, or having emotional flashbacks. Just wondering your thoughts, in case I end up adopting an autistic child, end up a special education teacher, become an OTA, or just end up working with autistic kids in some other capacity.
This sounds like what I have done and learned independently in my 30y of life. Now that I have learned that I'm autistic, I have realized that acting this way has caused my several burnouts and that not knowing the cause (being autistic and using my energies to act "normal" and "not wierd") has wasted my money and time in useless therapy for NTs. It honestly makes me cry (for reasons unknown to me, you know, because I'm autistic that way). It's very hard to act against my learned behaviours. It's so engraved in me and comes from my unconciousness. But it's funny how sometimes I realize that my learned behavior and my newfound rebellious will fight it out in my subcontiousness and raise the issue to my contiousness to deside.
The problem with "social thinking" is that it forces some of us to develop not just masking behaviors, but something far deeper and more injurious. I'm not sure what to call it, but "masking behavior" doesn't quite cover it. It's cumulative effects are manifested in low self-esteem, and for me, has caused me to feel like a liar and a fake even when I'm having success in various areas of my life; though I'm just trying to cope and "fit in". Eventually, from time to time, the maintenance of the facade becomes so exhaustive that I lash out in frustration and have completely life encompassing meltdowns, which seem inexplicable and "out of the blue" to others. "Practice Social thinking" is an underhanded way of saying "hurt yourself so that we feel more comfortable, weird kid". I saw in another comment here that someone referenced Dale Carnegie and his most popular work as kind of a guide post. I want to wholeheartedly disagree with that mode of thinking. What Dale Carnegie taught was a system that can be most accurately described as "Personality Ethics"; or in simple terms, "How to behave so that people will like you." "How To Win Friends and Influence People" is a master-class in social-thinking and manipulation for neuro-typical people and a master-class in masking for those who are affected by Autism. An "educator" handed that book to me when I was 13 and I employed it with great outward effect. The problem is that it's a very superficial system that should be used to augment an already healthy social self-image and the inner effect is very damaging when it's used as a set of masking techniques for a person who is challenged on that front. I'm trying to focus more on "Character Ethics" and learning to just be myself (and only myself) these days. Inner work, for me; rather than outer work, for everyone else. I think that in the long run, there will be more benefit for me and everyone else. I say "try" because I still fall into the trap of social thinking as a crutch and feel like I just got played immediately afterward, every time I catch myself... which is probably 3 to 5 times a day. ...And in true Autistic style, I only worked on this comment for 50 minutes and edited four times before noticing the time and moving on...
Stephanie Bethany I love your channel and this is great vid. Thank you. Sounds like Social Thinking teaching external locus of evaluation as a plus... a great source of depression and anxiety. The antisocial society strikes again, telling us only we are responsible for everything and everyone else is responsible for nothing in every social interaction.
The takeaway? We are less important, our authenticity, our integrity is less important than anyone else's. Sound's abusive and teaching the targets to internalise that abuse.
Well intentioned, perhaps, but sounds actively horrendous
The book “Captivate” by Vanessa Van Edwards takes this to the next level! I can send it to you on Audible if you want! It struck me, watching your video, how social skills are perceived as so critical in our world!
Coming from my experience, there's no amount of 'being nice' that will get some people to treat you right, and it takes a while to unlearn this. It just causes more anxiety because then you fear conflict. And if you slip up and have a bad/awkward moment, these people will still act like you grew a unicorn horn, just like the true angels of this world will treat you kindly regardless if you caused a situation to become awkward. This social thinking method won't work for interactions with people who react immediately to any deviation to "normal" socialization by themselves becoming off-putting.
Yup. It's weird. But I worked in retail and the more accommodating, nice, polite, and submissive I was to the customer and what they wanted the more mean they were to me. It's surprising how many people just want someone to kick. The more you try to please them, the crueler they are. Of course I can't yell and cuss at my job or anything really mean like that. But the more I raised my voice and the less nice I was, the less mean customers were. It's really sad to know that we live in a world with these people.
I went to camp as a young child and I was ostracized and ignored by all of the other girls. When I brought this up to the counselor, feeling so alone and isolated and feeling more of a connection to adults... Hoping she could help me... She told me I needed to put in more effort. She asked me how I expected the other kids to include me if I didn't try harder. I don't remember much from my childhood but that's one of the things that I never forgot. It crushed me. It told me I was the problem and I did not know how to be any other way. I almost always try to play devil's advocate and understand the other side. I did that when I first started watching this video to try to understand how this concept could be helpful and what parts were problematic but there is more problematic content here than helpful.
This was an excellent video. I didn’t even realize that they had someone teaching this kind of stuff. I totally agree with you Stephanie. *dramatic pan in* @4:51 “EXCUSE ME?!” Personally, I don’t think anyone should be teaching people to go around acting a certain way in order to get liked by people. Isn’t that essentially teaching other people to be less tolerant of others differences? I mean come on now. We’re all different. We’re supposed to celebrate those differences & try our best to be accepting; not to be teaching our children or other people to cookie cut or whitewash themselves in order to fit into a society that’s messy itself. I’ve always been a weirdo since I can remember & I’ve always accepted that & love that about myself. I most certainly will not change that for anyone nor should I have to because my weirdness doesn’t harm anyone or at least that’s not my intention. Growing up as an only child, quite possibly on the spectrum & being a lesbian in a supportive environment I was lucky to be able to establish myself as a person, embracing & loving every part of myself along with my imperfections as a human being. I’m a weirdo, you’re a weirdo, we’re all weirdos in some way to someone. Accept that, yourself & love that about yourself & others it may just be what makes someone unique & quite fantastic. As long as that weirdness doesn’t cross over into an unhealthy & cause harm then that’s perfectly fine otherwise that may require some deep introspection & or professional help sought out. With that being said, most people place far more value on someone who is genuine to themselves & authentic to other people rather than a plastic person but, then again fake people like fake people. Most people are probably fake at least sometimes & some most times, which I’ve dubbed ‘deep/shallow fakes’. Depends on the person & quite possibly the situation. By the way Stephanie, I can’t speak for anyone else, although I know that other people could say & feel the same way, I do care about you & what you have to say. I thoroughly enjoy your videos & your perspective. Now that’s GENUINE.😁
The better version of this i've heard about is in-school programs for elementary and middle school age autistic girls, because navigating the the social structures of nuerotypical girl can be very traumatic for young autistic girls. It sounds like it's one part anthropology/sociology. Like, let's talk about the behavior of neurotypical girls in their natural habitat...lol. Basically it objectively educates autistic girls on why neurotypical girls behave in a certain way and what they mean when they say different things. So learning how to translate neurotypical communication and how to fill in the spots that are confusing to you. The second part is part is like an acting and improv class. So it's still not telling them that their "default" setting is wrong, bad, or should be changed, but it teaches autistic girls what neurotypical girl's body language and social behavior means or why they do things. The goal is to get young autistic girls to understand the world of neurotypical girls so they can better understand the world around them better. They also participate in scripting activities and role playing so the autistic girl has a pool of resources to pull from when she doesn't know what do next. I really loved the way this kind of program was described because it specifically doesn't tell the autistic girl that her behavior is wrong and that she needs to be different. It's really designed to give her information she wouldn't be able to come to on her own and a tool kit to survive confusing interactions. I have no idea where this was implemented, I just remember watching a video by the woman who put together the program and thinking, Man, that wouldn't have solved all my problems but it would have really helped to know that my brain was different, its ok to be different, and be giving ways to interpret the world around me. I just remember repeating to myself over and over for the longest time, "why do I deserve to be treated like this? I didn't do anything." If someone had been able to work with to let me know that unfortunately, people can behave badly when they don't understand someone's behavior. Just like how I didn't understand my peer's behavior, they didn't understand mine. It would have made a world of difference to a have a pocket of resources to draw from if I ended up in a situation I wanted to get out of.
As a person with a learning disability, I think that it is very damaging for people with disabilities to have to conform just because the world or society do not understand us. Society just needs to try to understand, support, and help in any ways that they can. I have a TH-cam channel where I help, encourage, and inspire all people with disabilities by sharing my personal experiences and sharing important topics and tips through my ideas that I come up with and suggestions for others.
Wow! Talk about a biased therapy method if I've ever seen one. Basically, we're normal and you need to be like us or get lost. This might be enough to send some to an early grave via depression and suicide. I would also add that for those like myself, who have ADHD in addition to autism, there's no way we'd remember everything they're trying to tell us to watch for.
This is interesting... I didn’t realize it was a “thing”. I feel like I personally spent a lot of time worrying about this myself. (As an adult awaiting a diagnosis) so I feel like I was taught this unknowingly as a child... it gives me HORRIBLE ANXIETY. I will be chatting with the school at our next IEP meeting to see if they do this, and the details if they do.
Having to learn how other people navigate the social world quite late made me feel so many things. At first I was confused, then panicked that I should try to figure out how to do it, to then just feeling kind of sad. If I’m being blunt, it initially made me think of the whole thing as kind of hollow? I realize it’s just different brains and ways of doing things, but it was a shocking difference to me.
Very interesting, never heard of this before! Also wanted to thank you for putting the text up on your videos when reading. I have a hard time processing things when I hear them so I really appreciate it!
I think overall a better approach than social thinking would be making safe spaces for autistic people to express themselves. I got through elementary and middle school undiagnosed because I had my best friend who was also neurodivergent. Instead of trying to protect spectrum kids by making them not be different, creating groups of safe spaces would make a lot more sense. I've been able to glean so much wisdom from my fellow autistic friends, more so than some therapists who worked with me for years. It felt good to be in a space where everyone kind of got one another. www.spectrumnews.org/features/deep-dive/how-people-with-autism-forge-friendships/ I was able to find the Autistic Women's alliance and they're planning another Saturday chat in a couple weeks. www.autisticwomensalliance.com/ It was wonderful to talk to fellow spectrum women. Then there's also Felicity House in New York which is a recreational space for autistic women to just be themselves. felicity-house.org/ Having community supports for autistic people where they can feel included and accepted makes more sense to me.
I never realized I had autism until just this past summer and I'm in my late 40s. I've just wanted people to like me for who I was...and I guess I had always thought I was acting "normally" but I guess I wasn't at all as I was constantly bullied and picked on by others. So even if you are told to "act normal" it doesn't mean you are able to actually do it. They still know you are different somehow. I often feel I'm walking around with a big target on my back. And what happens when your ideas about what's right doesn't match up with the normal people around you? A good example is you don't drink alcohol and they think it's normal? Or you have celiac and you can't eat certain things and they tell you "a little won't hurt you..." So you try it and you end up puking for 4 days. Autism increases your risk for gut problems. Back then when I had listened to the NP (normal people) I didn't know I had celiac but I knew something in lots of food was bugging me so I was avoiding lots of processed foods but they convinced me to try a small pie and I ended up sick for four days. Then they told me it was all in my head as there was nothing wrong with the pies. They totally dismissed the fact I got sick.
I didn't know this was an official thing, but also knew it was a thing. It's also the biggest reason I am pursuing an official diagnosis of autism. My reality is not in line with whatever reality this is. 😫
My son's para teachers used expected and unexpected behaviors before we pulled him. THANK YOU FOR BRINGING THIS TO MY ATTENTION!! I had no idea this is what it meant. I thought it was a safety thing. Not a social thing. Now I'm mad.
Social thinking seems to be a very defensive, distrusting, self-serving, black-or-white way of thinking for the sake of achieving and protecting social power. We are not our social roles; we are people. I've been trying to teach myself Self-Interpreting, representing my authentic self to others clearly, directly and socially appropriately, and learning to watch for clues about what people truly want, for the sake of meaningful connection. There is a social language gap that needs to be addressed and much of the time I have to initiate, but I do it as a considerate person (addressing another worthy person), not as a future victim. It's easier to teach appropriate vs. inappropriate behavior, but humans are not so uniform. Being adaptable pays dividends in goodwill!
having lived my life doing everything i can to mould myself into a manipulative pavlov dog just living to eke positive reinforcement out of others (to get by) your content and videos are challenging and refreshing. i feel like it’s too late to reconfigure my methods of relating... 🙄
This is extremely problematic. It's like a whole new level of masking. I think of masking like having to software render what other people can hardware render and in the process it takes a lot more CPU power. This is like software rendering something in emulation where you've got a whole additional layer of abstraction and conscious processing going on that normally happens subconsciously. This seems like it could be very damaging to teach so much masking at that level, as it could result in burnout or other mental health issues.
I am over my 40's and i just finding out now i might be in the spectrum. Back in my days you either you were a non verbal 3 YO either you were nerotypical. It is wrong but that was the science back than. What can we do? In my teens years and up to my 20's i though i had a problem with social skills. I have a low education family and i believed this lake of education was responsable for my "weird" behaviors. In a total empirical way i was sure that i needed To do what exactly what is described in the "social thinking". Let me tell you how it did end up for me: People kept see my reactions not 100% genuine. They can tel that, no idea how but they can. So a ton of different people start to tell me i was an hypocrite. People with who don't know each other. And we the time distance, i have to agree with them. Social Thinking is basically be an hypocrite: "don't mind what people say just smile because this is what they want", or "just be the person they do want you to be", all this is just faking. Also this requires an impressive amount of time for regenerating. If you do this social thinking you will be exhausted and you'll need a lot of time by your self, and guess what: daily self isolation it is not a "socially accepted" behavior. So al this energy is basically wasted. At least this is how my experience make my see this social thinking. Sorry for the ton of words there :)
I agree with you stephanie. That social thinking stuff it angers me to I hate when people try to make me do things I dont want in order to so called fit in. I'm autistic I have aspergers an I dont really care what others think of me. I like being differnt and maybe even wierd I was not meant to fit in. Thanks stephanie. For this topic I'm big fan of you by for now
So this social thinking thing sounds like the coping mechanisms I invetnted on my own living in a rural area with no mental health tradition as a kid who was later diagnosed with ADHD @ 30 and highly HIGHLY suspect I'm on the spectrum. Later, I realized that was called masking and I did that so hard and for so long that I have literally lost touch with my true self and that's the focus of my therapy for the last year since ADHD diagnoses. In fact, my main 'diagnoses' of mental health from multiple professionals and support network folks was EXTREMELY EXTREMELY low self esteem, so much so that it was mimicking depression symptoms but wasn't depression. So yea, I'm a little pissed about this. It sounds like LITERALLY everything I hate about interacting in modern society. Pure power dynamics. This seems like it would cause 'eased' social situations in the moment but it's fully at the cost of the subject's self esteem and true self. Let me tell you, going through life thinking that you just have to do what people want you to so you can just leave is NOT a good way to live, and that seems like the only way this approach would form.
Having had experience in narcissistic relationships before I learned what that was, and how to avoid being trapped again in the future, seeing these tactics for teaching complete conformity, internalizing and self blaming when someone doesn't accept you, accepting bullying, and trying to mind read to keep other people happy gives me severe alarm! I don't know if she's aware of the similarity between this and what I'm now recovering from, but this really screams, "NARCISSISM ALERT" at me. No, making the other person happy isn't the most important thing. Being kind and respectful to each other is the most important thing. Then both people can be happy. If one isn't, it's not the fault of the other.
Thanks, Stephanie. This is your best yet. And as for that woman, her heart might be in the right place, but if she tried to sell me used car, I wouldn't be surprised (though I might actually buy it, which is very sad).
I was put into social thinking as a teenager and almost EVERYTIME i tried things the practitioners taught me i always got the exact OPPOSITE of what i was told would happen as a result. Not to mention the practitioner herself and the psychiatrist she worked with eventually turned VERY abusive to her clients.
Your conclusions are great and you know, Dr. Tony Attwood’s idea that autism is the next advancement of the human condition is the logical analogue to this.
You know, I've seen tons of methods for trying to get autistic people to understand allistic people, but never the other way around. I can't imagine why that might be...
Sorry to comment on a 2 year video: but this was one of my coping (or masking) mechanisms, not learned from them thou, and yes, it's a little overwhelming, specially in complex social settings.
Hmmm... I think there's a fine bit of irony here. The designers of this Social Thinking method have managed to not take into account how the curriculum will be received, by the very people that are supposed to benefit from it. I'm sure that presenting the concept to neurotypicals, they all nod their heads and give great applause, but autistics hear a lot of negative things, as you outlined. All that said, it is possible to restate what they're saying in a more autistic friendly way. Since the presenters are not able to imagine what it is to be autistic, they're not able to imagine what the reaction will be. They've chosen their words in such a way that it would not offend people that are exactly like they are. Since autistics are not that similar to neurotypicals, we get offended. In social settings, since we (autistics) are in the minority, the onus is on us, to think about who the person we're speaking to is and make a determination as to whether what we're about to say, will be received well, or is likely to offend. This is a heavy burden since this requires some analytical thinking and the human brain does this notoriously slowly. It can make for awkward pauses in conversation while we sort out whether we're about to offend or not. It's also more than a little exhausting. Neurotypicals have a generic model of the average person in their brain and they use this model to automatically filter their actions and words so as to not offend. There is still plenty of offense likely, when the person to whom they're speaking, doesn't resemble the generic model. The model/filter is not an analytical process. It works lightning quick, with no effort on the part of neurotypicals. So they can socialize for hours, all very relaxed. The generic model/filter that the designers of the Social Thinking method use automatically without thinking, manages to offend autistics, because we don't fit the model. The irony here, is that they're preaching this idea that we need to think about what others will think about what we're doing or saying, yet they have utterly failed at this themselves. I agree with the idea that we as autistics should cultivate thinking about what others will think about what we're doing or saying, not because we're deficient in some ways, but because it should bother us that if we don't, we may hurt other people's feelings. That should matter to us. If it doesn't, then we may be somewhat narcissistic We can't tell automatically not to say or do such and such, but we can consciously think about it. B.
The core is social masking. There is one thing that is correct. It does not matter what you say or do it is how you are perceived. Unfortunately, life is not fair. Idiots and abilist will always be there and will treat us like crap, no matter what the situation. I don't like it either that we are expected to adapt to others. You are right about this. Unfortunately, in the real world we will always be blamed and be expected to conform to NT'S. There is a huge balance between what is right and what is real. We as autistic people have to try to figure out on our own when to do what. To mask or not to mask, that is the question. I do agree in principle but expecting NT'S to have appropriate behaviors is Unfortunately realistic. This being said we do need to fight for it as much as possible with ACTUAL education not just "awareness".
Sounds like you did a really good job explaining all of this. I had all the same reactions to this as you did. Again, we are being forced to live and act as they require. We must meet their expectations. It almost sounds like a form of Communist mind control from decades ago.
One major potential pitfall in this idea is that being a "people pleaser" opens one up to manipulation. Being a " people pleaser" has probably caused more problems than it's ever solved in my life. I mean, let's be honest here, we already did this our whole lives before we knew we were autistic. The last psychologist I consulted some thirty to forty years ago was of the opinion that my meltdowns were not caused by the psychological torture I was being subjected to. Rather he suggested that my meltdowns were the cause of my being constantly tormented. His actually said, as a parting remark to my final session, that if I didn't stop having meltdowns I'd end up going to jail. Now that I'm working in DCS, I know that he was kinda right. If only psychologists understood the bio-chemistry behind the startle response in the first place. If I could suppress my body's response to adrenaline, I would never have had a meltdown in the first place. He was also of the opinion that I didn't need medication. (Possibly he was thinking of psychoactive meds as used for treating mental illness and not meds in general) I strongly believe that I would have had more success, both in school and in life had my lifelong anxiety simply being treated with a pill. At the very least, it would have suppressed the startle response and reduced, if not eliminated, my meltdowns.
Hmmmm. I suspect that "Social Thinking Lady" used to wear a purple dinosaur costume on a popular children's show...."I love you, You love me....." ( am basing my comment on the information you provided) "Social Thinking": sounds like they are either teaching people how to be highly manipulative and control peoples responses AKA "Used Car Salesman" and/or preaching suppression of individuality. The surrendering of independent contrary thought and expression is to sacrifice who you are as a person. In any conversational group, there will be active and passive people. Some people are listeners, some are thinkers, and some are talkers. In theory, all people interacting in a group would do so equally. That is NOT HUMAN. In many cases, emotion and inflection can be important components on the strength of a point being made. "He who understands the World least likes it"..........."He who UNDERSTANDS the World, least likes it."......"He who understands the World LEAST, likes it." To constrain communication to within "boundaries" is ineffectual. If you could get each person from a group to give an honest view of others in the group, there would be two responses; one which they REALLY thought of each person, one that they think the OTHERS would say. How each of us is seen by others is more often a result of "group think." The dominant person of any group will pretty much call the shots, the others, not wanting to be singled out, will agree or conform. If you win over the dominant person, you are "cool", if not, you are labeled in some manner. So apparently "Social Thinking" only works if you figure out who the group leader is and conform to their standards. I agree "Social Thinking" appears to be a re-branding of ABA therapy. In other words, in any interaction, you must conform to the behaviors and expectations of others sense of social norms, or you can expect to be rejected. Correct me if I am wrong, but this sounds very much like the line of thinking stipulated in many highly oppressive countries! Sorry, I would much rather be considered a nonconformist, an outcast, a radical.....and OMG, an independent thinker... than suppress who I am to conform to someone else's rules of what is "normal!"
(My thought will get me canceled.) To be honest just like how the spectrum is very broad, social thinking works for some while others may not feel comfortable dealing with it. Maybe it's just my personal experience because my SLP was more focused on how to deal with people I didn't like and how to do adult things(such as paying taxes) rather than changing my identity or trying to please people. However, I do agree to try to make someone make eye contact and stop stimming is something that needs to be out ruled. In conclusion: My thoughts on SLPs are mixed.
Looks like it's been a while since anyone posted here, but we just learned our 1st Grader will be introduced to Social Thinking next week. 1st Grade! Feels like they are asking the sheep to get in line or not be accepted/liked by others. Anyone have an opinion that it's ok to teach this in public school? I am open ears right now.
I would like you to see "Everything is gonna be okay" It's on Hulu and seems based on the intro to have multiple Aut-istic characters along with females on the spectrum.
I am a little bit uncertain of what to think about that program. Ofcourse, its normal that people need to learn how to act in certain environments to avoid "social trouble". And the acceptance and tolerance rhetorics of some activists goes too far. This rhetorics might only achieve toleration and there are limits of what toleration can achieve. Especially in regards to love.If girls think "that guy annoys the shit out of me, but I can tolerate his behavior due to the circumstances", that guy probably will not have a lot of success with girls. (Ofcourse, theoretically, there would also be the slight possibility that there is at least one person who can like you. But if people should aim at that possibility, I think therapists would also think about "are there 2 of my patients who would be better off if they would meet each other?". But instead, most therapists do nothing at all or just tell their patient that "sorry but your love life does not matter. thus, shut up.") I fully agree with your consent argument. But I think if parents want to value the consent and free will of their children in this regard, they should at least think about homeschooling or free schools. With home schooling or alternative school concepts, parents can avoid a lot of pressure and public schools use a lot of pressure, stress and fear tactics to control the pupils. Because of this, schools increase the likelyhood of conflicts and bullying. And lack of social skills in conjunction with bullying can create a vicious cycle where things get worse. (If you get bullied by everyone, you will not be willing to listen to anyone. Even in cases where they might be right.) Parents need to be aware of that danger. And I agree that teaching "being bullied is the fault of the victim" is definitely not ok. The problem is, most schools already do exactly that. Even without special programs. (I was told that by nearly every teacher at school,) This shows how stupid our school system really is.
Social thinking model? It's just crap. I have very low expectations. I don't expect other people to be nice to me. They don't have to like me either. Basically, I don't care, which makes life much easier. If people act in accordance with this model, they're just fake, not genuine. When people liked me, it was because I'm honest, straightforward. I would never want to change that, no matter what other people think.
Don't feel like you have to! But if you really really want to, I do have a PayPal, which is paypal.me/StephanieBethany but seriously you don't need to! I appreciate you being here 💛
telling the autistic folk that it's their own fault they are being bullied is like blaming rape victims instead of rapists. telling them they should adapt their behaviours to what's expected by society so they dont get bullied is like telling girls to cover up so they dont get raped...oh, wait...
Society needs to be reopened to diversity! All kinds of diversity. So much to win for everybody, and nothing to loose, nothing. The mobsters need to be cured not the autists (or other group).
You mean she's teaching autistic people(and other disabled) that they're less humans and worthless in the society than "normal" people are. She's saying we're LESS humans. Let that sink in. Someone tell her please!!!! What she's doing is sadistic. Okay, lady. I'm angry now too!!! Like we all HAVE TO be gray and boring. Gtfo.
I think Stephany has misunderstood the professional who is trying to teach how we should behave and act. Not only Aspi's, but also NT's need guidance how to behave in a social context. There is nothing wrong about it.
I went to a clinic ran by her and so far I disagree with u. I have a very ablest SLP in high school she was too old and set in her ways. I was nervous when I started and was recovering from a psychotic break, not caused by being in the clinic. The SLP who saw me was great. I want to go back because I want to be social and date, at 28 I have not been to a bar or had a boyfriend. I don't think its masking we need to surive in the real world because the world is mostly able bodied
…I used this approach several times throughout the course of my life, to make friends & fit in. Warning - ALL people do this to some extent.2. There’s no guarantee they will like you or stay engaged. Just sayin’…
It would be much more useful to teach kids on the spectrum how to differentiate between douchebag and non-douchebag behavior in NT kids rather than manipulatively forcing them to modify their behavior.
This is the first time I've ever heard of social thinking. It doesnt seem like a good idea. There is a lot of negativity towards autism that you have to get through in this world. Very sad.
Oh wow, this social thinking 'treatment program' is super manipulative! Whatever happened to being accepted for our differences, to being included even when different? In my experience, people will make their own judgements no matter how well a person learns how to mask. This is a passport to treating people badly :( Do better people! Ugh.
Telling people that they have to act a certain way in order to make people like them is what cults do, and it's what abusers do. I get what the intention of this is, but that doesn't make it okay to condition people to want to please everyone. People who are conditioned like that are more likely to become victims of awful manipulative people. Definitely not okay.
Simply VInce: You said it better than I did 😁
Agreed!
On the contrary, it is merely teaching you how to express your cultural background with your own people.
@@christiantaylor1495 what does that even mean?
@@simplyvince1744 It's teaching you how to be part of something greater than your individual self. For example, my ethnicity is English, so my socialisation was supposed to nurture me into my identity. I'm autistic and used to think i shouldn't try to change.
Shephanie's a weirdo. Stephanie makes the world more interesting. Be like Stephanie kids. 🙂
I'm over 40 now, recently diagnosed with ASD and in treatment for clinical depression since my teenage years. I'll just add that, yes, learning and understanding conventional social skills is essential to live a meaningful and fulfilling life in a society where we are not "the norm". But if this becomes the central task of your everyday life - to conform to society, without regard to your natural state of being, you will eventually end up drained, burned out, fundamentally unhappy, potentially even suicidal. I believe that to some degree, society will have to change, especially if more and more people have difficulties "functioning" as is required in order to live a decent and dignified life.
I've been suspecting I might be autistic for years and I mentally freaked OUT when you got to the part where they were teaching that people care more about how you make them feel than what you say! I asked my mom about it and she was like "Yeah, didn't you know that?" and then thought I was joking when I said I had no idea! I feel like I just discovered the rosetta stone of human interaction I have been missing all of my life. This is as big of a discovery as when I found out I have to fake looking people in the eye or they think I am being rude or that I'm abused or something. I didn't realize that until I was a teenager.
Me too I freaked out about that sentence. It explaines so much. For example when I feel bad, I never liked the feeling of people trying to comfort me with empty words. They would say things like "don't worry, everything will be fine...", thinking that it would make me feel better. I never understood the point of that. First of all: I like honnesty and facts, so stop pretending to know the outcome of this situation. And second: those empty words don't mean anything, neighter do they make me feel better...like why would they? I would rather have someone allowing me to feel bad, even if that completely kills the athmosphere. Someone who helps me digging into why something is making me feel bad, with clever insights. This is just one example. It so represents a big part of the clash between autistics and neurotypicals. I can see this difference totally appearing when an autistic person is having a discussion with a neurotypical person. The autistic getting upset about incorrect/unlogical statements/information being used, or opinions that they find unethical/immoral. Those things affect autistics often so much more and are more important to autistics than keeping a fake nice athmosphere. Then probably the autistic person getting upset and the neurotypical being like "let's keep the athmosphere nice". But in that moment the autistic is very likely to give more importance to what is being said than how the social interaction is making them feel.
Omg this is me
@@noor-5187 That's exactly how I feel about it.
People DON'T actually care what you're saying to them usually. Not in direct conversation from my personal experience, unless they're talking about themselves. Dale Carnegie's book How to Win Friends and Influence People really focuses on this fact and has been a worldwide classic for decades for this very reason. People are self-interested by nature and generally only care about how you make them feel. It's why I don't bother trying to make friends and my friends are my close family. Even my parents didn't usually care what I had to say.
Remember that old saying "kids are to be seen and not heard"? That was what I grew up with. I used to dream about growing old enough that my "elders" would finally listen to my ideas and consider them. I'm 40 years old, and that magical day still hasn't happened. EXCEPT on the internet where you can occasionally find small groups of people to debate ideas with and they don't care who you are or how old you are (unless you sound like an immature kid). Thank god for the internet!
I took a dale carnegie class when I was 17, and I do think it helped me in life. I got 'most improved' since I was a gibbering mess at the start.
What I learned and 'got permission' to do was treat people like fuckin idiots, lol! That's what I took away from Dale's philosophy. I always suspected people were shallow and only liked to hear about themselves, but I had faith in humanity that this wasn't true. But then, this whole class was designed to teach me that everyone is shallow and vapid. So I 'let' myself just go full on with that and, like I said, got most improved.
IDK what the point of this post is, but it was my experience. From my perspective, All the 'help' for socially anxious or autistic people just seems to be NTs trying to say "Yea, we're sucky idiots just like you suspected! Treat us as such!". It always feels like they're trying to teach us THEIR worldview where they hold EVERYONE who isn't themselves as 'below' them in hierarchical rank. Like the 'imagine everyone in their underwear' advice. Assuming that would make you feel powerful since you're 'above' the naked people. When in reality, that just makes me feel embarrassed and out of place.
This is how I was raised. Whenever I was mad at neurotypicals it was my fault because I showed signs of individualality and when NTs were mad at me it was my fault because I showed signs of individuality. Also, I was often told that it wasn't everyone's job to change for me, while insisting that I change for everyone else.
I was in therapy ever since the fall of 1969. So much of the training was very simular to the stuff in today's video.
Baisicly "COMPLY" "CONFORM"... ETC
or Compel me to employ deep masking 24 / 7 in public. You are only allowed to be yourself in private.
This is extremely exausting. I was able to comply fairly well up to my late 20s or early 30s then I started using booze and drugs to help me pretend.
By my late 40s I couldn't do it any more I could no longer muster enough energy for such things.
I'm so greatful that you are putting these things out there for our young people to have more to work with than we had.
Thank you bunches baby
Christa
Ж
I don't act like my true self around my parents because when I do I'm "disrespectful." So I just behave in a way I know they won't yell at me for. But it doesn't make me feel good about myself in the slightest. It just makes me feel ignored and unseen. I have good self esteem and self love but pretending to be something I'm not definitely doesn't make me feel good about myself. My advice to anyone reading this is be who you really are and not what people want you to be.
This is something I've learned on my own to do. Before I was diagnosed I thought something was very wrong with me and I was the problem. So I changed myself to get along with those around me. I suffer from depression and anxiety because I thought like that. Now after being diagnosed I am coming to peace with all the past mistakes I've made and am learning to not be so guarded about my feelings and likes.
People Like me because i’m different, BECAUSE I don’t act like Everyone Else, This mindset is Crap, And Hurts everyone involved, makes everyone look bad. I fell into that mindset of everything Is my fault, and It has taken years of Therapy to Break that... so, that’s a thing...
This social thinking approach very much triggered the trauma I have from years and years of heavily masking. (Till age 25, now 30 and still in the process of changing old habbits and thinking patterns). What they seem to teach basicly looks like everything I am working on to let go of. I'm kind of shocked, are they seriously teaching this to vulnerable children?! Thank u for the video! I love hearing your views on things, I relate to your way of thinking, it's also just nice to recognize myself in how deeply touched u are by things and how big of a deal they seem to u. That's how I feel about so many things in life and often look around me and feel like "whyyy do I seem to care so much more deeply about certain things than other people?"😟 Haha I guess that's a state of being many autistics experience.
Noor Aziah It's strange the government encouraging autistic behaviour.
Which is like a gift from the gods during autism awarness week.
Until last month social isolation just meet being autistic.
At least the world stop talking about Brexit now.
@@garyfrancis5015 I also feel this, the new rules really fit my autism. I like when shops are less bussy. I like staying at home a lot (I have a big garden, so now already 4 weeks not leaving the house was no problem for me at all). I'm used to having desinfecting gel with me, even before Corona (OCD). No social contact for long, also used to that. No kissing or shaking hands...no problemo😋When I hear people talking about living in fear, I feel like "welcome to my life"😅 Is it the similar for u?
Thank you SO much Stephanie. I'm an instructional aide for special education and one of the teachers whose class I support uses the social thinking curriculum, and pressures me to use the same language/guidance with students. You've perfectly summed up my issues with it. I have an issue with how often special education becomes "Conformity 101."
This just sounds like they want people to not be themselves and to just mask/conform. It just take me back to school where we were told to "act this way" to fit into classes and stuff. I think this is where I get my fears of really hating getting things wrong from honestly. I guess to some degree that being aware of how we present ourselves might be helpful. But it really should be on our terms and we shouldn't have to fit into what others expect because that to me is suppression on individuality and suppression of what makes us who we are.
This really got me thinking so thank you Stephanie as always for your great videos and great topic choices :)
"This just sounds like they want people to not be themselves and to just mask/conform." In my 32 years of life, all I found is... YES THIS IS 100% WHAT 'NORMIE' CULTURE IS! It's ALLLLLLL one big bullying mechanism, and some people are responsive to that and develop the 'right' way, and other people need more emotional or physical beatings to comply. That's what an autism diagnoses indicates.
The NTs will never admit it or view it this way, but I cannot see an argument otherwise based purely on the facts and reality I've seen. A bunch of people that can't stand when things aren't the way they expect. And THEY call US the "rigid" ones! >:(
This whole social thinking scam is a huge trigger for me, lol. I've had this opinion since I was literally a child and I have never once been proven wrong... unless it's someone with autism, ADHD, bipolar, etc. I really have a hard time thinking that "neurotypical" isn't it's own type of diagnoses...
It feels like making this situation to be ok: "OMG, Look what you made me do, making me having to punch and strangle you. If you only could've been normal..."
Sure teach people to be abusers.
I feel with you... *sigh*
Literally just watching this and realising this is exactly what my old SLP used.. she even called it “social thinking” at one point. Now I legit have trauma and nightmares about this therapist. She taught me to mask so hard, to suppress my stimming and at FIVE FRICKING YEARS OLD scolded me for “going on and on too much”. SIGH.
I'm so sorry 😔
🤗
these videos really ought to have more views! I'm glad I found you
Glad to have you here!
I can agree, I'm a non allic person with an autistic partner, and this seems like masking with a HIGHLY manipulative twist. I would never wish this on my partner. I love them for who they are. I hope one day everyone can be loved that way and love everyone that way. The people who love you won't expect you to mask. They will do the work to understand.
I refuse to be an unpaid actor for the rest of my life.
I don't get involved with people, though I do say Good Morning to my neighbours.
I think I must give off "don't bother me" vibes as people don't speak to me first, they tend to respond when I speak to them.
I think perhaps I've shut myself off from people so successfully that I'm doing it on autopilot.
In college my sense of humour won me many friends, which I discovered by accident after one joke worked very well, so I kept on doing it (in 1987).
The only social currency I have is the fact I can sing and write songs.
This drew people to me in a way they never did before, and this was helpful I suppose, but I still didn't feel accepted by a social circle, they just noticed me more.
Today I walk around minding my own business and living a quiet life, I have no friends or relationship (thank God), and I'm happy in my own space.
"Now I know we all fake."
Me: Just like that Nosedive Black Mirror episode! I knew there was plenty of truth to it.
I never heard of this before, but on the surface it sounds kind of like the old 'how to win friends and influence people' type stuff, but as you kept explaining it, yea got kind of not good.
and yea I agree 100% on your position of that 'social fake' thing!
I refuse to consider what other people think of me - it’s not my responsibility . My work is to discover who I am by exploring life & see what I like to learn more about, etc. -
It is inappropriate for me to develop esp skills to figure out what other people like so I can arrange myself around them ..
Mind blowing !
No wonder there’s so much confusion in the world !
PS - I don’t like staring into people’s eyes when I talk to them. It’s culturally inappropriate for me..
Hi there. I am an autistic speech language pathologist. I have very mixed thoughts on the Social Thinking Curriculum. Is it teaching masking? Pretty much, yes. It is exhausting to go through the think about what other people are thinking about me process. She has a Zones of Regulation part of the Curriculum, basically like meltdown, excited/anxious, neutral, tired, and falling sleep. Being able to identify "where" you are is important, and there is some good research coming out that an interaception based therapy program can be effective in helping emotional regulation. However, she has a component of the program that is being able to match the feeling and intensity of that feeling to the severity of the situation, and so you can visualize the disconnect. Those of us without intellectual disabilities can probably easily know that these two things are mismatched. Then what? I know I am overreacting--its hard for me to tell by how much, but I know I am. Can I stop crying? No. My feelings are still there. The intensity is still there. Her program is based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy principles. But the issue it that is takes so so much mental energy to try to think through, use my cognitive processes, to troubleshoot my emotions and make sense of them. I attended a talk of hers a year ago. A lot of her "target" client base seems to be the undiagnosed autistic kid in class who keeps pissing off his classmates by trying to outsmart the teacher and correct them and who ends up being bullied. Or, conversely, the kid in class who says some pretty shitty things to peers and doesn't see what the big deal is. These are populations where parts of the Social Thinking Curriculum could be beneficial, as you have autistic kids either being bullied or being bullies themselves.
It sounds like a formalized curriculum of the ways people have been treating autistic kids forever and the things we have to learn by trial and error, and then if we're lucky spend a lot of effort unlearning. I don't think it would have helped me to have a structured explanation of all the ways my behavior was defective so I could get started on fixing it ASAP. In any other context telling someone they're responsible for the thoughts you have about them is a type of emotional abuse.
What would you think about this as an approach?
a) Teach them positive self-affirmations (since others tend to be drawn to confidence)
b) Social stories
c) Teaching them the golden rule.
d) Teaching them boundaries, so if they're doing harmless autistic things, it's okay to say, "Don't bully me." "Don't treat me that way." "Don't make fun of me."
Social interaction has always been a challenge, especially because I have mental health issues along with ADHD and autism (which I don't consider to be mental illnesses). Social skills training has always been triggering, and I have hard time using principles in high-stress situations where I'm on sensory overload to the point I'm dissociating, or having emotional flashbacks. Just wondering your thoughts, in case I end up adopting an autistic child, end up a special education teacher, become an OTA, or just end up working with autistic kids in some other capacity.
This is certainly better than that. What is the golden rule?
@@ameena6485, "Treat others the way you want to be treated." It's a good thing to teach any kid. Not unique to autistic or ADHD kids.
Sounds great to me 💛
@@narwhal9249 You should also teach them to balance that with the way others want to be treated. You can't hug someone if they haven't asked for it
This sounds like what I have done and learned independently in my 30y of life. Now that I have learned that I'm autistic, I have realized that acting this way has caused my several burnouts and that not knowing the cause (being autistic and using my energies to act "normal" and "not wierd") has wasted my money and time in useless therapy for NTs. It honestly makes me cry (for reasons unknown to me, you know, because I'm autistic that way).
It's very hard to act against my learned behaviours. It's so engraved in me and comes from my unconciousness. But it's funny how sometimes I realize that my learned behavior and my newfound rebellious will fight it out in my subcontiousness and raise the issue to my contiousness to deside.
The problem with "social thinking" is that it forces some of us to develop not just masking behaviors, but something far deeper and more injurious. I'm not sure what to call it, but "masking behavior" doesn't quite cover it. It's cumulative effects are manifested in low self-esteem, and for me, has caused me to feel like a liar and a fake even when I'm having success in various areas of my life; though I'm just trying to cope and "fit in". Eventually, from time to time, the maintenance of the facade becomes so exhaustive that I lash out in frustration and have completely life encompassing meltdowns, which seem inexplicable and "out of the blue" to others.
"Practice Social thinking" is an underhanded way of saying "hurt yourself so that we feel more comfortable, weird kid".
I saw in another comment here that someone referenced Dale Carnegie and his most popular work as kind of a guide post. I want to wholeheartedly disagree with that mode of thinking. What Dale Carnegie taught was a system that can be most accurately described as "Personality Ethics"; or in simple terms, "How to behave so that people will like you."
"How To Win Friends and Influence People" is a master-class in social-thinking and manipulation for neuro-typical people and a master-class in masking for those who are affected by Autism. An "educator" handed that book to me when I was 13 and I employed it with great outward effect. The problem is that it's a very superficial system that should be used to augment an already healthy social self-image and the inner effect is very damaging when it's used as a set of masking techniques for a person who is challenged on that front.
I'm trying to focus more on "Character Ethics" and learning to just be myself (and only myself) these days. Inner work, for me; rather than outer work, for everyone else. I think that in the long run, there will be more benefit for me and everyone else.
I say "try" because I still fall into the trap of social thinking as a crutch and feel like I just got played immediately afterward, every time I catch myself... which is probably 3 to 5 times a day.
...And in true Autistic style, I only worked on this comment for 50 minutes and edited four times before noticing the time and moving on...
Stephanie Bethany I love your channel and this is great vid. Thank you.
Sounds like Social Thinking teaching external locus of evaluation as a plus... a great source of depression and anxiety. The antisocial society strikes again, telling us only we are responsible for everything and everyone else is responsible for nothing in every social interaction.
The takeaway? We are less important, our authenticity, our integrity is less important than anyone else's.
Sound's abusive and teaching the targets to internalise that abuse.
Well intentioned, perhaps, but sounds actively horrendous
The book “Captivate” by Vanessa Van Edwards takes this to the next level! I can send it to you on Audible if you want! It struck me, watching your video, how social skills are perceived as so critical in our world!
I'm from the UK and this is a good video, never heard of Social Thinking before.
Coming from my experience, there's no amount of 'being nice' that will get some people to treat you right, and it takes a while to unlearn this. It just causes more anxiety because then you fear conflict. And if you slip up and have a bad/awkward moment, these people will still act like you grew a unicorn horn, just like the true angels of this world will treat you kindly regardless if you caused a situation to become awkward. This social thinking method won't work for interactions with people who react immediately to any deviation to "normal" socialization by themselves becoming off-putting.
Yup. It's weird. But I worked in retail and the more accommodating, nice, polite, and submissive I was to the customer and what they wanted the more mean they were to me. It's surprising how many people just want someone to kick. The more you try to please them, the crueler they are. Of course I can't yell and cuss at my job or anything really mean like that. But the more I raised my voice and the less nice I was, the less mean customers were. It's really sad to know that we live in a world with these people.
I went to camp as a young child and I was ostracized and ignored by all of the other girls. When I brought this up to the counselor, feeling so alone and isolated and feeling more of a connection to adults... Hoping she could help me... She told me I needed to put in more effort. She asked me how I expected the other kids to include me if I didn't try harder. I don't remember much from my childhood but that's one of the things that I never forgot. It crushed me. It told me I was the problem and I did not know how to be any other way.
I almost always try to play devil's advocate and understand the other side. I did that when I first started watching this video to try to understand how this concept could be helpful and what parts were problematic but there is more problematic content here than helpful.
This was an excellent video. I didn’t even realize that they had someone teaching this kind of stuff. I totally agree with you Stephanie. *dramatic pan in* @4:51 “EXCUSE ME?!” Personally, I don’t think anyone should be teaching people to go around acting a certain way in order to get liked by people. Isn’t that essentially teaching other people to be less tolerant of others differences? I mean come on now. We’re all different. We’re supposed to celebrate those differences & try our best to be accepting; not to be teaching our children or other people to cookie cut or whitewash themselves in order to fit into a society that’s messy itself. I’ve always been a weirdo since I can remember & I’ve always accepted that & love that about myself. I most certainly will not change that for anyone nor should I have to because my weirdness doesn’t harm anyone or at least that’s not my intention. Growing up as an only child, quite possibly on the spectrum & being a lesbian in a supportive environment I was lucky to be able to establish myself as a person, embracing & loving every part of myself along with my imperfections as a human being. I’m a weirdo, you’re a weirdo, we’re all weirdos in some way to someone. Accept that, yourself & love that about yourself & others it may just be what makes someone unique & quite fantastic. As long as that weirdness doesn’t cross over into an unhealthy & cause harm then that’s perfectly fine otherwise that may require some deep introspection & or professional help sought out. With that being said, most people place far more value on someone who is genuine to themselves & authentic to other people rather than a plastic person but, then again fake people like fake people. Most people are probably fake at least sometimes & some most times, which I’ve dubbed ‘deep/shallow fakes’. Depends on the person & quite possibly the situation. By the way Stephanie, I can’t speak for anyone else, although I know that other people could say & feel the same way, I do care about you & what you have to say. I thoroughly enjoy your videos & your perspective. Now that’s GENUINE.😁
I want to add a Thank you for making people aware that this is being taught to children.
It seems people are always telling us that we are responsible for the way that others treat us.
Victim blaming essentially
The better version of this i've heard about is in-school programs for elementary and middle school age autistic girls, because navigating the the social structures of nuerotypical girl can be very traumatic for young autistic girls. It sounds like it's one part anthropology/sociology. Like, let's talk about the behavior of neurotypical girls in their natural habitat...lol. Basically it objectively educates autistic girls on why neurotypical girls behave in a certain way and what they mean when they say different things. So learning how to translate neurotypical communication and how to fill in the spots that are confusing to you. The second part is part is like an acting and improv class. So it's still not telling them that their "default" setting is wrong, bad, or should be changed, but it teaches autistic girls what neurotypical girl's body language and social behavior means or why they do things. The goal is to get young autistic girls to understand the world of neurotypical girls so they can better understand the world around them better. They also participate in scripting activities and role playing so the autistic girl has a pool of resources to pull from when she doesn't know what do next. I really loved the way this kind of program was described because it specifically doesn't tell the autistic girl that her behavior is wrong and that she needs to be different. It's really designed to give her information she wouldn't be able to come to on her own and a tool kit to survive confusing interactions. I have no idea where this was implemented, I just remember watching a video by the woman who put together the program and thinking, Man, that wouldn't have solved all my problems but it would have really helped to know that my brain was different, its ok to be different, and be giving ways to interpret the world around me. I just remember repeating to myself over and over for the longest time, "why do I deserve to be treated like this? I didn't do anything." If someone had been able to work with to let me know that unfortunately, people can behave badly when they don't understand someone's behavior. Just like how I didn't understand my peer's behavior, they didn't understand mine. It would have made a world of difference to a have a pocket of resources to draw from if I ended up in a situation I wanted to get out of.
U did an amazing job on this video! Love your content and how u look at all sides.
As a person with a learning disability, I think that it is very damaging for people with disabilities to have to conform just because the world or society do not understand us. Society just needs to try to understand, support, and help in any ways that they can. I have a TH-cam channel where I help, encourage, and inspire all people with disabilities by sharing my personal experiences and sharing important topics and tips through my ideas that I come up with and suggestions for others.
Wow! Talk about a biased therapy method if I've ever seen one. Basically, we're normal and you need to be like us or get lost. This might be enough to send some to an early grave via depression and suicide.
I would also add that for those like myself, who have ADHD in addition to autism, there's no way we'd remember everything they're trying to tell us to watch for.
Thanks Stephanie! You are on this and I'm very grateful for what you're doing here.
This is interesting... I didn’t realize it was a “thing”. I feel like I personally spent a lot of time worrying about this myself. (As an adult awaiting a diagnosis) so I feel like I was taught this unknowingly as a child... it gives me HORRIBLE ANXIETY. I will be chatting with the school at our next IEP meeting to see if they do this, and the details if they do.
Having to learn how other people navigate the social world quite late made me feel so many things. At first I was confused, then panicked that I should try to figure out how to do it, to then just feeling kind of sad. If I’m being blunt, it initially made me think of the whole thing as kind of hollow? I realize it’s just different brains and ways of doing things, but it was a shocking difference to me.
Very interesting, never heard of this before! Also wanted to thank you for putting the text up on your videos when reading. I have a hard time processing things when I hear them so I really appreciate it!
God this just felt like a realization of what my 5 year old brain told itself to mask so hard so well until I was 21
Oh dear, this is like PUA for everyday life. The premise seems like "Your flawed and we will teach you how to mask".
I think overall a better approach than social thinking would be making safe spaces for autistic people to express themselves. I got through elementary and middle school undiagnosed because I had my best friend who was also neurodivergent. Instead of trying to protect spectrum kids by making them not be different, creating groups of safe spaces would make a lot more sense. I've been able to glean so much wisdom from my fellow autistic friends, more so than some therapists who worked with me for years. It felt good to be in a space where everyone kind of got one another. www.spectrumnews.org/features/deep-dive/how-people-with-autism-forge-friendships/ I was able to find the Autistic Women's alliance and they're planning another Saturday chat in a couple weeks. www.autisticwomensalliance.com/ It was wonderful to talk to fellow spectrum women. Then there's also Felicity House in New York which is a recreational space for autistic women to just be themselves. felicity-house.org/ Having community supports for autistic people where they can feel included and accepted makes more sense to me.
I never realized I had autism until just this past summer and I'm in my late 40s. I've just wanted people to like me for who I was...and I guess I had always thought I was acting "normally" but I guess I wasn't at all as I was constantly bullied and picked on by others. So even if you are told to "act normal" it doesn't mean you are able to actually do it. They still know you are different somehow. I often feel I'm walking around with a big target on my back. And what happens when your ideas about what's right doesn't match up with the normal people around you? A good example is you don't drink alcohol and they think it's normal? Or you have celiac and you can't eat certain things and they tell you "a little won't hurt you..." So you try it and you end up puking for 4 days. Autism increases your risk for gut problems. Back then when I had listened to the NP (normal people) I didn't know I had celiac but I knew something in lots of food was bugging me so I was avoiding lots of processed foods but they convinced me to try a small pie and I ended up sick for four days. Then they told me it was all in my head as there was nothing wrong with the pies. They totally dismissed the fact I got sick.
Thank You Stephanie
Differences makes the world more interesting.
🌟🖤🖤🖤🌟
I didn't know this was an official thing, but also knew it was a thing. It's also the biggest reason I am pursuing an official diagnosis of autism. My reality is not in line with whatever reality this is. 😫
My son's para teachers used expected and unexpected behaviors before we pulled him. THANK YOU FOR BRINGING THIS TO MY ATTENTION!! I had no idea this is what it meant. I thought it was a safety thing. Not a social thing. Now I'm mad.
Social thinking seems to be a very defensive, distrusting, self-serving, black-or-white way of thinking for the sake of achieving and protecting social power. We are not our social roles; we are people. I've been trying to teach myself Self-Interpreting, representing my authentic self to others clearly, directly and socially appropriately, and learning to watch for clues about what people truly want, for the sake of meaningful connection. There is a social language gap that needs to be addressed and much of the time I have to initiate, but I do it as a considerate person (addressing another worthy person), not as a future victim. It's easier to teach appropriate vs. inappropriate behavior, but humans are not so uniform. Being adaptable pays dividends in goodwill!
having lived my life doing everything i can to mould myself into a manipulative pavlov dog just living to eke positive reinforcement out of others (to get by) your content and videos are challenging and refreshing. i feel like it’s too late to reconfigure my methods of relating... 🙄
This is extremely problematic. It's like a whole new level of masking. I think of masking like having to software render what other people can hardware render and in the process it takes a lot more CPU power. This is like software rendering something in emulation where you've got a whole additional layer of abstraction and conscious processing going on that normally happens subconsciously. This seems like it could be very damaging to teach so much masking at that level, as it could result in burnout or other mental health issues.
I am over my 40's and i just finding out now i might be in the spectrum. Back in my days you either you were a non verbal 3 YO either you were nerotypical. It is wrong but that was the science back than. What can we do?
In my teens years and up to my 20's i though i had a problem with social skills. I have a low education family and i believed this lake of education was responsable for my "weird" behaviors. In a total empirical way i was sure that i needed To do what exactly what is described in the "social thinking". Let me tell you how it did end up for me: People kept see my reactions not 100% genuine. They can tel that, no idea how but they can. So a ton of different people start to tell me i was an hypocrite. People with who don't know each other. And we the time distance, i have to agree with them. Social Thinking is basically be an hypocrite: "don't mind what people say just smile because this is what they want", or "just be the person they do want you to be", all this is just faking.
Also this requires an impressive amount of time for regenerating. If you do this social thinking you will be exhausted and you'll need a lot of time by your self, and guess what: daily self isolation it is not a "socially accepted" behavior. So al this energy is basically wasted. At least this is how my experience make my see this social thinking.
Sorry for the ton of words there :)
You’re so cute. 🧸
Yet inspirational. 🦸🏻♀️👏🏻
Thank you for voicing your opinion. 🗣
Thank you for being you!✨🧜🏼♀️✨
I agree with you stephanie. That social thinking stuff it angers me to I hate when people try to make me do things I dont want in order to so called fit in. I'm autistic I have aspergers an I dont really care what others think of me. I like being differnt and maybe even wierd I was not meant to fit in. Thanks stephanie. For this topic I'm big fan of you by for now
So this social thinking thing sounds like the coping mechanisms I invetnted on my own living in a rural area with no mental health tradition as a kid who was later diagnosed with ADHD @ 30 and highly HIGHLY suspect I'm on the spectrum. Later, I realized that was called masking and I did that so hard and for so long that I have literally lost touch with my true self and that's the focus of my therapy for the last year since ADHD diagnoses.
In fact, my main 'diagnoses' of mental health from multiple professionals and support network folks was EXTREMELY EXTREMELY low self esteem, so much so that it was mimicking depression symptoms but wasn't depression.
So yea, I'm a little pissed about this. It sounds like LITERALLY everything I hate about interacting in modern society. Pure power dynamics. This seems like it would cause 'eased' social situations in the moment but it's fully at the cost of the subject's self esteem and true self. Let me tell you, going through life thinking that you just have to do what people want you to so you can just leave is NOT a good way to live, and that seems like the only way this approach would form.
Having had experience in narcissistic relationships before I learned what that was, and how to avoid being trapped again in the future, seeing these tactics for teaching complete conformity, internalizing and self blaming when someone doesn't accept you, accepting bullying, and trying to mind read to keep other people happy gives me severe alarm! I don't know if she's aware of the similarity between this and what I'm now recovering from, but this really screams, "NARCISSISM ALERT" at me. No, making the other person happy isn't the most important thing. Being kind and respectful to each other is the most important thing. Then both people can be happy. If one isn't, it's not the fault of the other.
Thanks, Stephanie. This is your best yet. And as for that woman, her heart might be in the right place, but if she tried to sell me used car, I wouldn't be surprised (though I might actually buy it, which is very sad).
I was put into social thinking as a teenager and almost EVERYTIME i tried things the practitioners taught me i always got the exact OPPOSITE of what i was told would happen as a result. Not to mention the practitioner herself and the psychiatrist she worked with eventually turned VERY abusive to her clients.
Your conclusions are great and you know, Dr. Tony Attwood’s idea that autism is the next advancement of the human condition is the logical analogue to this.
Thanks!
If You want to be liked , don't be yourself !
It sounds like ABA. It's a masking school. I did not experience ABA but I had a therapy wich was pretty much like this
Also is that a synthesizer in the background? If so, what kind? I love synths!
You know, I've seen tons of methods for trying to get autistic people to understand allistic people, but never the other way around. I can't imagine why that might be...
Sorry to comment on a 2 year video: but this was one of my coping (or masking) mechanisms, not learned from them thou, and yes, it's a little overwhelming, specially in complex social settings.
Hmmm... I think there's a fine bit of irony here. The designers of this Social Thinking method have managed to not take into account how the curriculum will be received, by the very people that are supposed to benefit from it.
I'm sure that presenting the concept to neurotypicals, they all nod their heads and give great applause, but autistics hear a lot of negative things, as you outlined.
All that said, it is possible to restate what they're saying in a more autistic friendly way. Since the presenters are not able to imagine what it is to be autistic, they're not able to imagine what the reaction will be. They've chosen their words in such a way that it would not offend people that are exactly like they are.
Since autistics are not that similar to neurotypicals, we get offended.
In social settings, since we (autistics) are in the minority, the onus is on us, to think about who the person we're speaking to is and make a determination as to whether what we're about to say, will be received well, or is likely to offend. This is a heavy burden since this requires some analytical thinking and the human brain does this notoriously slowly. It can make for awkward pauses in conversation while we sort out whether we're about to offend or not. It's also more than a little exhausting.
Neurotypicals have a generic model of the average person in their brain and they use this model to automatically filter their actions and words so as to not offend. There is still plenty of offense likely, when the person to whom they're speaking, doesn't resemble the generic model. The model/filter is not an analytical process. It works lightning quick, with no effort on the part of neurotypicals. So they can socialize for hours, all very relaxed.
The generic model/filter that the designers of the Social Thinking method use automatically without thinking, manages to offend autistics, because we don't fit the model.
The irony here, is that they're preaching this idea that we need to think about what others will think about what we're doing or saying, yet they have utterly failed at this themselves.
I agree with the idea that we as autistics should cultivate thinking about what others will think about what we're doing or saying, not because we're deficient in some ways, but because it should bother us that if we don't, we may hurt other people's feelings. That should matter to us. If it doesn't, then we may be somewhat narcissistic We can't tell automatically not to say or do such and such, but we can consciously think about it.
B.
The core is social masking. There is one thing that is correct. It does not matter what you say or do it is how you are perceived. Unfortunately, life is not fair. Idiots and abilist will always be there and will treat us like crap, no matter what the situation. I don't like it either that we are expected to adapt to others. You are right about this.
Unfortunately, in the real world we will always be blamed and be expected to conform to NT'S.
There is a huge balance between what is right and what is real. We as autistic people have to try to figure out on our own when to do what.
To mask or not to mask, that is the question.
I do agree in principle but expecting NT'S to have appropriate behaviors is Unfortunately realistic. This being said we do need to fight for it as much as possible with ACTUAL education not just "awareness".
Sounds like you did a really good job explaining all of this. I had all the same reactions to this as you did. Again, we are being forced to live and act as they require. We must meet their expectations. It almost sounds like a form of Communist mind control from decades ago.
I was taught this but with violence by the teacher, when I was 8.
I’m so sorry.
🤗
One major potential pitfall in this idea is that being a "people pleaser" opens one up to manipulation.
Being a " people pleaser" has probably caused more problems than it's ever solved in my life.
I mean, let's be honest here, we already did this our whole lives before we knew we were autistic.
The last psychologist I consulted some thirty to forty years ago was of the opinion that my meltdowns were not caused by the psychological torture I was being subjected to. Rather he suggested that my meltdowns were the cause of my being constantly tormented.
His actually said, as a parting remark to my final session, that if I didn't stop having meltdowns I'd end up going to jail.
Now that I'm working in DCS, I know that he was kinda right. If only psychologists understood the bio-chemistry behind the startle response in the first place.
If I could suppress my body's response to adrenaline, I would never have had a meltdown in the first place.
He was also of the opinion that I didn't need medication. (Possibly he was thinking of psychoactive meds as used for treating mental illness and not meds in general)
I strongly believe that I would have had more success, both in school and in life had my lifelong anxiety simply being treated with a pill.
At the very least, it would have suppressed the startle response and reduced, if not eliminated, my meltdowns.
Hmmmm. I suspect that "Social Thinking Lady" used to wear a purple dinosaur costume on a popular children's show...."I love you, You love me....." ( am basing my comment on the information you provided)
"Social Thinking": sounds like they are either teaching people how to be highly manipulative and control peoples responses AKA "Used Car Salesman" and/or preaching suppression of individuality. The surrendering of independent contrary thought and expression is to sacrifice who you are as a person. In any conversational group, there will be active and passive people. Some people are listeners, some are thinkers, and some are talkers. In theory, all people interacting in a group would do so equally. That is NOT HUMAN. In many cases, emotion and inflection can be important components on the strength of a point being made. "He who understands the World least likes it"..........."He who UNDERSTANDS the World, least likes it."......"He who understands the World LEAST, likes it." To constrain communication to within "boundaries" is ineffectual. If you could get each person from a group to give an honest view of others in the group, there would be two responses; one which they REALLY thought of each person, one that they think the OTHERS would say.
How each of us is seen by others is more often a result of "group think." The dominant person of any group will pretty much call the shots, the others, not wanting to be singled out, will agree or conform. If you win over the dominant person, you are "cool", if not, you are labeled in some manner. So apparently "Social Thinking" only works if you figure out who the group leader is and conform to their standards.
I agree "Social Thinking" appears to be a re-branding of ABA therapy. In other words, in any interaction, you must conform to the behaviors and expectations of others sense of social norms, or you can expect to be rejected. Correct me if I am wrong, but this sounds very much like the line of thinking stipulated in many highly oppressive countries!
Sorry, I would much rather be considered a nonconformist, an outcast, a radical.....and OMG, an independent thinker... than suppress who I am to conform to someone else's rules of what is "normal!"
Dave F As the up comment said it's PUA for everyday communication.
She sounds like a fan of Kant's hypothetical imperative.
(My thought will get me canceled.)
To be honest just like how the spectrum is very broad, social thinking works for some while others may not feel comfortable dealing with it. Maybe it's just my personal experience because my SLP was more focused on how to deal with people I didn't like and how to do adult things(such as paying taxes) rather than changing my identity or trying to please people. However, I do agree to try to make someone make eye contact and stop stimming is something that needs to be out ruled.
In conclusion: My thoughts on SLPs are mixed.
"Social Thinking" - now I finally have a name the education system's methodology...
Why I am watching this video since I went through my whole life still waiting for a diagnosis and nuerotypical people failed me.
Pretending to be "normal" is exhausting.
I gave up lol.
Looks like it's been a while since anyone posted here, but we just learned our 1st Grader will be introduced to Social Thinking next week. 1st Grade! Feels like they are asking the sheep to get in line or not be accepted/liked by others. Anyone have an opinion that it's ok to teach this in public school? I am open ears right now.
I would like you to see "Everything is gonna be okay"
It's on Hulu and seems based on the intro to have multiple Aut-istic characters along with females on the spectrum.
I am a little bit uncertain of what to think about that program. Ofcourse, its normal that people need to learn how to act in certain environments to avoid "social trouble". And the acceptance and tolerance rhetorics of some activists goes too far. This rhetorics might only achieve toleration and there are limits of what toleration can achieve. Especially in regards to love.If girls think "that guy annoys the shit out of me, but I can tolerate his behavior due to the circumstances", that guy probably will not have a lot of success with girls. (Ofcourse, theoretically, there would also be the slight possibility that there is at least one person who can like you. But if people should aim at that possibility, I think therapists would also think about "are there 2 of my patients who would be better off if they would meet each other?". But instead, most therapists do nothing at all or just tell their patient that "sorry but your love life does not matter. thus, shut up.")
I fully agree with your consent argument. But I think if parents want to value the consent and free will of their children in this regard, they should at least think about homeschooling or free schools. With home schooling or alternative school concepts, parents can avoid a lot of pressure and public schools use a lot of pressure, stress and fear tactics to control the pupils. Because of this, schools increase the likelyhood of conflicts and bullying.
And lack of social skills in conjunction with bullying can create a vicious cycle where things get worse. (If you get bullied by everyone, you will not be willing to listen to anyone. Even in cases where they might be right.) Parents need to be aware of that danger.
And I agree that teaching "being bullied is the fault of the victim" is definitely not ok. The problem is, most schools already do exactly that. Even without special programs. (I was told that by nearly every teacher at school,) This shows how stupid our school system really is.
Social thinking model? It's just crap. I have very low expectations. I don't expect other people to be nice to me. They don't have to like me either. Basically, I don't care, which makes life much easier. If people act in accordance with this model, they're just fake, not genuine. When people liked me, it was because I'm honest, straightforward. I would never want to change that, no matter what other people think.
Does anyone know how to give Steph money for birthday 🎂 ?
Don't feel like you have to! But if you really really want to, I do have a PayPal, which is paypal.me/StephanieBethany but seriously you don't need to! I appreciate you being here 💛
telling the autistic folk that it's their own fault they are being bullied is like blaming rape victims instead of rapists.
telling them they should adapt their behaviours to what's expected by society so they dont get bullied is like telling girls to cover up so they dont get raped...oh, wait...
What is the difference between social skills and masking?
If this encourages masking it could be harmful.
4:16 what the hell !? it doesn't matters the elf's views, it matters only the trolls's views. basically.
Instead of teaching us how to effectively advocate for ourselves they teach us how to disappear.
I would call this social over thinking
Just more "it makes mommy feel good" BS. Are these people trying to cause/worsen trust issues?
Society needs to be reopened to diversity! All kinds of diversity. So much to win for everybody, and nothing to loose, nothing. The mobsters need to be cured not the autists (or other group).
I would prefer being alone. I dont want to mask everything about me.
You mean she's teaching autistic people(and other disabled) that they're less humans and worthless in the society than "normal" people are.
She's saying we're LESS humans. Let that sink in. Someone tell her please!!!! What she's doing is sadistic.
Okay, lady. I'm angry now too!!!
Like we all HAVE TO be gray and boring. Gtfo.
I think Stephany has misunderstood the professional who is trying to teach how we should behave and act. Not only Aspi's, but also NT's need guidance how to behave in a social context. There is nothing wrong about it.
I went to a clinic ran by her and so far I disagree with u. I have a very ablest SLP in high school she was too old and set in her ways. I was nervous when I started and was recovering from a psychotic break, not caused by being in the clinic. The SLP who saw me was great. I want to go back because I want to be social and date, at 28 I have not been to a bar or had a boyfriend. I don't think its masking we need to surive in the real world because the world is mostly able bodied
You don't get to decide if you're an asshole. That is the long and short of social thinking.
I mean i like the explanations of certain social cues she should not assign a value to following them.
…I used this approach several times throughout the course of my life, to make friends & fit in. Warning - ALL people do this to some extent.2. There’s no guarantee they will like you or stay engaged.
Just sayin’…
It would be much more useful to teach kids on the spectrum how to differentiate between douchebag and non-douchebag behavior in NT kids rather than manipulatively forcing them to modify their behavior.
This is the first time I've ever heard of social thinking. It doesnt seem like a good idea. There is a lot of negativity towards autism that you have to get through in this world. Very sad.
Oh wow, this social thinking 'treatment program' is super manipulative! Whatever happened to being accepted for our differences, to being included even when different? In my experience, people will make their own judgements no matter how well a person learns how to mask. This is a passport to treating people badly :( Do better people! Ugh.
She’s imposing her neurotypical perspective on others. Just shows she really doesn’t get it.