Social Thinking
What is Social Thinking® ?
Social Thinking® is a teaching framework for parents and practitioners, created by Michelle Garcia Winner, CCC-SLP, designed to assist persons of all ages who struggle to understand the ways of the social world. With Social Thinking concepts, vocabulary, and constructs, clients learn to identify what thought patterns and behaviors are sabotaging their social experiences. Then Social Thinking books and curriculum offer practical strategies to address the problematic behavior and thought patterns.
Social Thinking also bridges the social-academic connection, and supports social-emotional learning (SEL), Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) and Response to Intervention (RTI) initiatives. Because it clearly, and through its materials visually, demonstrates the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behavior, it’s a giant leap forward in bringing awareness to, and teaching about, the area of “social executive functioning”—the mental processing we all do on a subconscious level to participate and succeed in our social interactions.
The Social Thinking framework addresses core areas of social functioning that include but are not limited to:
- Working and learning as part of a group
- Social self-regulation and social skills
- Strategies to interpret others’ social intentions and emotions
- Strategies to identify and assess how students function socially based on the level of their social mind
- Connecting the dots between our thoughts, feelings, and our mental health
- Strategies to encourage the growth of perspective taking and socially based executive function skills
- Assessment of social competencies in real-world, real-time social situations, as opposed to carefully manicured testing settings
- Demonstrating the link between social thinking, social skills, social academic interpretation and expression (written, oral, etc.)
- Teaching about the connection between the social mind and socially-based Common Core and State Standards of Education as well as how to encourage deeper learning related to the standards
- Teaching conflict resolution and social problem solving skills
- Teachings concepts and skills for relationship development
- Providing information to better understand transition to adulthood choices
- Providing strategies for adults in the workplace
How Does Social Thinking Connect with CBT?
It is increasingly being recognized that behavioral interventions are limited when working with persons of moderate to high intelligences who manifest social learning/social thinking challenges. Social Thinking goes behind the behavior to the level of thinking and asks a fundamental question, "Why do people use social skills?" Within the Social Thinking framework, several answers are offered: "To participate in a social situation." "To impact how people feel about us." "To figure out how we feel about others." "To consider the thoughts, feelings, and actions of those around us." The idea within Social Thinking that thoughts affect feelings and actions, and actions affect thoughts is reflective of the same cycle of thoughts-feelings-actions within cognitive behavioral theory. Mental health therapists understand this cycle and are consistently working with clients to help them feel their emotions genuinely but then stop and think before acting. This is especially true in cases of physical self-injury. However, blurting, interrupting, dominating a conversation and other unaccepted social behaviors are self-injury of the emotional kind, behaviors that can result in self-imposed social isolation, high levels of anxiety and deep depression.
The Social Thinking framework incorporates cognitive psychology constructs repackaged in a way that respects the developmental level and concrete mind of a client on the autism spectrum or those with other social learning challenges. For instance, Superflex® is a Social Thinking superhero who helps individuals learn to defeat the "Unthinkables" that invade their brain and cause them to act inappropriately. Fourteen unique Unthinkables include Rock Brain, who gets people stuck on their ideas, One-Sided Sid who gets people to only talk about themselves, Glassman who makes people have huge upset reactions, or Brain Eater who distracts people so they are unable to focus on a task. Social Thinking concepts and a common vocabulary that explains abstract social concepts at a more concrete level, help clients learn to minimize socially inappropriate behavior while simultaneously improving their ability to think effectively about the world around them. Concepts such as "thinking with your eyes", "body and brain in the group", "expected/ unexpected behavior", and "people files" do just that.