Stand-Alone Social Skills Training for Youth with ADHD: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common childhood disorders, and its symptoms and impairment in multiple domains begin in childhood and can extend into adulthood as well. Many youth with ADHD experience impairment in the social domain, including social skills deficits and difficulties in peer relationships. Social skills interventions, or social skills training (SST), have been developed to target social impairment and improve the social skills and functioning of youth with ADHD. Previous reviews of SST for youth with ADHD have provided mixed conclusions, with many including comprehensive, multilevel interventions for ADHD and none examining stand-alone SST for ADHD in a systematic way. The present review addresses this gap in the literature by providing the first known comprehensive, systematic review of SST alone, along with ratings of methodological rigor for each evaluation of stand-alone SST. The present review provides insight into the strengths and weaknesses in the existing SST literature, and provides suggestions for improvement and future directions for SST. An outline of "specific ingredients" and characteristics of effective SST are also presented, with the goal of providing both researchers and clinicians guidance for creating and implementing effective SST for youth with ADHD.

Interventions for Adolescents With ADHD to Improve Peer Social Functioning: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…Two other recent reviews explored peer relationships in youth with ADHD and proposed improvements for interventions; however, neither review applied a systematic search or provided a meta-analytic summary of efficacy (Gardner & Gerdes, 2015;Mikami, Smit, & Khalis, 2017). Another recent review focused on stand-alone SST for children and adolescents, but only found one intervention for youth aged >12 years (Willis et al, 2019). Other reviews have evaluated psychosocial interventions to improve overall functioning in adolescents with ADHD, and therefore, conflated outcomes of peer social functioning with other domains of functioning, such as academic performance (Evans, Owens, & Bunford, 2014;Evans et al, 2018) or parent-child conflict (Chan et al, 2016).…”

The suitability and acceptability of a co-designed prototype psychoeducational activity book for seven- to eleven-year-olds with ADHD

“…Young people with ADHD are also more likely to be from socially deprived backgrounds and have ADHD related difficulties such as executive (Castellanos and Tannock 2002) and emotional dysfunction (Anastopoulos et al 2011), academic underachievement (DuPaul, Weyandt, and Janusis 2011) and poor social relationships and functioning (Wehmeier, Schacht, and Barkley 2010). Deficits in social communication skills (Bignell and Cain 2007) can underlie strained familial (Willis et al 2019) and peer relationships (Hoza et al 2005). Young people with ADHD often experience low levels of self-esteem, which have also been reported to lead to symptoms of severe depression (Kita and Inoue 2017) and lower quality of life (Wehmeier, Schacht, and Barkley 2010).…”

Estudio e intervención en niños con Trastorno por Déficit de Atención e Hiperactividad de educación primaria

“…Es frecuente que estos problemas estén presentes en los primeros años de vida y se agraven con la edad (Willis, Siceloff, Morse, Neger y Flory, 2019, y Fox, Dishman, Valicek, Ratcliff y Hilton, 2020.…”

“…El presente trabajo aborda el estudio de dos niños con TDAH (Trastorno por Déficit de Atención con Hiperactividad) de 10 y 11 años, en el ámbito escolar. Revisiones previas como Lora y Moreno (2008); Ronk, Hund y Landau (2011); Bishop, Mulraney, Rinehart y Sciberras (2019); Willis, Siceloff, Morse, Neger y Flory (2019) o Fox, Dishman, Valicek, Ratcliff y Hilton (2020), reflejaron la necesidad de llevar a cabo nuevos programas y enfoques de intervención social, para mejorar la capacidad social de estos escolares. La aportación de este estudio se centra en un programa de intervención de las habilidades sociales en escolares con TDAH desde un enfoque conductual.…”