Treatment of Social Skills in Dual Disorders

Social skills deficits and excesses are characteristics of people with intellectual disability. Similarly, mental health disorders and challenging behaviors are associated with poor coping and social skills. Because of this state of affairs, a broad array of treatments—including cognitive behavior therapy, applied behavior analysis, bibliotherapy, and school curriculum approaches—have been implemented to address the social skills deficits and excesses associated with intellectual disability. The scope of this chapter, as a result, will be broad given the age of various clients, their intellectual and adaptive behavior functioning levels, the presence of co-occurring mental health disorders and challenging behavior, and the range of contexts in which social skills interventions have been implemented.