Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Social Stories for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Validating the Content of a Virtual Reality Program

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects socio-emotional skills and perspective-taking abilities. Although social stories in a form of virtual reality program can help children with ASD, developing them and identifying appropriate responses might be subjective and thus challenging. Using Delphi method, and guided by general case training, we involved 63 parents and clinicians of individuals with ASD, in two rounds of online iteration to refine the stories. Scenarios that reached a 75% agreement level were accepted. This project is the first study to develop and validate a library of 75 short socio-emotional stories that illustrate various types and intensities of emotion in three social contexts of home, school, and community as the content of a virtual reality program.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Agran, M., & Krupp, M. (2010). A preliminary investigation of parents’ opinions about safety skills instruction: An apparent discrepancy between importance and expectation. Education and Training in Autism and Developmental Disabilities, 45, 303–311.

    Google Scholar 

  • American Psychiatric Association. (2013). DSM-5 Task Force. Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders: DSM-5 (5th ed.). Washington, D.C: American Psychiatric Publishing.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Balakrishnan, S., & Alias, A. (2017). Usage of social stories in encouraging social interaction of children with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of International Confrence on Special Education in Southeast Asia Region. https://doi.org/10.17977/um005v1i22017p091

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baron-Cohen, S. (2000). Theory of mind and autism: A fifteen year review. Understanding other minds: Perspectives from Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 2, 3–20.

    Google Scholar 

  • Behrmann, M., Thomas, C., & Humphreys, K. (2006). Seeing it differently: Visual processing in autism. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 10, 258–264.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bensalah, L., Caillies, S., & Anduze, M. (2016). Links among cognitive empathy, theory of mind, and affective perspective taking by young children. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 177, 17–31.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bernad-Ripoll, S. (2007). Using a self-as-model video combined with social stories™ to help a child with asperger syndrome understand emotions. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, 22, 100–106.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chezan, L. C., Drasgow, E., & Marshall, K. J. (2012). A report on using general-case programming to teach collateral academic skills to a student in a postsecondary setting. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, 27, 22–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Conaughton, R. J., Donovan, C. L., & March, S. (2017). Efficacy of an internet-based CBT program for children with comorbid high functioning autism spectrum disorder and anxiety: A randomised controlled trial. Journal of Affective Disorders, 218, 260–268.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dalkey, N. C. (1972). Studies in the quality of life; delphi and decision-making. Lexington: Lexington Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dalkey, N. C., Brown, B. B., & Cochran, S. (1969). The Delphi method: An experimental study of group opinion (Vol. 3). Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation.

    Google Scholar 

  • Day, H. M., & Horner, R. H. (1986). Response variation and the generalization of a dressing skill: Comparison of single instance and general case instruction. Applied Research in Mental Retardation, 7, 189–202.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Delano, M., & Snell, M. E. (2006). The effects of social stories on the social engagement of children with autism. Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions, 8, 29–42.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dziobek, I., Rogers, K., Fleck, S., Bahnemann, M., Heekeren, H. R., Wolf, O. T., & Convit, A. (2008). Dissociation of cognitive and emotional empathy in adults with Asperger syndrome using the multifaceted empathy test (MET). Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38, 464–473.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Golan, O., Ashwin, E., Granader, Y., McClintock, S., Day, K., Leggett, V., & Baron-Cohen, S. (2010). Enhancing emotion recognition in children with autism spectrum conditions: An intervention using animated vehicles with real emotional faces. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 40, 269–279.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Golan, O., & Baron-Cohen, S. (2006). Systemizing empathy: Teaching adults with Asperger syndrome or high-functioning autism to recognize complex emotions using interactive multimedia. Development and Psychopathology, 18, 591–617.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goldsmith, T. R., & LeBlanc, L. A. (2004). Use of technology in interventions for children with autism. Journal of Early and Intensive Behavior Intervention, 1, 166–178.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gray, C. A., & Garand, J. D. (1993). Social stories: Improving responses of students with autism with accurate social information. Focus on Autistic Behavior, 8, 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Happé, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account: Detail-focused cognitive style in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36, 5–25.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Horner, R., Sprague, J., & Wilcox, B. (2005). General case programming. Encyclopedia of Behavior Modification and Cognitive Behavior Therapy, 3, 1343–1348.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horner, R. H., & Albin, R. W. (1988). Research on general-case procedures for learners with severe disabilities. Education and Treatment of Children, 11, 375–388.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hsieh, H.-F., & Shannon, S. E. (2005). Three approaches to qualitative content analysis. Qualitative Health Research, 15, 1277–1288.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hsu, C.-C., & Sandford, B. A. (2007). The Delphi technique: Making sense of consensus. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 12, 1–8.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jorm, A. F. (2015). Using the Delphi expert consensus method in mental health research. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 49, 887–897.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Josman, N., Ben-Chaim, H., Friedrich, S., & Weiss, P. (2008). Effectiveness of virtual reality for teaching street-crossing skills to children and adolescents with autism. International Journal on Disability and Human Development, 7, 49–56.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kandalaft, M. R., Didehbani, N., Krawczyk, D. C., Allen, T. T., & Chapman, S. B. (2013). Virtual reality social cognition training for young adults with high-functioning autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43, 34–44.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Keeney, S., Hasson, F., & McKenna, H. (2006). Consulting the oracle: Ten lessons from using the Delphi technique in nursing research. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 53, 205–212.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kirkwood, M., Wales, A., & Wilson, A. (2003). A Delphi study to determine nursing research priorities in North Glasgow University Hospitals NHS Trust and the corresponding evidence base. Health Information and Libraries Journal, 20, 53–58.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kokina, A., & Kern, L. (2010). Social story™ interventions for students with autism spectrum disorders: A meta-analysis. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 40, 812–826.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kreider, C. M., Bendixen, R. M., Young, M. E., Prudencio, S. M., McCarty, C., & Mann, W. C. (2016). Social networks and participation with others for youth with learning, attention, and autism spectrum disorders: Réseaux sociaux et participation avec les autres, chez des adolescents ayant des troubles d’apprentissage, de l’attention et du spectre de l’autisme. Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy, 83, 14–26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kunda, M., & Goel, A. K. (2011). Thinking in pictures as a cognitive account of autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 41, 1157–1177.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Lau, B. T., & Win, K. M. (2017). Differentiated animated social stories to enhance social skills acquisition of children with autism spectrum disorder. V.C. Bryan, A.T. Musgrove & J.R. Powers, (Eds.), Handbook of research on human development in the digital age (pp. 300–329). Hershey: IGI Global.

    Google Scholar 

  • Marshall, D., Wright, B., Allgar, V., Adamson, J., Williams, C., Ainsworth, H., … Dempster, P. (2016). Social stories in mainstream schools for children with autism spectrum disorder: A feasibility randomised controlled trial. BMJ Open, 6, e011748.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • McDonnell, J. J., & Ferguson, B. (1988). A comparison of general case in vivo and general case simulation plus in vivo training. Journal of the Association for Persons with Severe Handicaps, 13, 116–124.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mitchell, P., Parsons, S., & Leonard, A. (2007). Using virtual environments for teaching social understanding to 6 adolescents with autistic spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 37, 589–600.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • More, C. (2008). Digital stories targeting social skills for children with disabilities: Multidimensional learning. Intervention in School and Clinic, 43, 168–177.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Parsons, S., & Cobb, S. (2011). State-of-the-art of virtual reality technologies for children on the autism spectrum. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 26, 355–366.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Petursdottir, A. L., McComas, J., McMaster, K., & Horner, K. (2007). The effects of scripted peer tutoring and programming common stimuli on social interactions of a student with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 40, 353–357.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Plaisted, K. C. (2001). Reduced generalisation in autism: An alternative to weak central coherence. In J. Burack, T. Charman, N. Yirmiya & P. R. Zelazo (Eds.), The development of autism: Perspectives from theory and research (pp. 149–169). Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ploog, B. O., Scharf, A., Nelson, D., & Brooks, P. J. (2013). Use of computer-assisted technologies (CAT) to enhance social, communicative, and language development in children with autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43, 301–322.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rao, P., Beidel, D., & Murray, M. (2008). Social skills interventions for children with asperger’s syndrome or high-functioning autism: A review and recommendations. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38, 353–361.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Reynhout, G., & Carter, M. (2006). Social Stories™ for children with disabilities. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36, 445–469.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Sanders, M. R., & Kirby, J. N. (2012). Consumer engagement and the development, evaluation, and dissemination of evidence-based parenting programs. Behavior Therapy, 43, 236–250.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Sansosti, F. J., Powell-Smith, K. A., & Kincaid, D. (2004). A research synthesis of social story interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders. Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, 19, 194–204.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Scattone, D. (2007). Social skills interventions for children with autism. Psychology in the Schools, 44, 717–726.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Self, T., Scudder, R. R., Weheba, G., & Crumrine, D. (2007). A virtual approach to teaching safety skills to children with autism spectrum disorder. Topics in Language Disorders, 27, 242–253.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, C. (2017). Writing and developing social stories: Practical interventions in autism (2nd ed.). Abingdon: Taylor & Francis.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Thiemann, K. S., & Goldstein, H. (2001). Social stories, written text cues, and video feedback: Effects on social communication of children with autism. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 34, 425–446.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Uljarevic, M., & Hamilton, A. (2013). Recognition of emotions in autism: A formal meta-analysis. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 43(7), 1517–1526.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Volioti, C., Tsiatsos, T., Mavropoulou, S., & Karagiannidis, C. (2016). VLEs, social stories and children with autism: A prototype implementation and evaluation. Education and Information Technologies, 21, 1679–1697.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Walsh, L., & Barry, M. (2008). A visual narrative for teaching social routines: Animations for young learners with autism. In Human-Computer Interaction Conference, 19–20 Sept 2008, University College Cork.

  • Weston, L., Hodgekins, J., & Langdon, P. E. (2016). Effectiveness of cognitive behavioural therapy with people who have autistic spectrum disorders: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review, 49, 41–54.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wilczynski, S. M., Menousek, K., Hunter, M., & Mudgal, D. (2007). Individualized education programs for youth with autism spectrum disorders. Psychology in the Schools, 44, 653–666.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wingate, M., Kirby, R., Pettygrove, S., Cunniff, C., Schulz, E., Ghosh, T., … Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network Surveillance Year 2010 Principal Investigators. (2014). Prevalence of autism spectrum disorder among children aged 8 years—autism and developmental disabilities monitoring network, 11 sites, united states, 2010. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report: Surveillance Summaries, 63, 1.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ying, K. T., Sah, S. B. M., & Abdullah, M. H. L. (2016). Personalised avatar on social stories and digital storytelling: Fostering positive behavioural skills for children with autism spectrum disorder. In Paper presented at the 2016 4th International Conference on User Science and Engineering (i-USEr).

Download references

Acknowledgments

We would like to express our sincere thanks to funding agencies, the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research and UBC Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies for their great support.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Occupational Therapy, Dalhousie University, 5869 University Avenue, Halifax, NS, Canada

    Parisa Ghanouni

  2. Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, University of British Columbia, T325 - 2211 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, BC, V6T 2B5, Canada

    Tal Jarus, Jill G. Zwicker, Kristin Mow & Alyssa Ledingham

  3. Department of Pediatrics (Division of Developmental Pediatrics), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

    Jill G. Zwicker

  4. Child & Family Research Institute, Vancouver, Canada

    Jill G. Zwicker

  5. Sunny Hill Health Centre for Children, Vancouver, Canada

    Jill G. Zwicker

  6. CanChild Centre for Childhood Disability Research, Hamilton, ON, Canada

    Jill G. Zwicker

  7. Department of Educational and Counseling Psychology and Special Education, Faculty of Education, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

    Joseph Lucyshyn

Authors
  1. Parisa Ghanouni
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Tal Jarus
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Jill G. Zwicker
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Joseph Lucyshyn
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Kristin Mow
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Alyssa Ledingham
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

Dr. Ghanouni, Dr. Jarus, Kristin Mow, and Alyssa Ledingham were involved in study design, ethics application, analysis of data, and writing or editing the manuscript. Dr. Zwicker and Dr. Lucyshyn were involved in the study design, editing, and reviewing the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Parisa Ghanouni.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with the ethical standards of the University Behavioural Research Ethics Board.

Informed Consent

We obtained written informed consent from all participants prior to the study.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Ghanouni, P., Jarus, T., Zwicker, J.G. et al. Social Stories for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Validating the Content of a Virtual Reality Program. J Autism Dev Disord 49, 660–668 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3737-0

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-018-3737-0

Keywords

Search

Navigation