Why don't Autistic Children Learn Social Skills like Other Children?

Why don’t autistic children learn social skills like other children. That is a cry of many parents of autistic children across the world.

Unfortunately, there is no simple answer: it depends on the particular autism of your child.

All categories in the Integrative Cognitive Profiling Framework can cause difficulties with social interaction. Generally, each category combines to cause difficulties, but if severe enough, each on their own is enough. How far your child gets with social interaction generally depends on the severity of the underlying issues. As children get older, social emotional reciprocity becomes key to social interaction. It is thought that around 50% of autistic adults are able to do this.

Let’s consider each category in turn starting with Processing:

Processing

All kinds of issues with processing speech cause problems with social interaction. The problem is that concentrating on understanding what is being said and then only getting the literal meaning, leaves little or no processing ability left to grasp the context.

However, note that many children will be able to process incoming emotion at the same time, if not their own as well.

This is an issue that gets worse as the child gets older. In younger years, it may be that no social difficulties are apparent. This is because interaction is all about content. Shared interests are enough to make friends. But as children develop social interaction morphs into being more about emotion than content. Then social interaction is about building connnection rather than just about shared interests.

Most autistic people with processing difficulties find structured conversations much easier. This is because they know what to expect and can expect to understand the topic under discussion.

Thinking and Learning

Most people find it easier to be with people who think in the same way as they do. The greater the difference in thinking style, the harder it becomes to communicate effectively. This translates to different academic subjects. The subjects that you find hard are the ones where your way of thinking conflicts with that of those who love the subject. Of course there are people who are good all rounders - and this is also found in the autistic population.

The standard example, is Temple Grandin who thinks in pictures and whose brain anatomy reflects that. This creates a barrier when it comes to communication and social interaction.

Similarly someone who thinks very logically, a common but not universal autistic trail, will struggle to communicate with someone who does not think logically. Social interaction is not logical and therefore cannot be condensed to rules.

Sensory

Sensory issues can form a huge barrier for social interaction. When it comes to the sensory issues, most people think of the environment and while this does play a big part, individual people can also unwittingly cause sensory issues.

Even moderate sensory hyper-sensitivities can make it difficult to ‘stand’ being around certain people. For example, those wearing their favourite perfume, or those with certain pitches of voice.

The environment can play a huge role. Noise, movement in the visual field are common issues with autistic children that make the playground environment intolerable and which can lead to chidren isolating themselves.

Emotion

Social emotional reciprocity becomes important as children get older. If your child cannot do this then they will find social chit chat boring and pointless. This difficlty is not unique to conditions like autism: it is found in the general population too. Those who do not have neurodiverse conditions develop ways to simulate it to get the social interaction they need. Lack of social emotional reciprocity can make you come across as cold and uninterested until people get to know you.

Most people like to talk about themselves, if your child has exposure anxiety and therefore has difficulty sharing about themselves, this can make building friendships very difficult. Friendships will remain superficial - people to be with, rather than to build deep and lasting relationships with.

Executive Function

Children who do not learn to regulate their emotions roughly in step with their peers will find friendships increasingly difficult as they get older. Other children will simply not want to be with them.

Similarly other children will find it difficult to tolerate impulsiveness or children who cannot concentrate on the game at hand.

Executive functioning is something that children learn as they develop through interacting with peers and with other children. If this interaction is not happening, there will be delays in developing executive functioning skills - beyond difficulties caused by inherent difficulties with executive functioning.

Focus and interest

Shared interests play an important part in social interaction. Afterall, people do need something to talk about. If your child has different interests to most other children, making that initial connection to make friends can be very difficult.

Social interaction generally includes swift changes of topic without warning. If your child struggles with this, then social interaction will be difficult.

Not all autistic children struggle to learn social interaction

There is a type of autism where children are able to learn and fully understand social interaction. The problem is that they cannot engage because they are unable to express themselves through speaking. For more information see the books by Ido Kedar and Naoki Higashida. Both are autistic but demonstrate a good grasp of social interaction.

We can help

Difficulties with social interaction can be difficult to crack because children can be very cruel. However, there are simple strategies to make things easier for your child.

For example, some autistic people find making eye contact or looking at faces difficult. But neither of these is actually neccessary for successful social interaction. It is enough to look at the forehead, tip of nose, lips, or even just vaguely in the direction of the face.

If you feel overwhelmed by all these different reasons for difficulty with social interaction, or uncertain about where to start, consider joining the Minds in Depth community. Our platform empowers you with the knowledge and tools to uncover the root causes of your child’s challenges, helping you to develop personalised strategies that truly work for them. Rather than offering ready-made one size fits all answers, we guide you in gaining the confidence and understanding to create solutions tailored to your child’s needs.

Alternatively, you can inquire about an assessment which applies the Integrative Cognitive Profiling Framework to gain deeper insights into your child’s strengths and needs.