Can corporate America accommodate people with social skills deficit?

Can corporate America accommodate people with social skills deficit? Well, yes, but how? Companies have cultures. Some may be easier for people with social skills deficits than others.  As the employee what is your role?  What is the managers role? There are no easy answers ,and it depends on the job. It’s a lot easier to …

“Your Fantastic Elastic Brain”: Motivating Children and Teens with Speech and Language Disorders

Struggling to motivate children and teens with speech and language disorders is an on going concern. Many learn to navigate around their deficit using strategies, but others avoid learning risks at all cost.  In therapy using interesting games is a popular motivator, but using these tools does not teach students how and why they should …

College Academic-Social Skills Coach

John, not his real name, a freshman was having difficulty managing his life on campus.  He spent most of his time in his room playing video games or watching Netflix, went to bed a 2-3 am missed classes and was turning in late assignments. By midterm, not only had John gained weight, he had no …

“Airplane” not “Mama:” Language Development in Children with Asperger Syndrome

Language development in children with Asperger Syndrome is often typical for verbal language but delayed in language use. “Compared with those affected by other forms of autism spectrum disorders those with Asperger syndrome (AS) do not have significant delays or difficulties in language or cognitive development,” states the “Autism Speak’s” website.  Slow developing non-verbal language skills in children …

Mindblindness vs Context blindness

Replacing the generic term of “mindblindness,” often used to refer to people on the autism spectrum, with a more specific term such as “context blindness” has been proposed by Peter Vermeulen, PhD.   Simon Baron-Cohen created the term “mindblindness,” to refer to the deficit  people on the autism spectrum have in reading others mental states. This term …

Social engineering to improve social deficits

In a recent article in Attitude magazine, a magazine that offers strategies and support for people and their families with ADHD and LD, a mom created a Facebook birthday event for her son with Asperger syndrome.  No one wanted to come to her son’s 13th birthday  and her son was upset.  She decided to with …