ABSTRACT
Social skills training enjoys a popularity unrivaled in psychiatric rehabilitation. It is used by practitioners in many fields, in diverse settings, with individuals who have a wide range of psychological disorders. For example, practitioners in the fields of education, mental retardation, psychiatric rehabilitation, and mental health advocate the use of social skills training. Within these different fields of practice, social skills training has been demonstrated effective in a wide range of settings, including inpatient and outpatient mental health, day hospital, rehabilitation programs, schools, correction facilities, and vocational settings. And in these settings, social skills training has been applied to a wide range of disorders, including marital distress, school problems, vocational decision making, anxiety disorders, drug abuse disorders, depression, and schizophrenia. In fact, there have been over 100 published evaluations of social skills training. Most of the empirical studies demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach.
