ABSTRACT
Impairments in social cognition, such as inadequate perception or understanding of socially relevant information, are common and salient sequelae of many neurocognitive, neurodevelopmental, and neuropsychiatric disorders. Presence of social cognitive impairment is core to diagnosis in some conditions, such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but they can also be acquired or exacerbated through a range of other presentations, such as serious brain injury, e.g. traumatic brain injury, or through development of a psychiatric disorder, e.g. schizophrenia spectrum disorder (SSD). Social cognitive deficits are known to disrupt interpersonal relationships, with negative consequences for the everyday life functioning and social participation of patients. Hence, effective treatments are sorely needed.
This chapter provides an overview of neuropsychological rehabilitation methods, with consideration to how these relate to the remediation of social cognition. It then reviews the evidence base of social cognitive treatment interventions that target one or more processes of social cognition, e.g. emotion recognition, empathy, theory of mind, and social behaviour. A distinction is made between treatments that focus on a single aspect of social cognition versus treatments that are multifaceted. Treatments developed for patients with serious brain injury will be discussed in detail, with approaches trialed in ASD and SSD also considered.
