I once visited a program where I had previously worked but hadn’t returned in over five years. One student I worked with frequently was about 12 years old when I had left and was about 17 when I visited. When he saw me, he said, “Hi, Barry,” and continued with his work as if he saw me every day. The staff thought it was hilarious.
Apparently, I had made enough of an impression that he remembered my name after five years, but not so much that he was interested in talking to me after so much time had passed. Running into people you haven’t seen in a very long time is an unusual event. It doesn’t come up very often, so the opportunity to practice appropriate social skills for that event are rare. This is not a particularly important event, but some others might be.
For example, many people with developmental disabilities have been victims of abuse. There are many programs designed to teach individuals the appropriate skills to prevent themselves from becoming victims of abuse. Parents of teenagers with developmental disabilities are often extremely interested in programs to address this issue. These skills can be quite challenging to teach. Sure, you might get acquisition, but teaching and assessing whether these skills are generalized to the point where they would be successful under real-world conditions is an extremely challenging task. Most of the time, when I’ve seen people attempt to teach these skills, they do not even attempt to get the generalization data to know if it is likely effective. It is just so hard to collect. Plus, there is little or no opportunity to practice these skills regularly. Even if you were extremely successful teaching these skills, what are the chances that the student would use those skills well if there was an occasion to use them in say, three years? Most skills will deteriorate without practice. Should we have a constant maintenance schedule for a skill we hope the person never has to use?
In my view, there is a place for teaching these types of skills for the right type of learner, for the right time in their development. Is this one of the most critical items for this learner now? If so, definitely teach these skills. Just don’t do it to check off a box on someone’s agenda. If you are going to teach abuse prevention skills, understand it is a major challenge that will require significant time and attention. Spend the time to do it right. If you don’t have the time or resources to do the generalization and maintenance, it’s probably better to not waste everyone’s time.