Description
Social skills function as a vehicle by which we negotiate important relationships and navigate the transition from childhood into the educational and professional experiences of early adulthood. Yet for individuals who are deaf, access to these opportunities may vary depending on their preferred language modality, family language use, and educational contexts. Drawing upon available data in the National Longitudinal Transition Survey 2 and controlling for demographic covariates, the authors examine the predictive role of social skills in high school on postsecondary education, employment, independent living, and self-beliefs. Parents’ ratings of social skills in their children who are deaf (from the first wave, when students were in high school) strongly positively predicted graduation from postsecondary settings up to 10 years later but did not predict employment or independent living outcomes.
Citation
Cawthon, S. W., Caemmerer, J. M., Dickson, D. M., Ocuto, O. L., Ge, J., & Bond, M. P. (2015). Social skills as a predictor of postsecondary outcomes for individuals who are deaf. Applied Developmental Science, 19(1), 19–30.