Social skills training for ADHD in children

Social skills training for ADHD might possibly improve children’s general behavior and ADHD symptoms rated by parents although it might not improve teacher-rated outcomes.

Summary

A Cochrane review included 11 studies with a total of 747 children with ADHD (between 5 and 12 years of age). Most of the trials compared child social skills training and parent training plus medication versus medication alone. The duration of the interventions ranged from 8 to 10 weeks (8 studies) up to 2 years. The types of social skills interventions were named social skills training, cognitive behavioural intervention, multimodal behavioural/psychosocial therapy, behavioural therapy/treatment, behavioural and social skills treatment, and psychosocial treatment.

Teacher-rated outcomes were chosen to use as the primary analysis. There were no statistically significant treatment effects either on teacher-rated social skills competences (SMD 0.16, 95% CI -0.04 to 0.36; 5 studies, n=392), on the teacher-rated general behaviour (SMD 0.00, 95% CI -0.21 to 0.21; 3 studies, n=358), or on the teacher-rated ADHD symptoms (SMD -0.02, 95% CI -0.19 to 0.16; 6 studies, n=515). In the secondary analyses, the parent-rated social skills competences (SMD 0.22, 95% CI 0.04 to 0.40, P=0.02; 7 studies, n=628), general behaviour (SMD -0.26; 95% CI -0.51 to -0.01, P=0.04; 1 study, n=254), and ADHD symptoms (SMD -0.49, 95% CI -0.79 to -0.19, I²=68%, P=0.001; 7 studies, n=654) showed significant improvement due to social skills training.

Comment: The quality of evidence is downgraded by study limitations (unclear allocation concealment and lack of blinding), by inconsistency (variability in results), and by imprecise results (few patients).

Clinical comments

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Ədəbiyyat

1. Storebø OJ, Skoog M, Damm D et al. Social skills training for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in children aged 5 to 18 years. Cochrane Database Syst Rev 2011;(12):CD008223.