Common Dimensions of Social Skills of Children and Adolescents: A Taxonomy of Positive Behaviors

Although much work has been done to derive empirically based taxonomies of child and adolescent problem behaviors, such is not the case for positive social behaviors. In the present study an extensive review, analysis, and synthesis of more than 2 decades of factor analytic research on child and adolescent social skills to was completed derive an empirically based taxonomy. Five behavioral dimensions occurred consistently: Peer Relations, Self Management, Academic, Compliance, and Assertion. The most common social skills associated with these dimensions are presented. Clinicians and researchers may use this taxonomy to provide a nomenclature with which to refer to the five positive social skill patterns, identify dimensions on which children or adolescents may have deficits, design interventions to increase the occurrence of these skills, measure the effects of interventions, and aid in theory development.