As presented at "FINAL CONFERENCE OF PROJECT “SERIOUS GAMES FOR COMPETENCIES AND CREATIVENESS”" - www.games4competence.eu Date: 03.06.2015 Starting time: 8.30 a.m. (till 13.30) Venue: Compass hall, Rectorate of Plovdiv University, 24 Tsar Assen Street, Plovdiv 4000, Bulgaria

1. SOCIAL COMPETENCE AS RESILIENCE
FACTOR IN MENTAL HEALTH AND
DISABILITY RESEARCH AND PRACTICE
Presentation within the
Plovdiv Conference
4.6.2015
Prof. Dr. Manfred Pretis
Dieses Projekt wurde mit Unterstützung der Europäischen Kommission finanziert. Die Verantwortung für den Inhalt dieser
Veröffentlichung (Mitteilung) trägt allein der Verfasser; die Kommission haftet nicht für die weitere Verwendung der darin
enthaltenen Angaben

2. Servus – Moin-Moin - Stravo
My work
My
heartt
My work

3. About do I wish to talk
The importance of social competence as a
resilience factor
The importance to belong to some one
The importance of social contacts to typically
developped persons as resilience factor

4. What will be the „TAKE HOME MESSAGE“?

5. Social competence is all about
a) coming into contact with other persons
b) Keeping contact (in terms of creating a joint reality)
c) Solving conflicts
We need social competences to BELONG to others
Social competence can be understood as use of
appropriate and effective social strategies in carrying out
one’s interpersonal goals in the peer context (Gurlanick
2014).

6. • Resilience is tied to the ability to learn to live with
ongoing fear and uncertainty, namely,
• the ability to show positive adaptation in spite of
significant life adversities and the
• ability to adapt to difficult and challenging life
experiences (see Rutter 1985, 1999)
Lessons learnt from early resilience research

7. - Social contacts to „well functioning“ peers are seen as
one major resilience factor (Werner/Werner 1993,
Petermann & Schmidt 2006).

8. Margalit (1994) Loneliness among Children with Special
Needs: Theory, Research, Coping and Intervention
(2011), personal communication)
Most of young persons with disability feel lonely (in the
classroom). More important than increasing cognitive or
academic skills (about 5 IQ points etc.) is the feeling of
HAPPINESS for each young person (with or without
disability).
Social contacts trigger the feeling of Belonging

9. Despite INCLUSION especially parents of
children/youngsters with complex learning difficulites
sometime prefer „segregated settings“ (special schools) as
they recognize, that their children perceive a feeling of
BELONGING to somebody (to the group of peers).
Also within the pilot run in Austria within SGSCC project
some participants report, that within the group of (disabled)
peers they BELONG to somebody.
In mainstream (secondary) school they mostly felt excluded
Steps back to separation?

10. Guralnick 2014

11. To promote social competence we need the
OTHERS, especially well functionning OTHERS

12. A developmental heuristic model towards self-efficacy and self-control
I have „factors“ I have people, who take care of me
I have people who give feedback to me
I have people who protect me
I have people who give me feedback
about my sucess and about what I might
have to improve
I can „factors“ I can do thinks by myself
I am „factors“ I am self-confident
I am proud of my self
I am a kind person
….
Social competence and the OTHERS

13. How to foster social competence?

14. Fostering social competence is necessary (from
the very beginning of the life) Guralnick, 2014

15. The importance of „translation processes“

16. a) Hands-on strategies (parents or professionals as
facilitators/mediators)
b) Creating supportive surroundings (inclusive settings)
c) https://www.bifie.at/buch/1024/4 only 0,45% (1 in 200
children with special needs in special schools), only
1,57% all over AT segregated
d) Fostering specific competences through strategy
training (e.g. within the SGSCC-project)
Resulting strategies

17. With friendly permission of Guralnick (2014)

18. Parents as moderators (Guralnick et al. 2003)

19. We are not able to „produce“ social competence
In the best case we are able to make bridges
Limitation of moderator model

20. Categorisation of children with disability in kindergarten
systems (
Ytterhus (2008)
- The kind peers
- The „strange“ peers (concerning behavioural pattern)
- The strange and sick peers (children with DS)
- The strange and weird ones (do not respect rules, hurt)
Social competence and peers

21. The importance of contact towards typically
develloped peers (Gutalnick et al (1996)
Sucessful communication for children with communication disorders was
More likely if it happened with typically develloped peers.

22. Most young children learn prosocial skills through
the natural process of observing and engageing in
social interactions with socially competent peers.
• Odom, 2005

23. Translational Models (Guralnick (2014)

25. Who is benefiting from programs?

27. Example of translational processes (Guralnick
2014)

28. SGSCC games initiate „translational“ processes
On the level of cognitions
On the level of executive functions (memory, attention)
On the level of motivation (within „games“ in terms of a
quest)
We are looking forward to our evaluation data.
Personal feedback from participants are promising
SGSCC within translationals processes
www.games4competence.eu

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Thank you and „SERVUS“ from AUSTRIA
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