Social skills and behavior analysis:

This paper focuses on issues that have been relatively neglected or scarcely emphasized in available literature regarding the interface between the areas of Social Skills and Behavior Analysis: (a) the contribution of the functional perspective of behavior analysis in the definition of social skills and in social competence criteria; (b) the understanding of social skills and social competence as resulting from the ontogenetic, phylogenetic and cultural selection of social behavioral patterns; and (c) the implications and potential contribution of social skills programs in the planning of cultural practices committed to survival and to quality of life in the complex contemporary society.