A replication and extension of the PEERS intervention: examining effects on social skills and social anxiety in adolescents with autism spectrum disorders.

Laugeson et al. (2014) ran the PEERS social-skills group in a community clinic. Five autistic teens attended the 14-week program with parent help.

They checked social skills and social worry before and after. No control group was used.

All five teens gained social skills and felt less anxious. Parents also saw fewer autism symptoms at home.

The gains were large enough to matter in everyday life.

The result lines up with Johnson et al. (2009) and Boudreau et al. (2015). Those larger RCTs also showed PEERS boosts social skills in teens and young adults.

Wyman et al. (2020) seems to disagree. They found PEERS helped social knowledge but not real friendships in autistic students with cognitive delays. The gap is about setting and IQ. Laugeson et al. (2014) worked with high-functioning teens in a clinic, while Joshua studied mixed-IQ students in special-ed classes.

Nickerson et al. (2015) extend the story: when teens gain skills, family chaos drops and parent confidence rises.

You can run PEERS in your local clinic and expect similar gains for bright autistic teens. Use the same parent-coach model and weekly homework. Track both social skills and anxiety; both move. If you serve students with ID, add extra generalization practice as Wyman et al. (2020) suggest.