TEACHERS’ EXPECTATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS’ SOCIAL SKILLS IN JAPAN

Japanese high school teachers rated 100 students on 30 social behaviors using a Japanese translation of the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS, Gresham & Elliott, 1990). Items on the Japanese scale (J-SSRS) formed two culturally meaningful subscales: Academic and Interpersonal. Japanese teachers’ ratings demonstrated that they considered nearly all 30 skills to be important in their classrooms and that they viewed Academic and Interpersonal skills as equally important. Ratings of students on the Academic subscale were strongly correlated with GPA. Female students were rated higher on both Academic and Interpersonal subscales than were males. Both subscales demonstrated high internal consistency reliability. Based on this initial study, it appears that the scale could be useful for assessing two types of social skills in Japanese high school students: skills that are highly related to academic achievement and skills that are important in school, but are not directly related to academic achievement.