Cultural adaptation of the understanding social situations program for individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders in Korea.

OBJECTIVE: This was a quasiexperimental investigation of the effects of the Korean version of the Understanding Social Situations (USS) intervention on social cognition in individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. The Korean version was adapted from the USS intervention according to the Korean culture and research interests, making the first cultural adaptation of the program for Korean patients. METHOD: Forty-one individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders were initially recruited, and 26 were assigned to either the intervention or conventional treatment condition. After the pretraining assessment, the intervention group underwent 8-10 weekly training sessions. Posttraining assessments were conducted in both groups within the same timeframe. RESULTS: The Korean version of the USS was found to be well tolerated. Large effects were observed for the USS Skills Training Test and theory of mind, whereas improvement in attributional style was not significant, possibly because of the limited sensitivity of the measure. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: The Korean version of USS showed good feasibility and potential as a culturally adapted intervention for improving higher level social cognition and as second-order theory of mind in schizophrenia spectrum disorders. These findings suggest that culturally adapted social cognitive interventions can be effectively implemented in Korean psychiatric rehabilitation settings. However, large-scale randomized controlled trials and additional modules are needed to target broader aspects of theory of mind and attributional style. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).