I went to a seminar a few days back by a social services agency that among other things provides some services for ASD individuals. The presenter was talking about his work in the area of behavioral modification with individuals across a range of ages and level of capabilities, and one of the case studies was a 30yr Aspie who really wanted to have a girlfriend, and had been unable to.
So they sat down with him, assessed his skills and challenges, worked out a plan involving him and put together a program to teach him social skills, 'scripts' to use a simplistic term (greetings, conversations starters), strategies to repair relationships with others, i.e. what to do when things go wrong and anxiety coping methods amongst other things. He was very motivated towards his goal.
They then went out and put that into practice with him in situations mainly cafes where he would be able to develop his interaction skills with women with the ultimate aim that he would be able to get a girlfriend. They did it fairly scientifically in that they observed him and got him to self-observe and they would later assess the results of the encounters and measure it deterministically, then feed that back into what they were doing to refine or change the approach.
I thought it was a refreshing and ultimately pragmatic approach, and goes with my personal view anybody can be taught anything - with the right support from others, hell I coulda done with help like this when I was a lad.
Anyway he got a girlfriend and she's moving in with him (yeah; a new set of challenges), the story made my day and I hope to see and hear of this type of thing happening in the future in my community.