The influence of peer interaction in micro-computer based problem-solving

Abstract

This thesis is concerned with the importance of social factors in cognitive development: specifically it addresses the question of the extent to which interaction between children can affect learning or developmental progress. Six studies were conducted in local schools using micro-computer based problem-solving tasks. In the first two studies, a Tower of Hanoi problem was used to explore the importance of peer-interaction in learning. In the four subsequent experiments a balance-beam problem was used to investigate the importance of variation in task and social circumstances in determing individual benefit. Subject ages ranged from eight to fourteen years. It was found that precise differences in the experimental circumstances were capable of influencing the extent to which interaction with a peer enhanced the individual child's post-test performance. The findings suggest that previous studies of peer-interaction have demonstrated a less general effect than previously supposed. The variability in benefit demonstrated may indicate, not that interaction is of no practical importance, but rather that the replication of an effect may be dependent upon repeating the exact circumstances in which it was first elicited. The concept of cognitive tactics is proposed as a means of describing cognitive porcesses in a way that acknowledges their relation to particular contexts. (D73132/87)

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