Socio-emotional conflict in collaborative learning—A process-oriented case study in a higher education context

Abstract

This case study explores cognitive, motivational and socio-emotional challenges experienced in collaborative learning, how conflict emerges and what students’ emotional reactions and interpretations are. Collaborative work of 22 higher education students was followed during a three-month course. All face-to-face group sessions were videotaped (33h), and cued retrospective recall interviews (with video stimulus) were conducted. The results indicate the differences between the groups with respect to the amount and the types of challenges. One case group was chosen (one that experienced more and particularly socio-emotional challenges) for the in-depth interaction analysis. Their overruling, status-centric, undermining and normative interaction created a socio-emotional conflict. Students were unable to maintain a well-balanced atmosphere, which led them to adopt avoidance-focused emotion regulation behaviour and to lower their on-task engagement.