Peer Group Interaction Research Articles

The Role of Trust in Virtual and Interpersonal Environments: Implications for Team Learning & Case Method Pedagogies

(Proquest Information and Learning: ... denotes non-USASCII text omitted.) In 2002, more than two million college students were estimated to be enrolled in some form of online learning, triple the number from just four years before.1 By the year 2005, it is estimated that more than 90 percent of U.S. colleges and universities will be offering online learning options.2 This shift toward interactive communication technologies in higher education may not be a bad thing at all for the cause of learning. Yet how can we tell when, as one of the premiere researchers in the field has noted,3 too little theory development and empirical research has been focused on communication technology in education? Communication technology is becoming especially popular in journalism and mass communication education. In addition to communication technology, active learning and team learning have been identified as the three principal pedagogical trends in communication education.4 The emphasis on active and team learning is made inevitable by the changing demands of the job market. Employers across a range of fields state that communication skills, problem-solving ability and teamwork are the most important qualities they look for in new college graduates.5 This lines up with our view that we are in the business of teaching future communication and information professionals how to write, think critically, work in a team environment and effectively utilize communication technology. In this article, we report research undertaken in a telecommunications management course that brought together all three of the trends mentioned above. The general research question investigates how communication technology can facilitate team learning. The justification for this question is that team learning, an example of what Moore calls learner-learner interaction, is said to be the third and often neglected essential element of distance education course design. Moore, a pioneer in distance education research, claims that independent learners must have the traditional learner-content and learner-instructor interactions, but also peer group interaction to fully stimulate a rich learning experience.6 After reviewing a selected portion of the research literature related to our question, we describe the quasi-experiment designed to observe the interaction among the pedagogies of team learning, active learning (in this case, thecase method) and computer-mediated learning. Finally, we report the results and conclude with implications both for teaching and learning as well as for future research on mass communication education and computer-enabled pedagogies. Previous Research The fast-growing body of research on online teaching and learning is still too new and diffuse to suggest whether online learning or the traditional classroom is better for educational outcomes. This question has been posed before of other communication technologies adopted for educational purposes. The mail was being used to mediate distance education as early as the 1840s in England.7 Since then, virtually every communication technology has been integrated into education. A vast body of published work on the efficacy of communication technologies in education has developed over the last seventy-five years. A 1999 compilation analyzed the results of more than 350 studies on distance education uses of communication technologies ranging from early radio, telephone and television to fax, e-mail, video conferencing and computers.8 The studies included in the report had been conducted between 1928 and 1999. The conclusions of this report were that there is essentially significant difference between face-to-face and mediated instruction. This so-called no significant difference phenomenon implies that the technology is neutral and the efficacy of education is in the teaching. Simply put, there is good teaching and bad teaching and it has nothing to do with the technology. …

Pediatric HIV/AIDS: Issues and Strategies for Intervention

Pediatric HIV/AIDS: Issues and Strategies for Intervention

On Being an Online Tutor

Many new ways are now becoming available for using computer-based communications technology to distribute and store online information. Such developments necessitate that we critically review the approaches that we employ for the realization of the educational infrastructures that are used for the support of teaching and learning activities. With this objective in mind, this paper introduces and discusses a model of teaching and learning that can be used as a basis for building new types of educational infrastructure based upon the use of web-based resources, peer group interaction and online tutoring. The special role that 'e-tutoring' plays within online courses is discussed and some of the implications of this activity for staff development are briefly outlined.

Social Interactions and the Institutions of Local Government

Many economic processes are influenced by externalities within groups. Educational outcomes depend on peer-group interactions between students, which may help explain the persistence of income inequality and the stability of subcultures and social classes.' Crime rates exhibit a geographic pattern that strongly suggests the presence of interactions between potential criminals. There is also substantial evidence that amenities are influenced by interactions between neighbors, and that interactions between firms influence labor productivity.2 This paper considers how social interactions affect the institutions of local government. Specifically, we show how social interactions encourage consumers to withdraw from the traditional public sector and join exclusive groups that regulate the activities of their members. Examples include familiar organizations like exclusive suburbs and private schools and new or newly popular institutions like private governments and charter schools. Each of these institutions mediates social interactions by excluding some agents and altering the actions of others. We view the formation of these institutions as a kind of secession, since members withdraw from the civic whole and limit their interactions to other group members. These new organizations are increasingly important, surprisingly powerful, and highly controversial. One of the most widespread innovations in local government in recent years has been the rise of residential private government, including common interest developments (CIDs) and homeowner associations (HOAs). Evan McKenzie (1996) reports that the number of CIDs in the United States grew from a few hundred in the 1960's to 150,000 in 1993, and that their populations now total at least 32 million people. CIDs and HOAs are generally formed by real estate developers, and are eventually governed by an elected board of members. CIDs limit interactions with the rest of the world in a number of ways, most notoriously by building walls (Edward J. Blakely and Mary Gail Snyder, 1997). They tax their members to pay for the local public services they provide (primarily street maintenance, trash collection, and policing), collectively own and manage shared facilities (recreation centers, parks, and sometimes streets), and regulate both property use and individual conduct through covenants, conditions, and restrictions (CCRs) established by the developer. The regulatory activities of CIDs are impressive. Activities that have been prohibited include flying the flag, delivering newspapers, parking pickup trucks in the driveway, kissing outside the front door, using one's own back door too much, building fences, painting the exterior certain colors, having pets, working from one's home, marrying people below a certain age, and even having children (McKenzie, 1996 p. 4). In spite of, or perhaps because of, these regulations, CIDs provide a higher level of amenities than is available in public developments. However, critics view them as undemocratic and discriminatory private governments operating outside the constitutional restrictions that public governments face. A primary goal of this paper is to provide a model that captures the common and general features of the new institutions of local government. To that end, we develop a model of local secession motivated by social interactions and supported by regulation. The model has three essential elements. First, heterogeneous agents belong to groups, and each takes an action that * Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration, 2053 Main Mall, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z2 Canada. We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the University of British Columbia Centre for Real Estate and Urban Land Economics, and the Real Estate Foundation of British Columbia. We also appreciate the comments of David Wildasin, two anonymous referees, and seminar participants at the 1996 University of British Columbia Summer Symposium on Urban Land Economics. 1See Anita A. Summers and Barbara L. Wolfe (1977), J. Vernon Henderson et al. (1978), Roland B6nabou (1993, 1996), Steven N. Durlauf (1996), and George A. Akerlof (1997). 2 See Joseph Gyourko and Joseph Tracy (1991), Raaj Sah (1991), William N. Evans et al. (1992), Charles F. Manski (1993), Edward L. Glaeser et al. (1996), and John M. Ouigley (1998).

Situational mechanisms of peer group interaction in collaborative meaning-making: Processes and conditions for learning

This paper discusses a case study that investigated situational mechanisms of peer group interaction in collaborative activity. Its goal was to highlight the processes and conditions for meaning-making and to characterise the complex relations of social and cognitive processes emerging in peer-mediated collaborative learning. The pedagogical framework derives from situated views of cognition which aim to engage the learner in activities which encourage problem posing and solving, negotiation and knowledge construction. Twenty 12 year-olds participated in the study. Each student worked in solo and in dyadic conditions on two tasks from their mathematics and language curriculum. Data were gathered by means of videotapes, direct observations, transcriptions, stimulated recall interviews, questionnaires and evaluations of the students’ task productions. Social interaction was analysed at a micro-analytic level within a three-dintensional analytic framework focusing on the communicative function, the nature of collaboration and cognitive processes. The results highlight the interactional and discursive processes inherent in peer-mediated collaborative learning and reveal situational features of students’ social activity which either support or inhibit successful collaboration. The ways in which the logic of peer interaction is reciprocally established in students’ evolving interactions and is shaped by their social and cognitive activity is highlighted. The results inaicate that the complexity and openness of the task, student initiation in meaning-making, and the opportunity to use different semiotic tools are important for supporting dialogic meaning-making in solo and in collaborative activity.

Life-cycle consumption under social interactions

Abstract In this paper we examine how social interactions affect consumption decisions at various levels of aggregation in a life-cycle economy made up of peer groups. For this purpose, we consider two analytically solvable life-cycle models, one under certainty equivalent behavior and one under prudence, and explicitly allow for three different forms of social interactions in peer groups, namely conformism, altruism, and jealousy. We show that whether social interactions have any effects on individuals’ optimal consumption decisions critically depends on intertemporal rather than static considerations. This is true regardless of whether individuals’ preferences are time separable or exhibit habit formation, and whether information within peer groups is homogeneous or disparate. It implies that analyzing the effects of social interactions in static rather than intertemporal settings is likely to be misleading. We also show that social interactions, when coupled with either habit formation or prudence, can significantly strengthen the effects of habit formation or prudence in the direction of resolving two well-known puzzles in the literature on the permanent income hypothesis, namely excess smoothness and excess sensitivity.

CONCEPTUAL CHANGE INSTRUCTION: A SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIVIST PERSPECTIVE

Studies of conceptual change from a social constructivist perspective are reviewed and synthesized. Some studies that analyzed teacher-student interactions involved the use of tradebooks and teacher-guided and student-initiated discussion helpful to conceptual change. Other studies that examined student student interactions in peer groups demonstrated that the interactions and sociocultural factors that affected them interfered with conceptual change. The effect of gender on conceptual change in teacher-student interactions and student-student interactions is also discussed. Finally, the implications of this research for instruction are drawn.

School Tracking and Student Violence

From the literature on symbolic interaction, we know that interaction between peers is important for self-development. We also know that strong bonding to schools and teachers protects against delinquency and violence. This peer interaction and social bonding must be placed in the context of societal change toward increased workplace participation by parents and the consequent increased parental role expected of schools. The result has been sharing the moral development of children with teachers; this highlights the importance of the parent-teacher relationship and its effect on the teacher as leader and guide. Moral development is also affected by school practices, not least tracking and mainstreaming. This article will explore how these changes affect peer group interaction and how schools can positively influence and channel such group formation.

The situated dynamics of peer group interaction: an introduction to an analytic framework

This paper introduces a descriptive system of analysis of peer group interaction. The method takes a dynamic and process-oriented approach to interaction which is seen as socially and situationally developed in students' moment-by-moment interactions. By concentrating on individual and group functioning, the method aims at highlighting the situated dynamics of peer group interaction and learning. The method consists of a three-dimensional analysis of peer group interaction by focusing on the functions of verbal interaction, and the nature of cognitive processing and social processing. These are investigated with the help of micro-analytical maps drawn out from the data based on video recordings, transcriptions, observations, interviews, and questionnaires. In the first part of the paper the theoretical and methodological background of the analysis will be discussed. That is followed by an introduction to the analysis method highlighted with empirical examples. The paper ends with a reflective analysis of the method.

Development of an instrument to measure caring peer group interactions.

The purpose of this study was to develop psychometric properties of the Peer Group Caring Interaction Scale (PGCIS) designed to measure caring during informal peer interactions as experienced by undergraduate nursing students. The PGCIS has two subscales that address caring peer behaviors and interactional events during which students assist their peers in the resolution of specific needs. PGCIS psychometric properties were developed using data from 873 junior students enrolled at 87 BSN schools of nursing. Internal consistency reliability was demonstrated for the 9-item Caring Behaviors and the 7-item Giving Assistance subscales with a coefficient alpha of .91 for each. Findings from an exploratory factor analysis supported the two subscale structure of the PGCIS. The PGCIS scores correlated positively with scores on the Intimacy subscale of the Organization Climate Description Questionnaire (OCDQ) and the Peer Group Interaction Scale and inversely with scores on the OCDQ Disengagement subscale. The findings from this study provide beginning support for the PCGIS as a valid and reliable approach to the measurement of caring in academic settings. Additional studies are recommended to continue the psychometric evaluation of this instrument.

Peer group play and co-childrearing in Japan: A historical ethnography of a fishing community

This research took a cultural-historical perspective, investigating children's social play and peer group interactions in cross-age groups. Participants lived in a local fishing community which had undergone dramatic changes during Japan's postwar era of high economic growth. An ethnographic description based on fieldwork and the collaborative recall of middle-aged community members clarified the growth process. This community traditionally maintained a co-rearing system to support children during long separations from their parents who were absent for months on fishing expeditions. Through ethnographic descriptions, three characteristics of the children's play and peer groups in this community were revealed: (1) they were constrained by geographical proximity; (2) the play group was hierarchically structured according to the member's age and went through a nine-year cycle; and (3) adults and children, while segregated from each other as social groups, used the same field (the ocean environment) for thier activities. The function of peer group play experiences for child development as a community member was related to the concepts of “community of play” and “prototype models.”

Development, use, and evaluation of clinical practice guidelines.

The development and use of practice guidelines, if framed as recommendations for best practices in the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and management of occupationally related health concerns and disability, can improve the quality of occupational medical practice and worker health and well being. Adherence to guidelines should improve the efficiency and effectiveness of prevention, care, and disability management by reducing the present wide variance in practices and then by moving the mean or median of process and outcome statistics toward recommended levels. The information developed for guidelines can also be used for patient discussion and expectation management. Practicing in evidence-based, agreed-upon ways should also make occupational medical practices more defensible. Guidelines should be explicit, be based on a review of the available evidence and benefits vs risks, have clear medical logic, link findings to diagnosis to treatment ot prevention, be time-based, and avoid recommending unproven approaches as a last resort. If possible, they should be reviewed and tested for usability. Guidelines that start with common occupational health concerns are best suited to prevention and outpatient care, because patients present in this way. The contents of a useful occupational health guideline would include a statement of purpose and scope, the method of development; the authors' and reviewers names and affiliations; an analysis of the specificity, sensitivity, and predictive power of mechanisms of illness or injury, symptoms, signs and tests; findings that point to a serious or emergent condition requiring immediate referral or treatment; diagnostic criteria; and initial treatment, including work with the patient in a therapeutic partnership. The guideline should also present information on factors known to be associated with work, and predictors of delayed recovery. Disability-duration statistics and methods of matching job requirements with worker abilities are also helpful. Guidelines should then outline reassessment of those patients whose health concerns remain after a reasonable recovery period. The recommendations should again be evidence-based and conform to the other attributes listed above. A discussion of management after reassessment, including behavioral referral, further testing, and procedures, is also quite useful. Recommendations for restoration of function and return to work complete guidelines focused on diagnosing, treating, and resolving activity limitations among workers. Simply developing and publishing guidelines has not resulted in improvement in practice. However, if used as the basis for peer-group interactions and actions by occupational health opinion leaders, guidelines can contribute to marked improvements in quality, worker satisfaction, and worker health.

Psychological aspects of ″environmental illness,” ″multiple chemical sensitivity,” and building-related illness

Psychological aspects of ″environmental illness,” ″multiple chemical sensitivity,” and building-related illness

Psychological aspects of “environmental illness,” “multiple chemical sensitivity,” and building-related illness

Psychological aspects of “environmental illness,” “multiple chemical sensitivity,” and building-related illness

Dominance and Deception in Children and Adults: Are Leaders the Best Misleaders?

Relationships between dominance and nonverbal deception skill were investigated in preschool children (Study 1) and in under-graduate men and women (Study 2). Subjects were assessed for dominance during peer group interactions. Later, they encoded and decoded deceptive messages. Raters assessed the credibility of each subject's encoded message using nonverbal cues alone. Ability to encode credible, deceptive messages predicted dominance in preschool children and men but not women. Decoding deception accurately from nonverbal cues was unrelated to dominance. Videotapes of subjects' performances were examined for nonverbal behaviors predictive of deception success. Very young children successfully masked their deception by smiling. Successful adult deceivers made eye contact with the listener and inhibited smiling while delivering deceptive messages. Overall, results were generally consistent with a social skills approach to dominance in which manipulative ability is believed to be integral to achieving and maintaining social power.

Peer Group Interactions and the Student-Perceived Climate for Caring

Using the descriptive mode of qualitative inquiry, this study was conducted with 10 junior nursing students at five baccalaureate schools of nursing to describe a climate for caring as it is experienced within the context of peer group interactions. The findings from this study indicate that a climate for caring is experienced through peer group behaviors that are perceived as caring, and during peer group interactional episodes that are characterized by giving assistance. Based on the data from these participants, student vulnerability and personal knowledge of peers are suggested as factors that mediate the ability of junior nursing students to experience a climate for caring during peer group interactions.

Diagnostic peer group assessments in preschoolers with anxiety disorders

Clinical evidence suggests that diagnostic peer groups may supplement conventional forms of psychiatric assessment. The peer group places the child in a naturalistic and unstructured setting with children of a comparable developmental level. The therapist can observe the child's reaction to separation and reunion with the parent. The stress of separation precipitated by the peer group format may be conducive to the assessment of conditions such as anxiety disorder. Peer groups also enable therapists to evaluate the child's overall developmental status, including play behavior, and prosocial and language skills. For all of these reasons, the assessment of children during peer group interaction may substantially enhance conventional diagnostic techniques.

Culturally sensitive instructional practices for African-American learners with disabilities.

This article discusses the cultural and educational needs of African-American learners with disabilities. Six theoretical assumptions establish some basic suppositions about culturally and linguistically diverse learners and effective instructional practices. A review of the literature describes African-American cultural practices, interests, and cognitive styles; highlights the attitudes, perceptions, and instructional practices of effective teachers of African-American students; and includes patterns of teacher-student and peer-group interactions that promote high academic achievement among African-American learners. Recommendations include organizing teaching, learning, and performance in ways that are compatible with the social structure of African-American students with disabilities.

Psychologie de l’apprentissage de la physique

The difficulties encountered by pupils and students when learning physics can often be explained by the differences that exist between their spontaneous ideas about the real world and how the scientist models this reality. How can children and adolescents be helped to better understand scientific ideas that could be of use to them? What is the role in learning and in teaching of: peer group interaction, different forms of representation (pictorial analogies, schemes, graphs), intelligent tutoring systems; etc? In this special edition there are a number of pieces of recent research of interest both to the researcher and to educator concerned with the development of knowledge and the teaching of the experimental sciences.

Peer group interaction in the Infant School

Peer group interaction in the Infant School