The Cognitive Consequences of Collaborative Problem Solving with and without Feedback

The goal of this research was to assess the impact of feedback, partner, and shared understanding in the course of problem solving. A sample of 180 6- to 9-year-olds was pretested to discover the children's "rule" for predicting the movement of a mathematical balance beam. For the treatment they either worked alone or with a partner who was equally, less, or more competent, with two-thirds receiving feedback from the materials. They subsequently participated in 2 individual posttests. The results revealed that children receiving feedback improved significantly more than those who did not, but that the presence of a partner was only beneficial when children received no feedback. Irrespective of feedback, those children whose partner exhibited higher-level reasoning were far more likely to benefit from collaboration than those whose partner did not, provided that the pair achieved shared understanding.