Social Competences, Transactive Interaction, and Achievement: Comparison of Two Differently Designed Cooperative Learning Environments and Evaluation of Scripting Transactive Interaction

Cooperative learning which is characterized by a greater positive interdependence requires social competencies of learners and high quality of task-relevant interaction. Positive interdependence can be achieved by an information pool which is unshared by the learners. In two consecutive investigations we examined to what extend social competencies influence the learning gains in a cooperative learning environment and to what extend transactive task-relevant interaction behaviour accounts for this correlation (study I) as well as how a scripting of the working process which promotes transactive interaction behaviour effects the learning gains (study II). In study I two differently designed learning environments were compared in an experiment. In the first learning environment the learners had a greater positive interdependence due to an unshared information pool whereas in the second learning environment the learners had a smaller positive interdependence since the information was shared. In both conditions social competencies influenced the learning gains. The influence of social competencies on the learning gains was partially mediated by integrative transactive interaction behaviour. In study II cooperative learning which was supported by a scripting of the integrative transactive interaction resulted in higher comprehension of the learning material than cooperative learning in the control group.