Social relations and cognitive development: The influence of conversation type and representations of gender

Abstract

While the productive role of social interaction between peers in promoting cognitive development has been clearly established, the communicative processes through which this is achieved have not been clearly identified. This paper reports a study in which 184 children aged between 6.5 to 7.5 years were presented with a Piagetian task of conservation of liquid. Both male and female non-conservers worked with a conserving partner in either same or mixed-sex dyads, thus creating four different pair types. The pairs were asked to discuss their conflicting answers and agree upon a joint response. Cognitive progress was assessed by pre- to post-test gains. The results indicated that the type of conversation established during the interaction was strongly related to the outcome. The results also indicate that the gender composition of the pairs influenced the type of conversation which occurred and the outcome measures. These results are discussed in relation to the general model of sociocognitive conflict, and highlight the role of representations and expectations of gender in the way in which the conflict is expressed and resolved in conditions of aligned or conflicting knowledge and gender asymmetries. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.