Causal attributions and cooperative learning

Abstract

ABSTRACT

In this research we aim to analyze the influence a cooperative learning program exerts in the attributions students make for their successes and failures. The participants were 50 pupils (boys and girls) in first year of Compulsory Secondary Education who were distributed in two groups: an experimental group that would follow a cooperative learning program, and a control group that would follow a “traditional” methodology. Our work hypothesis were: a) the participants in the experimental group will make internal attributions to a greater extent than the subjects in the control group, b) the participants in the experimental group will make unstable attributions to a greater extent than the subjects in the control group, c) intelligence does not affect the attributions students make of their successes and failures. A pretest-posttest design with a non-equivalent control group was used to test the hypotheses. We took a pretest measure to secure the initial equivalence between the groups and the variable “intelligence” was used as co-variable to keep its effects on the results constant, independently of the effect of the program. The results obtained showed that the students in the experimental group attribute their results to internal, unstable causes to a larger extent than the students in the control group. These results prove that the use of cooperative learning techniques favors this type of attributions regardless of the students’ intellectual level.