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ERIC Number: EJ1434906
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2024-Aug
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0022-0663
EISSN: EISSN-1939-2176
Available Date: N/A
Cooperative Learning Reduces the Gender Gap in Perceived Social Competences: A Large-Scale Nationwide Longitudinal Experiment
Journal of Educational Psychology, v116 n6 p903-920 2024
Considering the evolving and unpredictable job market, adaptability is an important skill for young adults. Such adaptability implies that schools need to teach key social competences, like communication, collaboration, or problem-solving. In this area, a gender gap has consistently been found, showing that boys display social competences less than girls. A large-scale nationwide multilab longitudinal experiment--the ProFAN project--was conducted in France among more than 10,000 vocational high-school students. Its primary goal was to develop and test an intervention promoting a range of psychological and psychosocial variables in vocational high schools, including social competences. This 2-year long, three-wave field experiment compared the effects of a cooperative learning method--the jigsaw classroom, that entails positive goal and resource interdependence--to two control conditions: one that involves cooperation with resource independence, and the other that remains business-as-usual. This article focuses on the differential development of perceived social competences of adolescent boys and girls over time, comparing the three pedagogical methods. Results of longitudinal multilevel modeling replicate the gender gap in perceived social competences and show that this gap widens with time. However, and most importantly, the analyses revealed that such widening of the gender gap was greater in the two control conditions than in the jigsaw condition, in which the evolution of boys' and girls' perceptions of social competences remained similar over time. Contributions to the understanding of the development and teaching of social competences in education settings are discussed.
American Psychological Association. Journals Department, 750 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20002. Tel: 800-374-2721; Tel: 202-336-5510; Fax: 202-336-5502; e-mail: order@apa.org; Web site: http://www.apa.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: High Schools; Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: France
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A