This unit on discussion skills was designed for junior high school students who have elementary discussion skills. The two primary student objectives are: (1) to be able to express themselves openly, but without hurting the feelings of other people; and (2) to improve their discussion skills. The 12 lessons in the unit focus on freedom of…

The effect of nonverbal behavior on communication is apparent, but educators are left with the question of how an awareness of nonverbal behavior can fit into the classroom. In fact the average classroom offers a vast supply of information about nonverbal communication that remains relatively untouched in scientific studies. The processes of…

It was hypothesized that increases in the amount and specificity of information furnished to a discussion group would facilitate group decision making and improve other aspects of group and individual performance. Procedures in testing these assumptions included varying the amounts of statistics, examples, testimony, and augmented information…

Prevailing criticism of communication research in and out of university speech departments is justified and means that the quality of research must be improved. The last three years of speech communication research has not been noteworthy, dramatic, or significant. An initial remedial step might be the development of good, relevant, and sound…

The historical independence of expert power and opinion leadership research and theorizing is noted, with the major credit for the separateness being attributed to differences in methodological approach usually taken in the two areas of research. A theoretical attempt to relate the two areas is make by relating: (1) the general areas of social…

This is a final report, for administrative purposes, of studies to be published in the general category of mathematical theory of social groups, with emphasis on the large groups typical of educational communities. Since the study of the large and complicated structures of high school and college communities is difficult by purely empirical…

The performance of 144 pairs of college students on four successive concept attainment problems was assessed. A 3 x 2 x 2 x 4 factorial design with repeated measures on the last factor was used with the following variables: (a) type of interaction format (cooperation with discussion allowed during solution of the problems, cooperation with…

This study was an attempt fo document aspects of small group work in classrooms engaged in the process education curricula called "Materials and Activities for Teachers and Children" (MATCH). Data on student-student interaction was related to small group work and gathered by paper-and-pencil sociometric questionnaires and measures of group…

This paper reports a study of the characteristics of the social interaction of single sex and mixed groups. Two all male groups, two all female groups, and two mixed groups were studied over five 90-minute sessions. Interaction data was gathered by two observers who recorded each time a member spoke and to whom he/she spoke. Group meetings were…

An experiment was performed in which 155 undergraduate student subjects were provided with information about a stimulus person whose behavioral consistency varied on several issues. The study assumed that if the individual's behavior on the relevant topic was consistent, then behavior on the other issues should have no impact on persuasiveness,…

A series of three studies investigated the role of play materials in supporting social interactions of nursery school children. Subjects were 14 boys and 11 girls, 4 and 5 years of age, who came from a variety of socioeconomic and racial backgrounds. Observations were made for 16 days, during the free play hour at each of four play centers: art,…

Testing the hypothesis that group-centered leadership leads to less problem behavior among emotionally disturbed adolescents, 20 male and female adolescents aged 14-18 (from Karitas Community in Crystal Springs, Mississippi) were divided into leader-centered and group-centered groups and exposed to 3 weekend camping experiences. Assessments were…

Studies that conclude that class size makes no difference are based almost entirely on student achievement of cognitive scores, whereas those studies that find class size significant include other important factors such as creativity, decline of learning and behavior problems, better class control, problem-solving and retention, and the amount of…

This article attempts to help teachers use group experiences for teaching purposes. It focuses on the importance of preplanning and designing the learning experience, the identification of events and behaviors that may emerge during the group process, and ways of dealing with these behaviors. (NG)

Describes differences in preferred modes of group interaction between 743 students from grades four to eight and from four relatively distinct social environments: rural Maine, suburban New Hampshire, urban Columbus, Ohio, and inner city Cincinnati, Ohio. Rural and inner city groups prefer similar modes as do urban and suburban groups. (Author/NEC)