| This dissertation focuses on how the motivational context influences the emergence of leadership in children's collaborative learning groups. Fourth and fifth grade classrooms were assigned to either a mastery (focus on learning and improving) or performance (focus on social comparison and competition) goal orientation induction. All students were assigned to three-person learning groups within their classrooms. The triads consisted of gender (majority-female or majority-male) and ability (high-ability, low-ability, or heterogeneous-ability) groups. In Study 1, 249 elementary students, nested within 99 groups, across 17 classrooms worked on a collaborative math task for 30 minutes. The Leadership Behavior Descriptor Questionnaire was adapted to create two scales of emergent leadership: task-focused and relationship-focused leadership. Task-focused leadership was lower in female majority groups. In the mastery condition, boys had lower relationship-focused leadership than girls. While task and relationship-focused leadership was not related to group math achievement, there were interaction effects between the goal orientation and the gender and ability group composition. Female-majority, high-ability, and homogeneous-ability groups in the performance condition had higher achievement. In Study 2, 90 students from Study 1 were randomly selected to be videotaped. Positive relationship-focused leadership, negative relationship-focused leadership, and task-focused leadership were coded. Positive leadership was higher in female-majority groups in the performance condition. Negative leadership was higher in girls. Task leadership was higher in girls in the female-majority group. Positive, negative, and task leadership were positively associated with group math achievement in the performance condition. Taken together, the motivational context influences the emergence of leadership and achievement in children's collaborative learning groups. |
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