Impact of peer interaction on conceptual test performance

TL;DR

This study investigates how peer collaboration influences students' performance on a conceptual physics test, finding that working with peers enhances understanding and supports co-construction of knowledge.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence that peer interaction improves conceptual test gains and explores factors like response formulation and achievement pairing.

Findings

Peer collaboration leads to higher normalized gains.

Students value peer interaction for learning.

No significant difference based on response formulation.

Abstract

We analyze the effectiveness of working in pairs on the Conceptual Survey of Electricity and Magnetism test in a calculus-based introductory physics course. Students who collaborated with a peer showed significantly larger normalized gain on individual testing than those who did not collaborate. We did not find statistically significant differences between the performance of students who were given an opportunity to formulate their own response before the peer discussions, compared to those who were not. Peer collaboration also shows evidence for co-construction of knowledge. Discussions with individual students show that students themselves value peer interaction. We discuss the effect of pairing students with different individual achievements.