As noted earlier, several reviews of the cooperative learning literature have concluded that cooperative learning is most consistently effective when groups are recognized or rewarded based on individual learning of their members (Davidson, 1985; Ellis & Fouts, 1993; Manning & Lucking, 1991; Mergendoller & Packer, 1989; Newmann &Thompson, 1987; Slavin, 1983a, 1983b, 1989, 1992, 1995). The specific form of group goals implemented ranges from simple recognition to classroom privileges to material rewards, such as certificates. Individual accountability may be achieved by averaging students’ individual quiz scores to derive the group score or by using the performance of a randomly selected individual to represent the group. In contrast, methods lacking group goals give students only individual grades or other individual feedback, with no group consequence for doing well as a group.
Methods lacking individual accountability might reward groups for doing well, but the basis for this reward would be a single project, worksheet, quiz, or other product that could theoretically have been done by only one group member. If we presume that students act solely out of self-interest, the importance of group goals and individual accountability is in providing students with an incentive to help each other and to encourage each other to put forth maximum effort (Slavin, 1995). If students can only do as well as the group and the group can succeed only by ensuring that all group members have learned the material, then group members will be motivated to teach each other. Studies of behaviors within groups that relate most to achievement gains consistently show that students who give each other
explanations (and less consistently, those who receive such explanations) are the students who learn the most in cooperative learning. Giving or receiving answers without explanation has generally been found to reduce achievement (Webb, 1989, 1992). At least in theory, group goals and individual accountability should motivate students to engage in the behaviors that increase achievement and avoid those that reduce it. If a group member wants her group to be successful, she must teach her group mates (and learn the material herself). If she simply tells her group mates the answers, they will fail the quiz that they must take individually. If she ignores a group mate who does not understand the material, the group mate will fail, and the group will fail as well.
In groups lacking individual accountability, one or two students may do the group’s work, while others engage in “free riding” or “social loafing” (Latane, Williams, & Harkins, 1979; Williams & Karau, 1991). For example, in a group asked to complete a single project or solve a single problem, some students may be discouraged from participating. A group trying to complete a common problem may not want to stop and explain what is going on to a group mate who does not understand or may feel that it is useless or counterproductive to try to involve certain group mates.
The importance of group goals that can be achieved only by ensuring the learning of all group members is supported by empirical evidence that emphasizes both degree and consistency. Recall that 25 studies of methods that incorporated group goals and individual accountability produced a much higher median effect size than did studies of other method. Recall also that 78% of studies assessing the effectiveness of methods using group goals and individual accountability found significantly positive effects and that there were no significantly negative effects. This is compared with only 37% significantly positive effects and 14% significantly negative effects in studies of methods lacking group goals and individual accountability.
A comparison among the Johnson’s methods studies (Johnson & Johnson, 1989) supports the same conclusions. Across eight studies of learning together methods in which students were rewarded based on a single worksheet or product, the median effect size was near zero (+.04). However, among four studies that evaluated forms of the program in which students were graded based on the average performance of all group members on individual assessments, three found significantly positive effects.
Finally, comparisons within the same studies consistently support the importance of group goals and individual accountability. For example, Chapman (2001) reported on five studies that compared group goals and individual accountability to other incentive formats. In two of those, cooperative learning with group goals and individual accountability resulted in better performance than did individualized incentives on a math task. Two more of the studies found similar results using a reading task. In the fifth study, mentioned earlier, resource interdependence with and without group-interdependent incentives yielded similar performance. That is, students who simply shared materials performed similarly to others who shared materials and were assigned interdependent goals. It is also noteworthy that an additional study by the same researchers compared group goals and individual accountability with and without cooperative interaction and found that the combination of group goals and individual accountability and cooperative interaction was superior to incentive alone. In four of the five comparisons made by Chapman and her associates, cooperative learning with group goals and individual accountability resulted in superior student performance in comparison to cooperation without such elements.
Fantuzzo et al. (1992) conducted a component analysis of Reciprocal Peer Tutoring (RPT). They compared four conditions in which students worked in dyads to learn math. In one, students were rewarded with opportunities to engage in special activities of their choice if the sum of the dyad’s scores on daily quizzes exceeded a set criterion. In another, students were taught a structured method of tutoring each other, correcting efforts, and alternating tutor-tutee roles. A third condition involved a combination of rewards and structure, and a fourth was a control condition in which students worked in pairs but were given neither rewards nor structure. The results showed that the reward—structure condition had by far the largest effects on math achievement and that reward alone had much larger effects than structure alone. The reward-structure condition exceeded the structure-only condition by an effect size, and the reward-only group exceeded control by an effect size (the structure-only group performed less well than did the control group).
Other studies also found greater achievement for cooperative methods using group goals and individual accountability than for those that did not. Huber et al. (1982) compared a form of STAD to traditional group work lacking group goals and individual accountability. The STAD group scored significantly better on a math test. In a study of Team Assisted Individualization (TAI), Cavanaugh (1984) found that students who received group recognition based on the number of units accurately completed by all group members both learned more and completed more units than did students who received individual recognition only. O’Donnell (1996) compared dyads working with and without incentives.
In three experimental studies students who received explicit incentives based on their learning learned significantly more than those who did not. Okebukola (1985), studying science in Nigeria, found substantially greater achievement in STAD and teams games tournaments (TGT) methods using group goals and individual accountability than in forms of Jigsaw and Johnsons’ methods that did not. In another study Okebukola (1986) found much higher achievement in classes that used a method combining cooperation and group competition (one form of group reward) than in a cooperative method that did
not use group rewards of any kind.
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Group goals, individual accountability, cooperative learning, Reciprocal Peer Tutoring (RPT), Students Teams Achievement Deveopment (STAD), Team Assisted Individualization (TAI), teams games tournaments (TGT)
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