THE COMPARATIVE EFFECT OF COOPERATIVE AND COMPETITIVE LEARNING ON IMPULSIVE AND REFLECTIVE EFL LEARNERSʹʹ WRITING ACHIEVEMENT

This study was an attempt to investigate the effect of two different types of learning modalities, namely cooperative and competitive, on English as a foreign language (EFL) impulsive and reflective learnersʹ writing achievement. For this purpose, 120 learners from among a total number of 185 intermediate learners studying at Tac English Language School of Tehran, Iran, were chosen all taking a PET (Preliminary English Test) first, for homogenization prior to the study. They also filled out the Eysenck and Eysenckʹs (1991) Impulsiveness Questionnaire (EIQ), which in turn categorized them into two subgroups within each learning modality setting, consisting of impulsives and reflectives. All in all, there were four subgroups: 30 impulsives and 30 reflectives undergoing the cooperative learning treatment, and 30 impulsives and 30 reflectives experiencing the competitive learning treatment. Part three of the writing section of a PET was used as the posttest of this study, after each group was exposed to the treatment for 18 sessions in nine weeks. At the end of the instruction, the mean scores of all four groups on the posttest were computed and a two-way ANOVA was run to test all the five hypotheses raised in the study. The results showed that the effect of the teaching technique depends on the cognitive style of the learners. However, it was found out that each of the independent variables alone was significantly effective on writing ability of the learners. Specifically, cooperative learning technique was more effective both on reflective and impulsive learners compared with competitive technique. As for the cognitive style, it was revealed that reflective learners performed better both in cooperative and in competitive techniques in comparison with the impulsive learners.