The Effect of Friendship and Tutoring Roles on Reciprocal Peer Tutoring Strategies

Intelligent Tutoring Systems that employ a teachable agent or reciprocal tutoring agent are designed to elicit the beneficial effects of tutoring, known as the tutor learning effect. However, untrained tutors do not spontaneously use beneficial tutoring strategies, and in a reciprocal format, it is unclear how the tutor learning effect affects those tutors' future problem-solving. Here, we examine the effect that the relationship between tutor and tutee has on their likelihood to use various tutoring and learning strategies, and the impact those strategies have on tutees' future problem-solving in a reciprocal format. We find that among friends, tutees tend towards more verbalization of their problem-solving, with their tutors adopting a more questioning tutoring style, while among strangers, tutees use more shallow questions, with more procedural instruction from their tutor.