Sequenzielle Einbettung von Begründungen in argumentativen Gesprächen unter Grundschulkindern im Klassenstufenvergleich

Abstract This study uses a broad empirical basis of 60 interactions among groups of four elementary schoolchildren (20 each from grades 2, 4, and 6) and conversation-analytically based quantification to investigate how justifications are sequentially embedded in their argumentative conversations. While justifications appear in the conversations of almost all groups, the findings show that there are considerable differences regarding the sequential contexts in which they are used in different grades. First, the paper analyzes which actions are used as follow-up actions to justifications. Results show that increasing age is associated with a stronger orientation towards the typical sequential structures of argumentation, as evidenced by the children’s more frequent use of pragmatic means that align with the conditional relevancies established locally by the obligation to give reasons. Second, focusing on the actions that regularly precede justifications, it becomes apparent that older children use justifications not only to defend their own position, but that they also establish justification more often than younger children as a communicative procedure without any preceding disagreement. Moreover, justifications no longer appear merely in isolation; rather, the older children increasingly build upon preceding justifications to collaboratively construct complex arguments across utterances.