TEACHING ASSISTANT ARGUMENTATIVENESS - EFFECTS ON AFFECTIVE LEARNING AND STUDENT PERCEPTIONS OF POWER USE

This study examined effects of teaching assistant argumentativeness on student affective learning and perceptions of teacher power use. Sign ificant differences were found in student affective learning for class es taught by low, moderate and high argumentative TAs. Lower TA argume ntativeness is positively associated with student affective learning a nd vice versa. Significant differences were also found for student per ceptions of instructor power use for classes taught by low, moderate, and high argumentative TAs. Lower TA argumentativeness is associated w ith higher levels of power use and vice versa. Multiple correlations r evealed that TA and student argumentativeness accounted for 14% of the variance in student affective learning and for 15% of the variance in TA referent power use. Findings suggest that although high argumentat ive TAs may be ''social specialists'' in power use (and thus be percei ved by students to use less power), their high levels of argumentative ness seem to have negative effects on student affective learning.