Past partner behaviour affects children's turn-taking with a new partner, but this depends on child characteristics

Children frequently work in pairs within social, educational, and athletic settings. While past work shows that a partner's behaviours influence children's behaviour during collaborative activities, less is known about the carryover impacts of partnered experiences to new social contexts. In the present study, children (aged 4–6 years, N = 88, primarily from North America) participated in a series of collaborative tasks with (fictional) peers assessing their turn-taking behaviour (number of turns, time provided to partner, equitability of turns). Children who worked with a collaborative partner showed more turn-taking behaviour subsequently with a new partner (relative to those who worked with an uncollaborative partner), with this effect more pronounced for girls and children with better verbal skills. Findings align with social development theories positing interactions between context and individual differences and have relevance for considerations as to how best to partner children such that benefit beyond the experience can be maximized. • Children frequently work in pairs, with collaborative learning showing educational benefit. • An interactive task assessed whether partner behaviour carries over to new interactions. • Children who worked with a collaborative partner showed more turn-taking with a new partner. • Children who showed more turn-taking initially had better socio-cognitive skills. • Girls and children with better verbal skills were most influenced by a previous partner's behaviour.