Abstract

The literature on social learning has shown that people are more likely to learn from those who are seen as prestigious or talented, or with whom they share demographic attributes. However, the link between cooperation and learning remains relatively unexplored. Here, we study the relationship between elementary school performance as measured with GPA and social networks. We mapped the social networks of 45 classrooms in 14 Chilean public schools, using a non-anonymous dyadic video game, and measured the cooperative centrality of students by quantifying their deviations from the average level of reciprocal cooperation in each interactions. We found that students that engaged in high levels of reciprocal cooperation have significantly higher GPAs. We also found that while students in the lowest GPA quantile generally cooperate more than other students, but in terms of friendship relationships, students with high GPAs generally cooperate more than those with low GPAs. This difference in the cooperation target indicates that students with high GPAs are more selective and strategic in their social relationships than other students. Finally, we did not find any significant effects of homophily patterns among students given their GPA. In contrast to older students, third- to fifth-grade students do not build cooperative relationships according to the GPA of their peers. The strategic cooperation of high GPA students and the lack of homophily regarding GPA, suggest the use of friendship as a mechanism to improve academic performance. This opens the doors for network interventions at the elementary school level. These results show that cooperation promotes the academic performance of elementary students that use social networks strategically, which points to new avenues for the application of network-based tools and experimental game theory in elementary education.