The influence of delaying judgments of learning on metacognitive accuracy: A meta-analytic review.

Many studies have examined the accuracy of predictions of future memory performance solicited through judgments of learning (JOLs). Among the most robust findings in this literature is that delaying predictions serves to substantially increase the relative accuracy of JOLs compared with soliciting JOLs immediately after study, a finding termed the delayed JOL effect. The meta-analyses reported in the current study examined the predominant theoretical accounts as well as potential moderators of the delayed JOL effect. The first meta-analysis examined the relative accuracy of delayed compared with immediate JOLs across 4,554 participants (112 effect sizes) through gamma correlations between JOLs and memory accuracy. Those data showed that delaying JOLs leads to robust benefits to relative accuracy (g = 0.93). The second meta-analysis examined memory performance for delayed compared with immediate JOLs across 3,807 participants (98 effect sizes). Those data showed that delayed JOLs result in a modest but reliable benefit for memory performance relative to immediate JOLs (g = 0.08). Findings from these meta-analyses are well accommodated by theories suggesting that delayed JOL accuracy reflects access to more diagnostic information from long-term memory rather than being a by-product of a retrieval opportunity. However, these data also suggest that theories proposing that the delayed JOL effect results from a memorial benefit or the match between the cues available for JOLs and those available at test may also provide viable explanatory mechanisms necessary for a comprehensive account. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Metacognition in motor learning.

Research on judgments of verbal learning has demonstrated that participants' judgments are unreliable and often overconfident. The authors studied judgments of perceptual-motor learning. Participants learned 3 keystroke patterns on the number pad of a computer, each requiring that a different sequence of keys be struck in a different total movement time. Practice trials on each pattern were either blocked or randomly interleaved with trials on the other patterns, and each participant was asked, periodically, to predict his or her performance on a 24-hr test. Consistent with earlier findings, blocked practice enhanced acquisition but harmed retention. Participants, though, predicted better performance given blocked practice. These results augment research on judgments of verbal learning and suggest that humans, at their peril, interpret current ease of access to a perceptual-motor skill as a valid index of learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Aging and recollection in the accuracy of judgments of learning.

Dual-process theories propose that episodic memory performance reflects both recollection of prior details as well as more automatic influences of the past. The authors explored the idea that recollection mediates the accuracy of judgments of learning (JOLs) and may also help explain age differences in JOL accuracy. Young and older adults made immediate JOLs at study and then completed recognition or recall tests that included a recollect/familiar judgment. JOLs were found to be strongly related to recollected items but not to items remembered on the basis of familiarity. The pattern was weaker in older adults, consistent with age-related declines in recollection. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Separating bias and sensitivity in judgments of associative memory.

Ratings of the degree of association between words are linearly related to normed associative strengths, but the intercept is high, and the slope is shallow (the judgments of associative memory [JAM] function). Two experiments included manipulations intended to decrease the intercept and increase the slope. Discrimination training on many pairs of words and constraining ratings to sum to a constant both reduced the intercept but failed to change the slope. The intercept of the JAM function appears to contain a bias component that can be manipulated independently of the slope, which reflects sensitivity to associative strengths. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reversing the truth effect: Learning the interpretation of processing fluency in judgments of truth.

Repeated statements receive higher truth ratings than new statements. Given that repetition leads to greater experienced processing fluency, the author proposes that fluency is used in truth judgments according to its ecological validity. Thus, the truth effect occurs because people learn that fluency and truth tend to be positively correlated. Three experiments tested this notion. Experiment 1 replicated the truth effect by directly manipulating processing fluency; Experiment 2 reversed the effect by manipulating the correlation between fluency and truth in a learning phase. Experiment 3 generalized this reversal by showing a transfer of a negative correlation between perceptual fluency (due to color contrast) and truth to truth judgments when fluency is due to prior exposure (i.e., repetition). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comprehension as a basis for metacognitive judgments: Effects of effort after meaning on recall and metacognition.

We examined free recall and metacognitive judgments of ambiguous sentences studied with and without clues to facilitate their comprehension. Sentences were either studied without clues, with clues meaningfully embedded, or with clues following a 10-s interval delay. After presentation, subjects made judgments of comprehension (JCOMPs) or judgments of learning (JOLs). Puzzling over the meaning of sentences for several seconds prior to receiving the clue enhanced recall compared with studying sentences without clues or with embedded clues. This benefit of effort after meaning was not reflected in JCOMPs or JOLs. Rather, sentences considered relatively easy to understand received higher JOLs regardless of experimental condition. Although effort after meaning enhanced recall, subjects displayed no awareness of this benefit in their judgments. Our study adds to a growing literature showing students’ ignorance of factors affecting their own learning, which have important implications for education. Making learning conditions more difficult, thus requiring students to engage more cognitive effort, often leads to enhanced retention. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of memory for past test in the underconfidence with practice effect.

According to the Memory for Past Test (MPT) heuristic, judgments of learning (JOLs) may be based, in part, on memory for the correctness of answers on a previous test. The authors explored MPT as the source of the underconfidence with practice effect (UWP; A. Koriat, L. Sheffer, & H. Ma'ayan, 2002), whereby Trial 1 overconfidence switches to underconfidence by Trial 2. Immediate and delayed JOLs were contrasted because only immediate JOLs demonstrate UWP. Consistent with MPT for immediate JOLs, Trial 1 test performance better predicted Trial 2 JOLs than did Trial 2 test performance. Delayed JOLs showed the reverse. Furthermore, items forgotten on Trial 1 but remembered on Trial 2 contributed disproportionately to UWP, but only with immediate JOLs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Collaboration in associative recognition memory: Using recalled information to defend "new" judgments.

S. E. Clark, A. Hori, A. Putnam, and T. J. Martin (2000) showed that collaboration on a recognition memory task produced facilitation in recognition of targets but had inconsistent and sometimes negative effects regarding distractors. They accounted for these results within the framework of a dual-process, recall-plus-familiarity model but showed only weak evidence to support it. The present results of 3 experiments present stronger evidence for Clark et al.'s dual-process view and also show why such evidence is difficult to obtain. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attributing study effort to data-driven and goal-driven effects: Implications for metacognitive judgments.

In self-paced learning, when the regulation of effort is goal driven (e.g., allocated to different items according to their relative importance), judgments of learning (JOLs) increase with study time. When it is data driven (i.e., determined by the ease of committing the item to memory), JOLs decrease with study time (Koriat, Ma’ayan, & Nussinson, 2006). Because the amount of effort invested in different items is conjointly determined by data-driven and goal-driven regulation, an attribution process must be postulated in which variations in effort are attributed by the learner to data-driven or goal-driven regulation before the implications for metacognitive judgments are determined. To support the reality of this process, the authors asked learners to adopt a facial expression that creates a feeling of effort and induced them to attribute that effort either to data-driven or to goal-driven regulation. This manipulation was found to determine the direction in which experienced effort affected metacognitive judgment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Recollection-based prospective metamemory judgments are more accurate than those based on confidence: Judgments of remembering and knowing (JORKS).

Five experiments were conducted to examine whether the nature of the information that is monitored during prospective metamemory judgments affected the relative accuracy of those judgments. We compared item-by-item judgments of learning (JOLs), which involved participants determining how confident they were that they would remember studied items, with judgments of remembering and knowing (JORKs), which involved participants determining whether studied items would later be accompanied by contextual details (i.e., remembering) or would not (i.e., knowing). JORKs were more accurate than JOLs when remember–know or confidence judgments were made at test and when cued recall was the outcome measure, but not for yes–no recognition. We conclude that the accuracy of metamemory judgments depends on the nature of the information monitored during study and test and that metamemory monitoring can be improved if participants are asked to base their judgments on contextual details rather than on confidence. These data support the contention that metamemory decisions can be based on qualitatively distinct cues, rather than an overall memory strength signal. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Age differences in the monitoring of learning: Cross-sectional evidence of spared resolution across the adult life span.

Researchers of metacognitive development in adulthood have exclusively used extreme-age-groups designs. We used a full cross-sectional sample (N = 285, age range: 18–80) to evaluate how associative relatedness and encoding strategies influence judgments of learning (JOLs) in adulthood. Participants studied related and unrelated word pairs and made JOLs. After a cued-recall test, retrospective item strategy reports were collected. Results revealed developmental patterns not available from previous studies (e.g., a linear age-related increase in aggregate JOL resolution across the life span). They also demonstrated the value of investigating multiple cues' influences on JOLs. Multilevel regression models showed that both relatedness and effective strategy use positively and independently influenced JOLs. Furthermore, effective strategy use was responsible for higher resolution of JOLs for unrelated items (relative to related items). The effects of relatedness and strategy use with JOLs did not interact with age. The monitoring of learning is spared by adult development despite age differences in learning itself. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A stability bias in human memory: Overestimating remembering and underestimating learning.

The dynamics of human memory are complex and often unintuitive, but certain features—such as the fact that studying results in learning—seem like common knowledge. In 12 experiments, however, participants who were told they would be allowed to study a list of word pairs between 1 and 4 times and then take a cued-recall test predicted little or no learning across trials, notwithstanding their large increases in actual learning. When queried directly, the participants espoused the belief that studying results in learning, but they showed little evidence of that belief in the actual task. These findings, when combined with A. Koriat, R. A. Bjork, L. Sheffer, and S. K. Bar’s (2004) research on judgments of forgetting, suggest a stability bias in human memory—that is, a tendency to assume that the accessibility of one’s memories will remain relatively stable over time rather than benefiting from future learning or suffering from future forgetting. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Illusions of competence for phonetically, orthographically, and semantically similar word pairs.

Illusions of competence are thought to arise when judgements of learning (JOLs) made in the presence of intact cue-target pairs during study create a “foresight bias,” such that JOLs are inflated by the apparent association between a cue and a target, despite the lack of benefit this association has for recall performance. For example, Castel, McCabe, and Roediger (2007) recently demonstrated an illusion of competence for identical word pairs (mouse—mouse). In two experiments, the authors examined possible sources for this overconfidence, including phonetic, semantic, and orthographic similarity. An illusion of competence was found for homophones, synonyms, orthographically similar, and unrelated items, whereas no illusion of competence was found for word pairs with a relatively high forward-semantic association. Self-paced study times indicated that encoding fluency was not closely associated with the magnitude of overconfidence. Error data revealed participants may have been engaging in strategic responding in order to maximise correct recall. Our results underscore the importance of considering factors that influence both JOLs and recall performance when considering sources of (mis)calibration in absolute accuracy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The interplay between value and relatedness as bases for metacognitive monitoring and control: Evidence for agenda-based monitoring.

Two experiments are reported examining how value and relatedness interact to influence metacognitive monitoring and control processes. Participants studied unrelated and related word pairs, each accompanied by point values denoting how important the items were to remember. These values were presented either before or after each pair in a between-subjects design, and participants made item-by-item judgments of learning (JOLs) predicting the likelihood that each item would be remembered later. Results from Experiment 1 showed that participants used value and relatedness as cues to inform their JOLs. Interestingly, JOLs increased as a function of value even in the after condition in which value had no impact on cued recall. Participants in Experiment 2 were permitted to control study time for each item. Results showed that value and relatedness were simultaneously considered when allocating study time. These results support a cue-weighting process in which JOLs and study time allocation are based on multiple cues, which may or may not be predictive of future memory performance, and complements the agenda-based regulation model of study time (Ariel, Dunlosky, & Bailey, 2009) by providing evidence for agenda-based monitoring. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Impaired Visuospatial Recognition Memory but Normal Object Novelty Detection and Relative Familiarity Judgments in Adult Mice Expressing the APPswe Alzheimer's Disease Mutation.

The present study examined the effects of a human APPswe mutation on object recognition memory in adult Tg2576 mice. The results showed that 14-month old Tg2576 mice were able to detect object novelty as well as control mice, even with delays of up to 24 hr. In addition, transgenic mice showed a normal recency effect and explored the most recently encountered object significantly less than an object encountered earlier in a trial. However, adult Tg2576 mice showed impairments in detecting a change in the relative positions of an array of familiar objects. The results suggest that the formation of representations involving a combination of object identity and spatial information are particularly sensitive to amyloid pathology in adult APPswe mutant mice. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Memory predictions are influenced by perceptual information: Evidence for metacognitive illusions.

Although perceptual information is utilized to judge size or depth, little work has investigated whether such information is used to make memory predictions. The present study examined how the font size of to-be-remembered words influences predicted memory performance. Participants studied words for a free-recall test that varied in font size and made judgments of learning (JOLs) for each item. JOLs were influenced by font size, as larger font sizes were given higher JOLs, whereas little relationship was evident between font size and recall. The effect was modified when other, more valid, sources of information (e.g., associative strength) were available when JOLs were made and persisted despite experience with multiple study-test sessions, use of a forgetting scale to assess predictions, and explicit warning of participants that font size has little effect on memory performance. When ease of reading was manipulated, such that large font size words were made less fluent, the effect was eliminated. Thus, highly accessible perceptual cues can strongly influence JOLs, likely via encoding fluency, and this effect can lead to metacognitive illusions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Study efficacy and the region of proximal learning framework.

One of the most important reasons to investigate human metacognition is its role in directing how people study. However, limited evidence exists that metacognitively guided study benefits learning. Three experiments are presented that provide evidence for this link. In Experiment 1, participants' learning was enhanced when they were allowed to control what they studied. Experiments 2a-d replicated this finding and showed contributions of self-regulated study to learning. Experiments 3a and 3b showed that, when forced to choose among items they did not know, participants chose the easiest items and benefited from doing so, providing evidence for the link between metacognitive monitoring/control and learning, and supporting the region of proximal learning model of study-time allocation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Flexible use of recent information in causal and predictive judgments.

Associative and statistical theories of causal and predictive learning make opposite predictions for situations in which the most recent information contradicts the information provided by older trials (e.g., acquisition followed by extinction). Associative theories predict that people will rely on the most recent information to best adapt their behavior to the changing environment. Statistical theories predict that people will integrate what they have learned in the two phases. The results of this study showed one or the other effect as a function of response mode (trial by trial vs. global), type of question (contiguity, causality, or predictiveness), and postacquisition instructions. That is, participants are able to give either an integrative judgment, or a judgment that relies on recent information as a function of test demands. The authors concluded that any model must allow for flexible use of information once it has been acquired. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Competitive short-term and long-term memory processes in spatial habituation.

Exposure to a spatial location leads to habituation of exploration such that, in a novelty preference test, rodents subsequently prefer exploring a novel location to the familiar location. According to Wagner's (1981) theory of memory, short-term and long-term habituation are caused by separate and sometimes opponent processes. In the present study, this dual-process account of memory was tested. Mice received a series of exposure training trials to a location before receiving a novelty preference test. The novelty preference was greater when tested after a short, rather than a long, interval. In contrast, the novelty preference was weaker when exposure training trials were separated by a short, rather than a long interval. Furthermore, it was found that long-term habituation was determined by the independent effects of the amount of exposure training and the number of exposure training trials when factors such as the intertrial interval and the cumulative intertrial interval were controlled. A final experiment demonstrated that a long-term reduction of exploration could be caused by a negative priming effect due to associations formed during exploration. These results provide evidence against a single-process account of habituation and suggest that spatial habituation is determined by both short-term, recency-based memory and long-term, incrementally strengthened memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Impaired place learning and unimpaired cue learning in hippocampal-lesioned pigeons.

Hippocampal processing is often crucial for normal spatial learning and memory in both birds and mammals, suggesting a general similarity in avian and mammalian hippocampal function. However, few studies using birds have examined the effect of hippocampal lesions on spatial tasks analogous to those typically used with mammals. Therefore, we examined how hippocampal lesions would affect the performance of pigeons in a dry version of the water maze. Experiment 1 showed that hippocampal-lesioned birds were impaired in acquiring the location of hidden food in the maze. Experiment 2 showed that hippocampal-lesioned birds were not impaired when a single cue indicated the location of hidden food. These results support the notion that avian and mammalian hippocampal functions are quite similar, in terms of the tasks for which their processing is crucial and the tasks for which it is not. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)