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Individual differences in metacognition: evidence against a general metacognitive ability
W L Kelemen1, P J Frost, C A Weaver
1University of Missouri, St. Louis, USA.
Memory & Cognition
|March 14, 2000
Summary
Individual differences in metacognitive accuracy are not consistent across tasks, challenging the idea that accuracy reflects stable metacognitive ability. Memory monitoring performance varied, indicating metacognitive accuracy is not a reliable trait.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Metacognition Research
Background:
- Metacognitive accuracy is often assumed to reflect stable individual differences in metacognitive ability.
- If this assumption holds, metacognitive accuracy should be consistent across various tasks and exhibit high test-retest reliability.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the consistency and reliability of individual differences in metacognitive accuracy across different tasks.
- To examine whether metacognitive accuracy is a stable trait or varies depending on the cognitive task.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments were conducted using four common metacognitive tasks: ease of learning judgments, feeling of knowing judgments, judgments of learning, and text comprehension monitoring.
- Alternate-forms correlations were used to assess metacognitive accuracy over a 1-week interval.
Main Results:
- Individual differences in memory performance and confidence judgments were stable across sessions and tasks.
- However, individual differences in metacognitive accuracy were not stable and varied significantly across the different metacognitive tasks.
Conclusions:
- The findings challenge the assumption that metacognitive accuracy is a consistent reflection of underlying metacognitive ability.
- The lack of stability in metacognitive accuracy across tasks poses significant practical and theoretical challenges for researchers in the field of metacognition.