Identity priming consistently affects perceptual fluency but only affects metamemory when primes are obvious

Perceptual fluency manipulations influence metamemory judgments, with more fluently perceived information judged as more memorable. However, it is not always clear whether this influence is driven by actual experienced processing fluency or by beliefs about memory. The current study used an identity-priming paradigm-in which words are preceded by either matched (identical) or mismatched primes-to examine the 2 influences. Participants named and made judgments of learning (JOLs) for critical words and then completed a memory test. In Experiment 1, we briefly presented the primes and found a priming effect on naming latencies but not on JOLs. In Experiment 2, we presented the primes for longer durations and, again, found an effect on naming in addition to an effect on JOLs. A mediation analysis revealed that naming latencies did not account for the prime-JOL relationship. This pattern of results demonstrated a manipulation of perceptual fluency that influenced JOLs only when belief-based information was readily available.