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Enhanced Metacognition for Unexpected Action Outcomes.

Daniel Yon1,2

  • 1School of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, United Kingdom.

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology (2006)
|February 11, 2026
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Metacognition, our ability to understand uncertainty, is more sensitive to unexpected events than predictable ones. This finding suggests a mechanism enhancing awareness for surprising prediction errors, crucial for navigating an unstable world.

Keywords:
awarenessconfidencemetacognitionpredictionprediction erroruncertainty

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Psychology
  • Decision Science

Background:

  • Metacognition enables explicit representation of uncertainty in perception and decision-making.
  • Theories debate whether metacognitive sensitivity is higher for predictable events or surprising prediction errors.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To empirically compare competing theories on the role of prediction in metacognitive sensitivity.
  • To investigate how metacognition adapts to expected versus unexpected environmental feedback.

Main Methods:

  • Two experiments involving participants performing actions to generate visual outcomes.
  • Signal detection analyses to quantify metacognitive sensitivity.
  • Reverse correlation and computational modeling to examine underlying mechanisms.

Main Results:

  • Metacognitive sensitivity was significantly higher for unexpected outcomes compared to expected ones.
  • Computational modeling indicated an enhanced metacognitive gain, not perceptual gain, for unexpected information.
  • Results challenge theories predicting greater sensitivity for predictable events.

Conclusions:

  • Metacognition is more attuned to surprising prediction errors, aligning with higher-order inference models.
  • This mechanism may optimize cognitive and behavioral adaptation in dynamic environments.
  • Findings highlight the adaptive role of metacognition in processing unexpected information.