Metacognition viewed through the judgment lens

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Metacognition, the ability to monitor and control one's own cognitive processes, guides effective regulation of behavior. To assess this ability, researchers often obtain metacognitive judgments. Although it is established that metacognitive judgments are inferences based on cues and heuristics, a comprehensive analysis with tools and methods of judgment and decision making (JDM) research has not yet been performed. Viewing metacognition through a judgment lens reveals that metacognition research has paid little attention to three key issues in the JDM literature. First, a largely neglected question is whether, when making metacognitive judgments, people integrate multiple cues or use simplified judgment strategies that focus on particular cues. The first part of this project systematically addresses this question, building on promising pilot work. Second, according to the enormously fruitful lens model framework from JDM research, several factors may limit the accuracy of metacognitive judgments in terms of resolution (i.e., correlations between metacognitive judgments and actual performance across items) – namely, inconsistent judgments, a mismatch between valid and utilized cues, and limited predictability of the judgment criterion. The second part of this project uses the lens model to determine the particular source of mediocre resolution of metacognitive judgments and to investigate the processes that underlie cue learning in metacognitive judgments. This might also reveal that established measures of resolution seriously underestimate true metacognitive ability. Finally, in JDM research and experimental economics, incentivizing optimal behavior is considered crucial to avoid biases, demand effects, and loss of motivation. In contrast, the accuracy of metacognitive judgments has hardly been incentivized. Consequently, the third part of this project investigates the effects of contingent incentives on the accuracy of metacognitive judgments. In particular, we evaluate whether metacognitive illusions in the literature are demand effects that can be eliminated by proper incentives. Overall, viewing metacognition through a judgment lens will extend our understanding of the basis of metacognition, will provide better measures of metacognitive accuracy, and will equip us with guidelines for improving the accuracy of metacognition.