More than just beliefs: Experience and beliefs jointly contribute to volume effects on metacognitive judgments.

Abstract

Experience-based cues, such as perceptual fluency, have long been thought to influence metacognitive judgments (Kelley & Jacoby, 1996; Koriat, 1997). Studies found that manipulations of perceptual fluency via changes in font and volume alter Judgments of Learning (JOLs) without influencing memory performance (Rhodes & Castel, 2008, 2009). Nonetheless, recent research (Mueller, Tauber, & Dunlosky, 2013; Mueller, Dunlosky, Tauber, & Rhodes, 2014, 2016) has challenged the notion that experience-based cues such as fluency are the primary basis for item-level JOLs, arguing instead that preexisting beliefs about these manipulations are responsible for these effects. For the first time, we compared global metacognitive judgments to item-level JOLs made during study to independently assess the contribution of beliefs and experience to volume-effects on JOLs. In 3 experiments, we found evidence for strong beliefs about volume-effects on memory, both before and after a study-test phase. However, these beliefs either did not account for the volume effect on JOLs (Experiment 3) or only partially accounted for the volume effect on JOLs (Experiments 1 and 2). Further, in Experiments 2 and 3 global performance estimates (before and after study) did not differ with respect to the volume dose whereas item-level JOLs generally varied with dose strength. Taken together, our findings suggest that both beliefs and experience-based cues contribute independently to the effects of volume on item-level JOLs, but that beliefs alone cannot fully account for the effects of volume on item-level JOLs. (PsycINFO Database Record

Beliefs about memory decline in aging do not impact judgments of learning (JOLs): A challenge for belief-based explanations of JOLs

“…given that evidence has revealed a direct-albeit small-impact of processing fluency on JOLs that cannot be attributed to beliefs (e.g., Besken, 2016;Besken & Mulligan, 2014;Susser & Mulligan, 2015;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015). This conclusion is also supported by evidence from Frank and Kuhlmann (2017), who found that most of their participants believed that they would remember more loud words than quiet words, which was also evident in their JOLs. Most important, some participants did not hold the volume belief, yet volume still had an impact on their JOLs analogous to the participants who did show such a belief.…”

“…One potentially relevant dimension is the intensity or strength of the belief (cf. Frank & Kuhlmann, 2017). According to this intensity hypothesis, strongly held beliefs are sufficient to impact JOLs, whereas weakly held beliefs are less so.…”

“…For instance, people typically believe that related pairs of words (e.g., loaf-bread) will be remembered better than unrelated pairs (e.g., cup-bread), and this belief apparently makes a substantial contribution to the relatedness effect, wherein people give higher JOLs to related than to unrelated pairs (Mueller, Tauber, & Dunlosky, 2013; for evidence that nonbelief factors may also contribute to this effect, see, e.g., Besken & Mulligan, 2013;Susser & Mulligan, 2015;Undorf & Erdfelder, 2015). However, few studies have systematically investigated the contribution of beliefs to JOLs (e.g., Frank & Kuhlmann, 2017;Mueller & Dunlosky, 2017), and consequently, current theories of JOLs have not been fully vetted with respect to how they explain the relationship between beliefs and JOLs. In prior studies, researchers have largely investigated the influence of people's beliefs about the materials or the learning task.…”

Generating lies produces lower memory predictions and higher memory performance than telling the truth: Evidence for a metacognitive illusion.

“…Experiment 4 provides more evidence for theory-based processes, as participants produced higher JOLs for truth than for lies, despite the lack of objective response latency differences. Third, participants can be directly asked about their beliefs through questionnaires without being exposed to the experimental materials (Besken, 2016;Koriat et al, 2004;Kornell et al, 2011;Mueller et al, 2014;Susser et al, 2016), make JOLs before they are exposed to the specific episode on an item-by-item basis (Mueller et al, 2014(Mueller et al, , 2016, or make global estimations about the predicted memory performance before the experiment begins (Frank & Kuhlmann, 2016). Experiment 5 showed the contribution of a priori beliefs to JOLs through the presentation of a scenario, in which participants had to predict their memory performance without exposure to the experiment, revealing higher memory predictions for truth trials than lie trials.…”

Alcohol Intoxication and Metamemory: Little Evidence that Moderate Intoxication Impairs Metacognitive Monitoring Processes

“…An important recent concern in metacognition is the extent to which participants' judgments are influenced by their expectations (Efklides, ; Kornell & Finn, ). For example, Frank and Kuhlman () compared metacognition and memory across spoken words that were presented at a loud, or soft, volume. Although memory was not affected by volume, people who expected loud voices to affect memory consistently gave higher JOLs to items that were presented in a loud voice, thereby supporting the view that beliefs affect individual metacognitive judgments.…”