Scaffolded Memory and Metacognitive Feelings

Storing information in-the-world: Metacognition and cognitive offloading in a short-term memory task

“…For example, the observation that almost half the participants offloaded when only expected to remember two items (and that this did not benefit performance) seems, on its face, problematic for this view. Experiments 2a and 2b, however, provided clear support for an account wherein deciding to store information internally or externally is tied to individuals' metacognitive beliefs about the reliability of internal and external storage (or their metacognitive beliefs about their ability to engage in each; Arango-Muñoz, 2013;Cary & Carlson, 2001;Michaelian, 2012). For example, the individuals who were more likely to say they would store to-be-remembered information externally were less confident in their ability to store information internally.…”

“…Why go to the trouble to write when remembering only 2 letters? One answer to this question might lie in individuals' metacognitions about offloading in this context (Arango-Muñoz, 2013;Dunn & Risko, in press;Gilbert, 2015a,b). Specifically, while writing when required to remember a small amount of information might not objectively benefit performance this does not mean participants do not perceive a potential performance benefit (Dunn & Risko, in press).…”

“…First, this approach blurs the possible distinction between maximizing performance and minimizing effort and second it implies a mechanism for online performance monitoring or making judgments about how the use of external processes might influence performance, but leaves the nature of that mechanism unclear. One potential mechanism for performing this latter function, which has been discussed recently, is through some form of metacognitive processing (Arango-Muñoz, 2013;Dunn & Risko, in press;Gilbert, 2015a,b). Metacognition is thought to involve metacognitive monitoring, which involves an individual's subjective assessment of their cognitive processing, and metacognitive control, which involves actions taken to regulate cognition (e.g., Nelson & Narens, 1990;Koriat, 2007).…”

Remembering as a Mental Action *

“…Sometimes, when you are faced with a memory problem, even before trying to retrieve the solution, you already feel that you know it, that you will be able to reconstruct the memory. In the domain of semantic memory, it has been shown that FOKs play a central role in deciding whether to remember a piece of information or try another strategy to retrieve the information (Arango-Muñoz, 2013;Paynter, Reder, & Kieffaber, 2009;Reder, 1987). Although FOK has been less studied in the domain of episodic memory, 12 it seems likely that this experience provides the subjects with a sense of whether they would be able to reconstruct a piece of information or not.…”

The Cognitive Ecology of the Internet

“…Individuals may, for example, rely on the use of cloud-based personal data stores (see Van Kleek and O'Hara, 2014) as a source of trusted information. They may also exploit a range of so-called 'online reliability indicators' (Smart and Shadbolt, in press) to guide metacognitive processes relating to information selection and endorsement (Arango-Muñoz, 2013). Interestingly, processes that give rise to these indicators can, on occasion, be cast as a form of collective or distributed cognition.…”