Students’ Metacognitive Calibration to Task Complexity

Introduction One of the core ideas of many models of self-regulated learning concerns learners’ adaptation of their learning process to external conditions of learning scenarios. Additionally, theoretical models as well as empirical studies indicate that these adaptations might be influenced by learner characteristics. Based on the COPES-model (Winne & Hadwin, 1998) we examined learners’ adaptation to the external condition of task complexity and additionally explored the impact of prior domain knowledge and epistemological beliefs. A first explorative study focusing on the preparatory stages of self-regulated learning (Stahl, Pieschl, & Bromme, 2007) showed promising results, e.g. students with “sophisticated” beliefs in uncertain knowledge showed better calibration to task complexity. This study set out to replicate these results. As the preparatory stage of self-regulated learning is an important constituent of most theoretical models, it is the exclusive focus of this study. Figure 1: Effect of CAEB-variability