Metacognition: Self-Concept, Cognitive Styles And Cognitive Correlates

This paper reports the outcomes of a large study in which the metacognitive processes which take place during test-taking were assessed. The focus is primarily on confidence judgements that people assign to their answers to cognitive test items. There are pronounced individual differences in these judgments defining a Self-confidence factor, the exact nature of which remains unclear due to a lack of psychological correlates. The main findings presented in this paper show that self-confidence is a stable, broad psychological trait, affected by the dynamics occurring during decision-making in test-taking activities. An extensive battery of different thinking dispositions relating to the way in which people react to, and deal with, uncertainty was employed together with measures of personality and self-concepts. Structural Equation Modelling techniques were employed to provide a broad path model summarising the relationship between these measures and the Self-confidence trait. Self-confidence during test-taking was related only to the Metacognitive Beliefs factor as defined by specific self-concepts. These self-concepts assess competence in the fundamental cognitive abilities used by people in test-taking—memory and reasoning.