Metacognitive processes

The concept of metacognition was introduced by John Flavell in 1976, and defined it as a set of human knowledge about the main features of the cognitive sphere and how to control it ^[3] . J. Flavell identified four components of metacognition: metacognitive knowledge, metacognitive experience, goals and strategies.

A. Brown ( English AL Brown ) defines metacognition as knowledge of his own knowledge ^[4] . She divided metacognition into two broad categories:

1. knowledge of cognition - a set of activities that include conscious reflection on cognitive actions and abilities;
2. regulation of cognition - a set of types of activities that require mechanisms of self-regulation during training or problem solving.

A. Brown also points out that metacognitive processes allow you to regulate and control the learning process, and consist of a number of processes:

• activity planning process (forming a plan, anticipating the result, analyzing possible errors);
• process control activities
• the process of checking the results of cognitive activity.

R. Kluwe, in turn, distinguishes two processes in the structure of metacognition that control and regulate cognitive processes:

• control processes - processes that help identify the task that a person is working on and evaluate the progress of their work and predict the outcome;
• regulatory processes - processes that help to allocate resources for the current task, to determine the order of steps that will be taken to solve the problem.

In their work, D. Wrigley, P. Schetz, R. Glantz, and S. Weinstein define metacognition as the process of using reflection to consciously study one’s thinking, and to realize one’s own strategies of mental activity. These include planning; selection of business strategies; monitoring of cognitive activity ^[5] .

S. Tobias and H. T. Everson ( English S. Tobias and HT Everson ) proposed a hierarchical model of metacognitive abilities: monitoring knowledge; learning assessment; strategy selection and planning ^[6] . Moreover, they define knowledge monitoring as the ability of a person to know what he knows and what does not know, monitoring knowledge is a prerequisite for other metacognitive skills.

Domestic Theories

M. A. Kholodnaya , like a number of other authors, adheres to the idea that metacognition is not limited to conscious control. Exploring the problem of the structure of the intellectual sphere (mental experience), M. A. Kholodnaya identifies three levels of experience ^[1] :

• cognitive experience - mental structures that ensure the storage, ordering and transformation of available and incoming information;
• metacognitive experience - mental structures that allow for the implementation of involuntary and arbitrary regulation of intellectual activity. Metacognitive experience includes involuntary intellectual control; arbitrary intellectual control; metacognitive awareness and open cognitive position.
• intentional experience - mental structures that underlie individual intellectual inclinations.

Metcalfe and Shimamura note that in the study of metacognition, the main methodological problem is the problem of objectivity and accuracy of metacognitive judgments, which is associated with a number of phenomena ^[7]

1. The phenomenon of the feeling of knowledge is an error in the accuracy of updating knowledge;
2. The illusion of knowledge is a metacognitive distortion in which a person exaggerates the degree of understanding of the material (that is, the assessment of the level of understanding of the material is 50-60% higher than the actual level of the task);
3. The Dunning – Krueger effect is a metacognitive distortion in which people with low cognitive abilities tend to overestimate the latter, and, conversely, people with high abilities tend to underestimate their self-esteem ^{[8] [9]} .

• Karpov A.V. , Skityaeva I.M. Psychology of metacognitive processes of personality. - M.: Publishing House "Institute of Psychology RAS", 2005. - 352 p.
• Chernokova T. E. Metacognitive psychology: the problem of the subject of research // Bulletin of the University of Pomerania. - 2011. - No. 3. - S. 153 −158.