The Influence of Feeling-of-Knowing on Metacognitive Processes in the Digital Media Environment

Research demonstrates that people outsource memory work to digital devices and to the web, which consequently engenders elevated self-assessments, such as enhanced cognitive self-esteem (CSE). Yet, the reasons for this phenomenon are not well-known. In this domain, two studies explored the role of feeling-of-knowing (FoK) - one's judgment about whether currently nonrecallable information is actually known - on enhanced CSE. Findings show that people believe that their ability to find needed information is better after performing a web search for answers, as a function of elevated FoK that occurs in the process, and that experiencing greater FoK is related to greater perceived memory ability, better anticipated future performance, and easier perceived question difficulty. Evidence of this metacognitive effect is particularly intriguing since it is also highly paradoxical: under precisely the circumstances when people should recognize their cognitive shortcomings, they assess them to be especially strong.