Metacognitive efficiency exhibits domain-general properties, meaning that an individual's ability to evaluate their own decisions is significantly correlated across different mental tasks such as memory and perception.

Sources and limits

Citation roles describe each study's relationship to this claim. Their counts do not measure evidence strength. This page reuses the published finding; it adds no new synthesis.

1. [1] Supports · 2020

   Is our ability to judge our own minds general or task-specific?

   Although the study supports a general metacognitive process, it cannot determine whether this shared resource can be trained to improve performance across different fields. Furthermore, because each of the tasks only featured 40 trials, there was higher statistical uncertainty when calculating individual performance measures. Finally, the correlational nature of the design means we cannot conclude whether a single brain region or multiple interconnected systems drive this shared ability across different domains.

   Original paper

2. [2] Supports · 2023

   Does our self-awareness change as we grow older?

   The cross-sectional design cannot track how individual self-awareness changes over time, meaning differences between age groups might stem from generational or cultural factors rather than aging itself. Additionally, the online platform used to recruit participants may have biased the sample toward technology-literate, high-functioning older adults, potentially obscuring a real-world decline in cognitive self-evaluation. Finally, the study used simplified laboratory tasks with performance-matching, which might not reflect how older adults evaluate their cognitive abilities in complex daily-life scenarios.

   Original paper

Review and correction history

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