Predicting Recall: The "Feeling-That-I-Will-Know" Phenomenon

Abstract

The relationship between subjects' free recall predictions and their subsequent free recall and recognition performance was studied to determine if a feeling-of-knowing phenomenon would occur during the storage of items. Subjects used a 5-point scale to make predictions for each word that they were told they would later have to recall. The results showed: (a) while subjects could identify during input the words which were most likely to be recalled, they, at the same time, overestimated their later recall performance. (b) Recognition performance was related to free recall predictions in a fashion similar to the predicted recall-actual recall relationship. (c) The word properties of frequency and imagery were reliable factors related to the prediction of recall. The results were interpreted as supporting the positions that recognition and recall structures start with a common basis and that words are