Tradeoff of semantic relatedness and degree of overlearning: Differential effects on metamemory and on long-term retention

Abstract

We investigated people's recall and recognition of, and Judgments of Learning (JOLs) and Feelings of Knowing (FOKs) about: (a) pairs of related words that were learned to a criterion of two correct recalls (criterion-learned/related) versus (b) pairs of unrelated words that were learned to a criterion of eight correct recalls (overlearned/unrelated). Recall, FOK on unrecalled targets, and recognition were tested at either (between-subjects variable) two or six weeks after learning. In Experiment 1, subjects' JOLs were greater in magnitude for criterion-learned/related items than for overlearned/unrelated items, and they predicted that recall would be the same after a 2-week retention interval as after a 6-week retention interval (between-subjects prediction). In contrast, however, subsequent recall was greater on the 2-week retention test than on the 6-week retention test and was greater for the overlearned/unrelated items than for the criterion-learned/related items; also, subjects' FOKs (and recognition performance) were greater in magnitude for the overlearned/unrelated items than for the criterion-learned/related items. Experiment 2 revealed that the overweighting of the importance of relatedness disappears from JOLs when those JOLs occur one day after the acquisition session. These findings imply that the information tracked by metacognitive monitoring judgments is different for JOLs than for FOKs, with the JOLs (relative to FOKs) based more on semantic relatedness and less on the degree of learning during acquisition. Also, subjects' JOLs are not particularly good at accurately forecasting their eventual level of recall on long-term retention tests that occur several acquisition.