Pupil size influences learners' judgments of learning

When studying material for an upcoming test, learners often utilize various different types of cues to assess their memory for the material they are studying. According to current metacognitive theories, learners may inferentially process these various cues in order to make a judgment of learning (JOL) about how well they have learned the material. While many cue(s) such as relatedness, value, and processing fluency have been investigated in how they influence learners’ JOLs, less research has investigated the influence of physiological cues. The current studies aim to investigate the potential influence of these physiological cues on learners’ JOLs. In particular, the current studies will investigate the influence on learners’ JOLs of providing pupillometry feedback. Pupil diameter has been linked to both recognition and free recall memory. These studies aimed to determine if learners incorporated information from pupil diameter feedback into their JOLs. Further, these studies investigated how strongly learners weight the information from pupil diameter feedback when making their JOLs versus another cue: the value of an item. Across both studies, participants utilized information from pupil size feedback when making JOLs. They also weighted this pupil size cue more than a value cue. The results of both studies suggest that participants potentially utilize a physiological cue such as pupil size when making metamemory judgments.