This work investigates how people make judgments about the content of their visual working memory (VWM). Some studies on long-term memory suggest that people base those metacognitive judgments on the outcome of a retrieval attempt. In contrast, Son and Metcalfe (2005) observed that people identify poorly remembered items immediately, presumably by…

In answering general-information questions, a within-person confidence-accuracy (C-A) correlation is typically observed, suggesting that people can monitor the correctness of their knowledge. However, because the correct answer is generally the consensual answer--the one endorsed by most participants--confidence judgment may actually monitor the…