Metacognition, proactive interference, and working memory: Can people monitor for proactive interference at encoding and retrieval

The present study investigated whether subjects were sensitive to negative transfer and proactive interference (PI) at encoding and retrieval and whether sensitivity varied with working memory (WM) ability. Monitoring at encoding was assessed by having subjects make judgments of learning (JOLs; E1 & E2) or by controlling study time (E3) while learning word pairs. Monitoring at retrieval was assessed by dynamic prediction of knowing (DPOK) judgments. At encoding, the results suggest that subjects are sensitive to negative transfer at the list level but not the item level. At retrieval, subjects were sensitive to PI at the list level and sometimes at the item level. Sensitivity to negative transfer did not vary with WM, but sensitivity to PI did. Implications for control are discussed.