Metacognitive Illusion in Category Learning: Contributions of Processing Fluency and Beliefs

Interleaving with other categories of stimuli has been shown to enhance category learning. However, learners, tend to believe that blocking enhances learning, even after their own performance had showed the opposite. The present study explored the contributions of processing fluency (Experiment 1) and beliefs (Experiment 2) to the illusion that blocking enhances category learning. We found that: (a) learners’ performance benefited from interleaving, but their metacognitive judgments were not in conformity with it, (b) the perceived tendency of metacognitive illusion was reduced by inserting an unrelated cartoon image in the blocked presentation condition to decrease fluency, and (c) learners came to the experimental task with a pre-existing belief that the instruction of blocking by topic was superior to intermixing topics. This belief disappeared when learners were offered the theoretical explanation of why interleaving exemplars is more effective. In conclusion, this study revealed that processing fluency and held beliefs were two factors that cause this metacognitive illusion.