Confidence at the limits of human nested cognition

Metacognition is the ability to weigh the quality of our own cognition, such as the confidence that our perceptual decisions are correct. Here we ask whether metacognitive performance can itself be evaluated or else metacognition is the ultimate reflective human faculty. Building upon a classic visual perception task, we show that human observers are able to produce nested, above-chance judgements on the quality of their decisions at least up to the fourth order (i.e. meta-meta-meta-cognition). A computational model can account for this nested cognitive ability if evidence has a high-resolution representation, and if there are two kinds of noise, including recursive evidence degradation. The existence of fourth-order sensitivity suggests that the neural mechanisms responsible for second-order metacognition can be flexibly generalized to evaluate any cognitive process, including metacognitive evaluations themselves. We define the theoretical and practical limits of nested cognition and discuss how this approach paves the way for a better understanding of human self-regulation

The Confidence Database

Understanding how people rate their confidence is critical for the characterization of a wide range of perceptual, memory, motor and cognitive processes. To enable the continued exploration of these processes, we created a large database of confidence studies spanning a broad set of paradigms, participant populations and fields of study. The data from each study are structured in a common, easy-to-use format that can be easily imported and analysed using multiple software packages. Each dataset is accompanied by an explanation regarding the nature of the collected data. At the time of publication, the Confidence Database (which is available at https://osf.io/s46pr/) contained 145 datasets with data from more than 8,700 participants and almost 4 million trials. The database will remain open for new submissions indefinitely and is expected to continue to grow. Here we show the usefulness of this large collection of datasets in four different analyses that provide precise estimations of several foundational confidence-related effects

Métacognition et dynamique de l'attention sélective

Adaptive decision-making requires precise monitoring of decision quality in light of both sensory uncertainty and the variability inherent in cognitive functions. Such monitoring, or metacognitive reasoning, can be assessed by relating subjective confidence in a perceptual decision to objective accuracy. Selective attention is a known modulator of sensory processing, and reliable metacognitive access to attention may be the key to cope with the variability of the environment. The present dissertation investigates the temporal construction of visual confidence during and after the allocation of selective attention either to a point in time (temporal attention) or to a point in space (spatial attention). In both the temporal and spatial domain, we observe that attention constrains metacognitive ability, both during and after allocation. The robust temporal binding observed in the present thesis between attention and metacognition induces dissociations between confidence and accuracy when attention is misallocated. The empirical results presented in this work highlight a systematic inability to integrate the temporal dynamics of selective attention into metacognitive judgments.La dynamique du monde qui nous entoure nécessite sans cesse d'adapter nos décisions à son incertitude latente. Cette incertitude définit autant notre perception que le fonctionnement même de nos fonctions cognitives. La « métacognition » d’un individu - la manière dont il raisonne sur ses propres perceptions - peut être étudiée en comparant sa confiance à la qualité objective de ses décisions perceptives. Parce que l’attention sélective est une source importante de modulation sensorielle, une bonne métacognition des effets de l’attention sur la perception semble primordiale. La façon dont la confiance émerge du processus d’orientation de l'attention, et se développe ensuite dans l'espace et le temps, fait l'objet de cette thèse. Nous y décrivons notamment la solide dépendance que la confiance cultive à l'égard de l’attention visuelle, une dépendance qui subsiste à chaque étape du processus attentionnel. Les travaux expérimentaux présentés dans cette thèse suggèrent ainsi une dépendance si forte qu’une orientation erronée de l’attention passe souvent inaperçue au niveau métacognitif. Ces résultats témoignent de l'incapacité de la confiance à prendre en compte certaines des limites temporelles de l'attention sélective

Knowability predicts curiosity and learning

Curiosity – defined as the urge to know and understand – is a fundamental driver of human cognition and behaviour throughout the lifespan. Distinct from the instrumental value of information in helping to achieve a pre-defined goal, curiosity can be defined as an intrinsic taste for information itself. Although existing research has suggested a role for curiosity in enhancing learning outcomes, questions remain regarding the mechanisms underlying the curiosity-learning relationship. In the current work, we explored the interplay between curiosity, confidence, and learning in relation to the perceived “knowability” of information. Drawing on Loewenstein's information gap theory and the classical observation that curiosity is maximum at intermediate states of knowledge, we propose that curiosity is influenced by the availability of potential answers, reflecting the subjective perception of information's knowability. We conducted an online experiment using trivia questions, wherein participants estimated the number of candidate answers they had in mind for each question, reported their curiosity and confidence regarding the correct answer, and their surprise when told it. Five days later they completed a memory test for those answers. Results indicate that greater availability of candidate answers predicted heightened curiosity, moderate confidence, and enhanced memory retention. This finding suggests that curiosity is not solely triggered by an information gap but also by the perception that information is retrievable. Our study highlights the significance of subjective perceptions of information accessibility in understanding curiosity and its impact on learning. These findings contribute to the growing body of research elucidating the cognitive processes underpinning curiosity and its implications for effective learning strategies

Metacognitive blindness in temporal selection during the deployment of spatial attention

How does orienting attention in space affect the quality of our confidence judgments? Orienting attention to a particular location is known to boost visual performance, but the deployment of attention is far from being instantaneous. Whether observers are able to monitor the time needed for attention to deploy remains largely unknown. To address this question, we adapted a “Wundt clocks” paradigm, asking observers (N=140) to reproduce the phase of a rotating clock at the time of an attentional cue, and to evaluate their confidence in their responses. Attention affected the latency between objective and perceived events: the average reported phase was delayed in accordance with the known latencies of voluntary and involuntary attention. Yet, we found that confidence remains oblivious to these attention-induced perceptual delays, like a ‘metacognitive blind spot’. In addition, we observed weaker metacognition specifically during the deployment of voluntary attention, suggesting a tight relationship between the attentional and metacognitive systems. While previous work has considered how visual confidence adjusts to fully attended versus unattended locations, our study demonstrates that the very process of orienting attention in space can alter metacognition

Learning to discriminate the eye of origin during continuous flash suppression

This project includes data files of our experiment aimed to investigate whether people can be trained to discriminate the eye of origin of a monocular stimulus

Metacognitive blindness in temporal selection during the deployment of spatial attention

Datasets for the paper "Metacognitive blindness in temporal selection during the deployment of spatial attention" (Cognition, 2021

Temporal attention causes systematic biases in visual confidence

This is the dataset for the two experiments of the paper "Temporal attention causes systematic biases in visual confidence" (Scientific Reports, 2019). The folder also includes the R Markdown script for the model presented in the Supplementary Material