Metacognition: A Biased Competition Model 1 Metacognition: A Closed-Loop Model of Biased Competition Evidence from Neuroscience, Cognition, and Instructional Research

Learning and thinking are synergistic actions of the way people develop knowledge to adapt to the world. The actions are collateral cognitive operations that share a unitary outcome of performance. And yet, it is not entirely clear how the operations actually take place-either at the neurological level of the brain, the metaphoric level of the mind, or the action-oriented level of behavior. In the present chapter, we will build a case for metacognition as an integral operator in learning and thought. We will put forth a position that thinking is best characterized by the metacognitive operations learners deploy when they attempt to learn—the planning, monitoring, and evaluating learners do to regulate their learning processes. We will support our case at the level of the neuro-anatomical structures of the brain, the metaphorical architecture of human cognition, and relevant features of instruction. We focus on these three levels because: 1) there is a rich literature on frontal lobe involvement specifically targeted to explain learners' ability to think and learn; 2) decades of research on human cognitive architecture has been closely examined in the context of the neurological involvement of frontal lobe activation; and 3) learning and thinking are inextricably combined under the auspices of instruction. Finally, we will inventory the role of metacognition in some of our work, and selected works of others. Metacognition and self-regulation are not synonymous terms. Individually, the concepts have a long, independent history with distinct theoretical bases (e.g., Flavell, 1979, Bandura, 1977); however, over the last few decades, the concepts have been blurred by inconsistent use and theoretical ambiguity, in addition to the necessary and inevitable revisions the concepts require to evolve theoretically over time. This led Dinsmore, Alexander, and Loughlin (2008) to review 255 articles published over the Metacognition: A Biased Competition Model 3 last five years, asking the question: ―should we expect to hold current generations to the conceptions first framed by Flavell, Bandura, and others, or is it assumed that alternative and contemporary conceptions are warranted?‖ Dinsmore et al. (2008) conclude that metacognition is rooted in the theoretical foundation of Jean Piaget and centers around cognition and matters of the mind. Flavell, working from a Piagetian theoretical base, was responsible for conceptualizing metacognition as ―thinking about thinking,‖ (Dinsmore et al., 2008); a definition that still stands 40 years later. Further, metacognition is conceptualized as being comprised of two factors: knowledge—what individuals know about their …