Development of Metamemory and the Role of Working Memory among Indian Adolescents

Metamemory research has gained traction in the past few decades spanning areas such as ageing, cognition, education, brain injury and the like. This study looks into the developmental trend of metamemory among school-going adolescents together with the influence of working memory. A sample of 891 adolescents participated in this study. Age-appropriate measures were developed for assessing metamemory components, viz., declarative and procedural metamemory. Digit-span tests and letter-number sequencing tests were taken as measures of working memory. Declarative metamemory showed an incremental trend till middle adolescence while sharply declining during late adolescence. Gender differences were non-existent for declarative metamemory but did exist for components of procedural with females outperforming males on the monitoring component and males outperforming females on the control component. Both declarative and procedural memory (control component) can predict memory task performance. Working memory can significantly predict how well one can exercise metamemory control, thus establishing a link between an object-level and a meta-level construct.