metacognition

noun

meta·​cog·​ni·​tion ˌme-tə-käg-ˈni-shən 

: awareness or analysis of one's own learning or thinking processes

Research on metacognition … has demonstrated the value of monitoring one's own cognitive processes.

—Colette A. Daiute

Examples of metacognition in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Their self-awareness is not a workshop outcome but a daily discipline based on mindfulness and metacognition. — Dr. Adil Dalal, Forbes.com, 12 June 2026

Plus, certain cognitive skills—like metacognition, or the ability to think about thinking—actually tend to improve in later life. — Angela Haupt, Time, 14 May 2026

To thrive in this new era, leaders need large amounts of something called metacognition, or put simply, thinking about thinking. — David Rock, Fortune, 6 May 2026

Instead, our hope is to provide a computational architecture for allocating resources and improving responses that also serves as a first step toward more sophisticated approaches for full artificial metacognition. — Ricky J. Sethi, The Conversation, 26 Jan. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1972, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for metacognition

• academician
• cycloaddition
• decomposition
• diagnostician
• disinhibition
• indisposition
• interposition
• juxtaposition
• mathematician
• metaphysician
• neurotransmission
• nonrecognition