Metacognitive skills: knowledge and cognitive regulation in psychology students

Abstract

Metacognition refers to people's reflexive processes about their own knowledge and the knowledge they have about their own cognitive activity. The knowledge that a person has about his own cognitive task allows him, when he performs some task, firstly, to monitor what he does, this is to exercise supervision while advancing in his activity and, finally, to direct the course of his cognitions, that is, exercise control (Huertas, Vesga and Galindo, 2014). This paper presents the results of an investigation that focuses on identifying the metacognitive skills that psychology students have developed throughout their professional training. A quantitative descriptive-comparative approach was adopted, addressed with 900 students of the Psychology Degree. The Metacognitive Skills Inventory of Huertas et al (2014) consisting of 52 questions with a likert scale of 1 to 5 was used, with a Cronbach alpha of 0.94. In the findings it can be seen that 66% of psychology students are shown to agree on the knowledge of their skills, learning strategies and the use of their cognitive abilities developed during their training. Also in regards to the regulation of cognition in the planning of their times and organization of their goals.