When searching for information before making a decision, one faces a fundamental trade-off. On the one hand, more information will almost always improve the decision outcome. On the other hand, spending more time, money, or effort on further information search may be more costly than that improvement is beneficial. If decision makers are adaptive, they should use their resources in information searches efficiently. Using a sampling-based decision paradigm with financial costs for each observation, we conducted five experiments to investigate whether and how participants adapt their information amount to relevant aspects of the environment. Experiment 1a (N = 67) and 1b (N = 79) focused on changes in response to different ratios of information cost and decision payoffs, revealing that participants are capable of adapting, but seem to do so mainly based on a priori planning. Experiment 2 (N = 131) assessed the role of a second process, online adjustment, by varying whether participants received feedback. Surprisingly, participants changed their behavior to the same extent irrespective of whether they received feedback. To further improve the opportunities for metacognitive monitoring and control, Experiments 3a and 3b (N = 160 and N = 318) implemented different feedback types across more decision trials for three different ratios of information cost and decision outcomes, which stayed constant per participant. Whether participants changed their sample size and efficiency across trials depended on that ratio, but not on the type of feedback. This provides crucial insights into how participants adapt and what challenges might befall the necessary metacognitive monitoring, serving as a valuable prompt for future research.

Do children use environmental base rates to infer unobservable characteristics of their parents? We examined whether children who lack transmitted knowledge of their parents’ country of birth fill this gap using base-rate-driven assumptions. Using data from over 200,000 children across 45 countries (TIMSS 2015), we compared the accuracy of children’s reports about parental nativity when parents were native-born versus foreign-born. Children were substantially (~17 percentage points) more accurate when parents were born in the country than when parents were born abroad, corresponding to meta-analytic odds ratios exceeding 3. Critically, this accuracy gap was almost entirely explained by children giving wrong answers rather than acknowledging uncertainty, consistent with confident inference from base rates rather than mere ignorance. Supporting this interpretation, the magnitude of the accuracy gap correlated strongly with the proportion of native-born parents in each country (rS = .80). Importantly, higher base rates were both associated with greater accuracy for children of natives and lower accuracy for children of immigrants. The same pattern emerged at the school level: the accuracy gap shrank in schools with higher proportions of immigrant families, demonstrating that children’s inferences track local base rates in their immediate social environment. These results demonstrate base-rate inference operating spontaneously in a naturalistic domain, extending laboratory findings to show how environmental statistics shape everyday judgments about family characteristics.

Cognitive distortions are central to the conceptual and therapeutic framework of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), yet the existing taxonomy has remained largely unchanged since its development in the 1980s. This article proposes a novel addition to the distortions: the ‘Forever Fallacy’ defined as the tendency to project present discomforts, limitations or emotional states across imagined future timelines as if they were permanent and unchanging. Drawing on dual-process models of cognition, the Forever Fallacy is conceptualised as a heuristic, System A-driven distortion characterised by temporal fusion, stability projection and affective permanence. It differs structurally from established distortions like catastrophising or fortune telling through targeting the perceived duration and stability of anticipated future states rather than their content or likelihood. The article synthesises empirical research on affective forecasting, prospective cognition and temporal construal theory to ground the construct in established psychological science. Clinical illustrations demonstrate its presentation in anxiety, depression and existential overwhelm. Implications for case formulation are discussed alongside proposed adaptations to standard CBT interventions. Through articulating and operationalising the Forever Fallacy, this article contributes a theoretically coherent and clinically relevant extension to cognitive models of emotional distress, warranting future empirical validation and integration into therapeutic practice.

Key learning aims

1. (1) Define and use the ‘Forever Fallacy’: recognise it as the tendency to treat a current state as if it will not change, then apply it in formulation and practice by (i) naming the patient’s duration belief (‘it will always be like this’), (ii) mapping fluctuation with time-stamped ratings (for example, 0–10 every 30–60 s for 5–10 min) and (iii) running brief, time-limited behavioural tests to demonstrate change over time.

2. (2) Differentiate the Forever Fallacy from related thinking errors by focusing on time: it fuses the present with the future, assumes things will stay the same, and treats feelings as if they will last. Unlike catastrophising or fortune-telling, it concerns duration rather than how bad something is or how likely it is to happen.

3. (3) Use research on affective forecasting and construal level to explain why people tend to over-estimate how long and how strongly they will feel in the future and to mistake current states for fixed trajectories (Trope and Liberman, 2010; Wilson and Gilbert, 2003).

4. (4) Apply targeted cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and third-wave methods that restore a sense of time; for example, episodic future simulation, thought records with time columns, and decentring, and test change across sessions (Holmes et al., 2007; Teasdale et al., 2002a; Yamada et al., 2018).

5. (5) Set the construct within familiar theory and brain science: Personal Construct Theory and Schema Therapy; the Looming Vulnerability model of anxiety; the negativity bias; and default mode network (DMN), amygdala interactions and neuroplasticity, to guide formulation and mechanism-focused intervention (Kelly, 1991; Young et al., 2003; Riskind, 1997; Baumeister et al., 2001; Phelps and LeDoux, 2005; Etkin et al., 2015).

Accurate self-assessment is notoriously difficult for many second language (L2) speakers as they struggle to align self-evaluations of their performance with external assessments by raters or examiners. We investigated whether a brief peer-assessment activity helps L2 speakers align their self-assessment of comprehensibility with the evaluations by external raters. We also explored how speakers’ metacognitive knowledge contributes to their self-assessments. We recorded 40 L2 English-speaking international students completing an academic oral summary task and self-assessing their speech for comprehensibility. Half of the students then performed a brief peer-assessment activity, whereas the other half engaged in a filler task before all students self-assessed their initial performance again. The speech of all students was subsequently evaluated for comprehensibility by 30 external listeners, allowing us to estimate the extent to which the students’ and the external raters’ assessments converged. Whereas engaging in peer-assessment was generally associated for L2 speakers with greater alignment between their self-ratings and external listeners’ evaluations, peer-assessment appeared to mainly benefit L2 speakers with initially good self-assessment skills. Metacognitive knowledge was not associated with greater alignment between self- and other-assessments. We discuss whether and how brief peer- and self-assessment awareness-raising activities can help L2 speakers calibrate self- and other-assessments.

Metacognition and mentalising are central change mechanisms in psychotherapy, with transdiagnostic relevance. The how, why and when of metacognition creates a roadmap for psychotherapy, enhancing awareness, understanding and options for changing maladaptive behaviours that maintain psychiatric disorders. This offers a framework for psychotherapy, fostering deeper self-understanding and improved interpersonal interactions.

This study explores the implementation of critical thinking via metacognition in linguistics courses. It employs surveys to examine strategies used by students in two courses, Morphosyntax and Field Methods, devoted to the development of analytical skills in linguistics. We hypothesized that the application of metacognition surveys would enhance students' awareness of techniques that promote critical thinking and active learning. Two surveys built in as core components in each course were deployed at different points during the semester. Students' responses indicate that metacognition surveys can help students and instructors gain greater awareness of learning concerns and capabilities and identify areas for intervention.

Schizophrenia features pervasive insight deficits, with many failing to recognize symptoms or the need for treatment, predictors of poorer outcomes. Rather than unitary, insight comprises clinical (awareness of illness and need for care) and cognitive (self-reflectiveness and the ability to question one’s beliefs). This review examines whether mental time travel (MTT) – vivid recollection of past events and construction of detailed future scenarios – may underlie insight deficits in schizophrenia. We synthesize evidence up to May 2025 from meta-analyses, experimental studies, and neuroimaging/neuroanatomical reports on MTT (autobiographical memory specificity, future simulation, temporal horizon) and their associations with clinical and cognitive insight. Individuals with schizophrenia show reduced autobiographical specificity, future simulation vividness, alongside a narrowed temporal horizon. These impairments are linked to diminished self-reflection, narrative coherence, and metacognitive abilities, all of which are essential for accurate illness recognition. Neuroimaging indicates that the networks supporting mental time travel, self-reflection, and insight – particularly the default-mode and ventromedial prefrontal circuits – substantially overlap and are disrupted in schizophrenia, with heterogeneity across illness stage and analytic approach. Moderators such as negative symptoms and trauma appear to intensify the MTT-insight links, while depressive mood may paradoxically enhance illness awareness. Although therapies targeting episodic specificity and metacognitive mastery show promise, longitudinal and interventional evidence remains limited. Associations between MTT impairments and insight are robust but largely correlational, so reverse or bidirectional causality cannot be excluded. We outline priorities for longitudinal, interventional, and trauma-stratified studies – attentive to illness stage and default-mode dynamics – to clarify mechanisms and guide targeted interventions.

Some philosophers have recently argued that one should not be curious about a question whose answer one knows. This norm is said to follow from the fact that curiosity aims at knowledge. This article contends that the view that curiosity is inappropriate when directed at what is known, though attractive, is false. In fact, we are frequently curious about questions whose answers we know, and this curiosity is entirely appropriate because, along with metacognitive judgments about the contents of memory, it plays an important role in the process by which we successfully retrieve knowledge from memory. If this argument is successful, it reveals that some curiosity-driven inquiries target knowledge that lies within one’s own mind and raises important questions about the status and interpretation of the claim that curiosity aims at knowledge.

The present contribution proposes a low-threshold action plan for research into what we consider critical areas in multilingualism where we see an urgent need for more empirical studies and research-based classroom interventions and a stronger commitment to multilingual standards both in research and teaching. Reaching out to a wide audience of researchers, educationalists and decision makers, we first stake out the conceptual frame for our discussion and delineate the theoretical base that informs our thinking. This is followed by a perforce perfunctory overview of the current state of things. Next, we outline three research tasks with concrete practical suggestions and guidance on how to operationalise and implement the respective projects. Each task is contextualised in terms of its broader socio-educational embedding and prospective practical-theoretical relevance. The overall aim is to challenge traditional monolingual-grounded notions of language development, promote a dynamic and inclusive multilingual perspective in language learning, teaching and assessment, and contribute to a more informed understanding of multilingualism.

English as a second language (L2) has become the medium of instruction in numerous contexts even though many people may have difficulties to read and study in L2. According to the self-regulated framework, metacognitive strategies are essential to achieve successful learning, but they are resource-consuming and their use might be compromised in demanding contexts such as learning in L2. In Experiment 1, nonbalanced bilinguals read high- and low-cohesion texts in L1 and L2 and self-rated their learning using a judgment of learning (JOL). Then, they answered open-ended questions and responded a customized questionnaire regarding their strategies. In Experiment 2, we introduced two bilingual groups varying in L2 proficiency. Overall, participants could adjust their JOLs and detect the difficulty of the texts correctly in L1 and L2. However, results evidenced some nuances in learning strategies related to L2 proficiency. We discuss these findings within the context of the self-regulated learning.