Illustration: from passive study to active recall and deeper engagement — conceptual image, not from the cited study.
Short version
Sometimes simply asking yourself:
“Will I remember this later?”
can slightly improve memory on its own.
Researchers call this a judgment of learning (JOL) — a prediction about how likely you are to remember something in the future. Surprisingly, earlier studies found that making these predictions can itself strengthen later recall. This phenomenon is known as the positive reactivity effect.
A new set of experiments explored why that happens.
The researchers found that JOLs improved memory in all conditions they tested, but the effect became smaller when learners were already highly engaged — for example when they used spaced repetition, read information aloud, or were strongly motivated to focus.
The findings suggest that JOLs may help mainly because they push learners to pay more attention during study. When attention and effort are already high, the extra boost becomes smaller.
What the researchers studied
The study was conducted by Li and Yang, who wanted to test a theory called the enhanced engagement theory.
According to this idea, JOLs do not improve memory because the ratings themselves are special or magical. Instead, the act of evaluating your future memory may increase mental engagement during learning.
To test this, the researchers ran three experiments using word-recognition tasks.
Participants studied lists of words and either:
- made judgments about how likely they were to remember each word later;
- or completed a control task without those predictions.
The researchers then changed several study conditions to see whether JOLs still helped when engagement was already elevated through other methods.
They manipulated:
- attention, by comparing silent reading with reading aloud;
- cognitive effort, by comparing massed study with spaced repetition;
- motivation, by comparing normal instructions with instructions emphasizing speed and efficiency.
After delays, participants completed recognition-memory tests so the researchers could compare how large the JOL benefit remained across different learning situations.
What the experiments found
Across all three experiments, the same general pattern appeared:
Making JOLs improved memory compared with the control conditions.
But the most important result was how that benefit changed depending on the study environment.
When learners were already studying under high-engagement conditions — such as spaced repetition, reading aloud, or stronger motivational focus — the additional benefit from JOLs became noticeably smaller.
In contrast, when study conditions were relatively passive or low-effort, JOLs produced a larger improvement.
The researchers interpret this as evidence that JOLs work partly by increasing attention and mental involvement during encoding. If another strategy already pushes engagement upward, there may simply be less room for JOLs to add extra benefit.
Why this matters
The study connects two important areas of learning science:
- metacognition, meaning awareness of your own learning;
- and active study strategies, such as retrieval practice and spaced repetition.
Many learners already use something similar to JOLs without realizing it. Every time you look at a flashcard and think:
“I probably know this.”
you are making a prediction about your future memory.
This research suggests those predictions may genuinely influence learning — especially when studying would otherwise feel passive.
But the study also carries an important caution:
JOLs are probably not a replacement for stronger learning methods like spaced repetition or active recall.
Instead, they may work best as a lightweight boost in situations where attention is low, motivation is weak, or studying has become too automatic.
Practical implications
For students, teachers, and learning-app designers, the findings suggest several useful ideas.
JOL-style prompts may be especially valuable when:
- learners are passively rereading notes;
- studying in one long cramming session;
- quickly skimming information without much focus;
- or struggling to stay mentally engaged.
Simple prompts such as:
- “How likely are you to remember this tomorrow?”
- “How confident are you in this answer?”
- “Do you think this fact has really stuck?”
may encourage deeper processing.
At the same time, the research suggests that highly engaging methods like spaced repetition and retrieval practice already provide many of the same attentional benefits. In those situations, adding more self-rating prompts may still help, but probably less dramatically.
Limitations
The experiments used controlled laboratory-style word-recognition tasks rather than real classroom learning over months or semesters.
The publicly available information also comes mainly from the abstract, so many methodological details and effect sizes were not fully available.
In addition, the researchers only tested a limited set of engagement manipulations. Other strategies — such as teaching others, drawing diagrams, or interleaving topics — may interact with JOLs differently.
Final thoughts
The study suggests that metacognitive reflection and active learning strategies may partly work through the same underlying mechanism: increasing mental engagement during study.
That means they can sometimes reinforce each other — but also partially overlap.
For learners, the practical lesson is balanced:
When studying feels passive or automatic, asking yourself how well you really know something may improve attention and memory. But when you are already using effortful methods like spaced repetition and active recall, the biggest gains may come from continuing those habits consistently rather than endlessly adding more learning tricks on top.
This is a plain-language summary of: “The Cognitive Mechanisms of the Positivity Reactivity Effect on Word Recognition Memory”.
Source: Journal of Intelligence (2026).