List of illusions of understanding
An illusion of understanding or illusion of knowing is a form of poor metacognition in which one thinks one knows something that one does not in fact know. An illusion of understanding can happen in both explainers and learners.
Name | Description | Whom does this illusion afflict? | Example |
---|---|---|---|
Illusion of transparency/curse of knowledge | Explainer | ||
Double illusion of transparency | Explainer and learner simultaneously | ||
Illusion of explanatory depth | Learner | ||
Illusions of the outsourced mind [1] | |||
Illusory superiority | Explainer and learner (not necessarily simultaneously) | ||
Impostor syndrome | Explainer and learner (not necessarily simultaneously) |
"Rereading a chapter a second time, for example, can provide a sense of familiarity or perceptual fluency that we interpret as understanding or comprehension, but may actually be a product of low-level perceptual priming. Similarly, information coming readily to mind can be interpreted as evidence of learning, but could instead be a product of cues that are present in the study situation, but that are unlikely to be present at a later time. We can also be misled by our current performance. Conditions of learning that make performance improve rapidly often fail to support long-term retention and transfer, whereas conditions that create challenges and slow the rate of apparent learning often optimize long-term retention and transfer." (Bjork and Bjork)
http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-amount-of-detail (I think this post reinvents the "illusion of explanatory depth" idea)