Within Cognitive Psychology the Information Processing approach sees the mind as a cognitive system that allows the human being to interact in his/her environment. This system is capable of monitoring and self-regulating itself which, in turn, empowers the system all together. This capability has been defined as metacognition. The first aim of this study is to analyze the concept of metacognition, trying to capture its essence and functionality as a cognitive process. The second aim is to show and discuss the models provided by the different authors in the area. The final goal is to report a number of investigations that shows metacognition as a determinant factor for the instructional learning.
Metacognition; cognition; information processing
