The Psychological Concept of Metacognitive Activity of the Personality

Abstract

The article is devoted to a reflective analysis of metacognitive activity from the standpoint of A. Furman’s act-cyclical approach. It has been established that metacognition in the modern view is a generalizing construct that unites a number of phenomena related to the regulation of a person’s own cognitive activity. These phenomena belong to a specific class of manifestations of the human psyche, the main distinguishing feature of which is their focus not on objective (external) reality, but on subjective (internal) reality. The possibility of integrating these mental phenomena is seen in metacognitive activity as a dynamic manifestation of metacognition in general. Based on a theoretical analysis of the subject area of study of this phenomenon, it has been determined that for the latest research (as well as for earlier studies), metacognition is characterized by locality, empiricism, and mainly an operational-technical perspective, from which it is presented in the form of a superstructure over cognitive activity, which is essentially formed by a set of monitoring and control strategies. This indicates that the subject of regulatory actions – the personality – remains outside the scope. The expediency of applying a research perspective that combines processual and personal dimensions and reveals metacognitive activity as a complex, holistic mental formation has been substantiated. The methodological foundations of the said act-cyclical approach become such a perspective. Its use makes it possible to understand the regulation of cognitive processes primarily as a function of the individual, who organizes their own intellectual experience in cyclical interactions with the object of search interest and the conditions of activity, coordinating it with accepted semantic guidelines. From the perspective of the said approach, in the study of thought-activity and thought-action as the highest levels of conceptual-categorical thinking, the author’s vision of metacognitive activity has been formed. It is interpreted as the manifestation of one’s own mental realities in the consciousness of the subject-researcher from a reflective position and the purposeful regulation of the processes of comprehension, interpretation, and further understanding-based representations of the ontological picture of the world. The components of metacognitive activity are outlined: 1) informational-orientational – a person’s immediate presence in the time-space of their own sociocultural realization; 2) emotional-motivational – acceptance of one’s own emotional sphere, a system of incentives and stimuli, clearly defined life priorities and aspirations; 3) conative-volitional – initiation, substantive content-filling, and correction of cognitive activity, manifested in the actions, behavior, activities, and deeds of a person; 4) reflective-evaluative – organization of the synergy of thoughts, reasoning, and judgments that determine the analytical position regarding what a person has learned. It is concluded that, on the basis of the substantive content of reflected experience, the individual returns to rethinking their own orientations, motives, and methods of action, thus closing the cycle of metacognitive activity and at the same time initiating its new stage. In this dynamic, the personality appears as a self-developing wholeness, where cognition ceases to be merely a function of the intellect and acquires the meaning of a way of human here-being in the world.