How Implicit is Implicitly Acquired Knowledge

Abstract

In this chapter we first discuss why it has recently been suggested that there is an intersection between two research fields as distant as metacognition and implicit learning. One major issue for implicit learning research is to determine whether the resulting knowledge might be itself implicit, an issue which has usually been explored through the dissociation procedure. As a matter of fact, to examine whether people know they know - the so-called subjective threshold approach - is an approach that is thought to avoid some of the problems reported about the dissociation procedure. We then review empirical studies using this new approach in the three main experimental paradigms used to investigate implicit learning. In so doing, one experiment on the control of a complex system will be briefly reported. On the whole, the results suggest that participants often lack metaknowledge. However, the picture is still unclear because of a lack of real replications and the use of methods that cannot be really compared.