Do we know what we've learned from listening to the news?

This study investigates the relationship between knowledge acquisition and an awareness of that knowledge within the context of listening to the news. Subjects listened to a recording of a radio news program consisting of regular news items as well as editorials, manipulated to be of high or low personal relevance. They then completed a surprise memory test and rated their confidence in their answers. In contrast to many studies, the results indicated a strong positive confidence-accuracy relationship. Confidence ratings were generally a better predictor of an individual's performance than were predictions based on item difficulty. Whereas subjects reported strong and accurate feelings of knowing, they apparently lacked complementary feelings of not knowing. The implications of these findings and others are discussed.