Tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) State
Tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) state is the sensation that a person is capable to remember a presently unrecalled word. It could be defined as the state of momentary inaccessibility .
The TOT state, according to Nelson (2000), is the cognitive state in which an individual is aware about incomplete semantic or phonological information concerning a particular thing or word, but is unable to remember the entire remark. He used the expression ‘feeling of knowing’ that pertains to the phenomenological occurrence which let us know that a word is, for the moment, inaccessible. Other investigations on TOT are similar to Nelson’s observations wherein TOT was operationally recognized based on mnemonic presentation with no metamemory constituent .
TOTs states have a significant function in several areas under cognitive psychology. TOT state may include theories of memory, metacognition and lexical retrieval. Since the beginning of cognitive psychology, TOTs have been gaining popularity especially on present researches.
This paper aims to identify if the TOT states are lexical retrieval failure or metacognitive awareness.
Lexical Retrieval Failure vs Metacognitive Awareness
Generally, the TOT state is analytical of resolution for momentary inaccessibility. A lexical retrieval failure pertains to the actual momentary inaccessibility or the cognitive TOT while a metacognitive awareness pertains to the feeling of momentary inaccessibility or the so-called the phenomenological TOT .
Studies by Schwartz and Diaz (2014) stated that there exists a strong association between the lexical retrieval failure and metacognitive awareness. The existing relationship means that the states of TOT are adaptive because they allow an individual to be aware of possible retrieval failures. Moreover, TOT states also give us a method of recognizing the associations among experience, behavior and process .
Using the perspective of language construction, TOTs have made retrieval researches that have delayed or unsuccessful and provided approaches on the organization of the lexicon. On the other side, the metacognitive view tells us that TOTs are feelings that occur when retrieval is unsuccessful. The metacognitive point differentiated the TOT feeling from the lexical retrieval failure itself.
The metacognitive awareness regards the likelihood of TOT and retrieval courses as dissociable. Since TOTs are made through metacognitive processes, it must be likely to discover variables for experiments that can influence the process without distressing recall along with the variables that affects recall exclusive of TOTs .
Considering TOTs as metacognition brought us more questions. The TOTs serves as a monitoring function, that alert people to the opportunity of remembering when retrieval failed.
Researches that regard TOT as a lexical retrieval failure consider that the TOT state is the momentary inaccessibility of a stored entry. It happens regardless of the awareness of the individual about it. However, the experiments under the said researches do not inquire the partakers on whether they are having TOTs or not. The conclusion was derived based on their activities (Hamberger & Seidel, 2003; Kikyo et al., 2001).
Nevertheless, other researches explored the state of TOT and operationalized it based on the phenomenological occurrence in the involve individuals. Researches gathered self-reported TOTs experiences and refer to the state of the incapability of retrieval of a recognized word as the ‘cognitive TOT’. On the other hand, the feeling of incapacity to retrieve is referred to as the phenomenological TOT or metacognitive awareness.
Schwartz (2006) opposed the idea of Nelson (2000) and other related researches. He mentioned that TOT must be considered as a metacognitive finding rather than a state of lexical retrieval failure. In his argument, he distinguished the two concepts of TOT and argued that partial independence of the ‘feeling of knowing’ related to metacognitive studies.
The metacognitive awareness approach, similar to other metacognitive ideas, is not accurate on recall predictions. The recalls are personal states identified by individual who remembers being in the state of TOT and not through experimentations .
TOTs are regarded as a flawed observation on current cognitive processes which means TOTs are empirical feelings, which let individuals to observe and manage their retrieval development .
The metacognitive observation does not control the direct admission to the unretrieved word or target. The examination only utilizes a host of inferential methods to deduce the ability to retrieve. On the other hand, other theories assume that TOTs directly check the unretrieved information. Schwatz implied that the expression TOT must refer to the experience of inaccessibility and not inaccessibility itself; the feeling and not the actual experience .
The process of lexical retrieval is a great influence in the researches that believed on cognitive, and not metacognitive, idea of TOT states. As a lexical retrieval failure, TOT is recognized as unsuccessful attempt to recover known information subsequent to limited information recovery.
For instance wherein TOTs were allocated to every unretrieved objectives for which the person who will remember created biased information deductions. In this experiment, the positive TOTs are those that were later documented as accurate while negative TOTs were those that are disassociated with the target word through a hypothetical proposed word. This TOT approach in this experiment is in conflict with the prevailing custom in the field of study.
Conclusion
Certainly, the majority of the researches on TOTs and lexical retrieval depend upon a metacognitive characterization of the TOT. The association between word knowledge and TOT made the issue on TOT serve as a room to investigate the retrieval process when it is interfered or slowed.
Therefore, there exist no inherent inconsistencies or oppositions among the employment of TOTs in bringing light to the theories of lexical retrieval and the utilization of metacognitive theory to give explanation on TOT occurrences.
The presence of unresolved matters anticipates supplementary research on TOT. Nevertheless, developments are at hand in obtaining a solid perception of the fundamental mechanisms that add to the occurrence of TOTs and their purposes. TOTs persist to provide us approaches into the cognition nature for both the metacognitive mechanisms and retrieval failure mechanisms that inspire improved efforts.
References
Hamberger, M. J. & Seidel, W. T. (2003). Auditory and visual naming tests: Normative and patient data for accuracy, response time, and tip-of-the-tongue. Journal of International Neuropsychological Society, 9, 479–489.
Kikyo, H., Ohki, K., & Sekihara, K. (2001). Temporal chacterization of memory retrieval processes: An MRI study of the tip of the tongue phenomenon. European Journal of Neuroscience, 14, 887–892.
Nelson, T. O. (2000). Consciousness, self-consciousness, and metacognition. Consciousness and Cognition, 9 , 220–223.
Schwartz, B. (2006). Tip-of-the-tongue states as metacognition. Metacognition Learning , 1-10.
Schwartz, B., & Diaz, F. (2014). Quantifying Human Metacognition. Verlag Berlin Heidelberg: Springer.
Schwartz, B., & Metcalfe, J. (2011). Tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) states: retrieval, behaviorand experience. Mem Cogn , 1-11.
