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A theory in which metamemory judgments infer likely performance from available cues, rather than necessarily inspecting a memory trace directly. Cue use and cue validity need not coincide.^[ref]

Metamemory includes several judgments with different targets: a judgment of learning predicts later recall, a feeling of knowing predicts whether currently unrecalled material could be recognized, and retrospective confidence evaluates an answer already produced. Their accuracy can depend on different information. Agreement between two judgments is therefore not sufficient evidence for one directly inspected memory-strength variable.

In Asher Koriat's cue-utilization approach to metamemory, intrinsic metamemory cues concern the material, extrinsic metamemory cues concern study conditions, and mnemonic cues concern the learner's current processing experience. Paired-associate experiments compared item difficulty, repetition and study duration with both learning predictions and later recall. Item difficulty affected both measures, whereas some changes in study conditions improved recall more than judgments anticipated. Practice could improve item discrimination while producing underconfidence.^[ref] The different patterns argue against treating all judgments as an identical readout of eventual memory performance.

A useful manipulation changes an accessible cue while measuring whether memory changes with it. Matthew G. Rhodes and Alan D. Castel varied the printed size of studied words and collected itemwise learning predictions before a free-recall test. Larger words received higher predictions, despite little corresponding recall advantage; the effect changed when more diagnostic associative information was available.^[ref] This is evidence for cue use and cue competition, rather than evidence that large print inevitably improves learning. A cue's influence on a judgment and its validity for predicting memory must be measured separately.

The timing and content of the judgment matter too. Thomas O. Nelson and John Dunlosky found a delayed judgment-of-learning effect; their subsequent manipulation showed a strong benefit for delayed judgments made from the cue alone, with little corresponding benefit when the cue and target were both displayed.^[ref] A cue-alone test permits a retrieval attempt resembling what will be needed later; seeing the answer can instead make it accessible without establishing that it could be independently recovered. Delay alone is therefore an incomplete description of the effect.

These findings have three implications. First, a cue-based judgment can be accurate without privileged access to a stored trace: accuracy depends on the relation between the sampled cues and the eventual test. Second, metacognitive calibration and metacognitive resolution can change separately. Learning predictions can become better at ranking items while being systematically too low overall. Third, monitoring affects metacognitive control. If an easily read item is mistakenly considered learned, a learner may stop studying it too early. An appropriate study therefore measures subsequent choices and recall, rather than assuming that a changed confidence report necessarily improves learning.

Multiple cues do not imply that every cue has an independent additive weight, nor that the same weights hold across tasks. To distinguish models, factorially manipulate candidate cues, control prior knowledge and test format, and predict judgments separately from memory outcomes. Include delayed and immediate judgments without assuming that eliciting a judgment is itself behaviourally inert. The evidence supports context-sensitive inference from several cues, with predictable successes and illusions, rather than one universally accurate memory gauge.