A taxonomy of adolescent metacognitive knowledge during the information search process

A case study that took place in Montreal, Canada, used naturalistic methods to investigate the metacognitive knowledge of 10 adolescents as they searched for, selected, and used information for a school-based inquiry project on a topic related to the history of Western civilization. The study identified 13 attributes of metacognitive knowledge related to the information search process: balancing, building a base, changing course, communicating, connecting, knowing that you don't know, knowing your strengths and weaknesses, parallel thinking, pulling back and reflecting, scaffolding, understanding curiosity, understanding memory, understanding time and effort. The results contribute to the understanding of adolescent information-seeking behavior and have implications for information literacy instruction.