Impact of Metacognitive Awareness on Academic Adjustment and Academic Outcome of the Students

The study aimed to examine the impacts of metacognition and gender on the academic adjustment and academic outcome of the participants. Five hundred twenty two undergraduate and postgraduate male (M = 20.53, SD = 2.06) and female (M = 20.47, SD = 2.00) students served as the participants in the study. Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (Schraw & Dennison, 1994) and Academic Adjustment Scale (Anderson et al., 2016) were employed to measure the metacognitive awareness and academic adjustment of the participants. The results of the study exhibited no gender differences in metacognition and academic adjustment except academic achievement and academic outcome of the male and female participants. The results of the study also evinced that scores on declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation components of metacognition and overall metacognitive awareness demonstrated positive correlations with the academic achievements, overall academic adjustment and academic outcome. Contrarily, the scores of planning and evaluation were found to be negatively correlated with the scores of academic lifestyle of the male, female and all the participants. Lastly, the results of the study demonstrated that the scores on declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation components of metacognition and overall metacognitive awareness accounted for significant variance in the scores of academic life style, academic achievements, overall academic adjustment and academic outcome. The results of the study have significant implications of for researchers, academicians, laymen, counselors and school psychologists. The limitations and future directions for researchers have also been discussed. The results indicated that there were negative and significant correlations among the scores of evaluation, academic lifestyle (r = -.138, p = .037) of the female participants. The positive and significant correlations existed among the scores of declarative knowledge, academic achievements (r = .225, p = .001), procedural knowledge (r = .166, p = .012), conditional knowledge (r = .179, p = .007), planning (r = .276, p = .000), information management (r = .167, p = .011) and monitoring (r = .144, p = .030) of the female participants. There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of overall metacognitive awareness, academic achievements (r = .234, p = .000) of the female participants. There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of information management, academic outcome (r = .189, p = .004), and debugging (r = .142, p = .032) of the female participants. The results indicated that there were negative and significant correlations among the scores of planning, academic lifestyle (r = -.101, p = .021) and evaluation (r = -.110, p = .012) of all the participants. The positive and significant correlations existed among the scores of declarative knowledge, academic achievements (r = .195, p = .000), procedural knowledge (r = .126, p = .004), conditional knowledge (r = .112, p = .010), planning (r = .193, p = .000), information management (r = .106, p = .015) and monitoring (r = .128, p = .003), evaluation (r = .095, p = .030) and overall metacognitive awareness (r = .174, p = .000) of all the participants. There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of declarative knowledge, overall academic adjustment (r =

Metacognition is important in learning and is a strong predictor of academic success (Dunning, Johnson, Ehrlinger & Kruger, 2003;Kruger & Dunning, 1999). Kurtz and Borkowski (1984) and others (Biggs, 1985;Stipek, 1982) suggested a positive relationship between the use of metacognition and academic achievement. This positive relationship suggests that as use of metacognition increases, regardless of the approach, one's academic average increases. Jacobs & Paris (1987) and Wittrock (1983) claim that the use of metacognition appears to be related to academic achievement and enhanced learning outcomes. Watkins and Hattie (1992) reported that students of high academic achievement tend to utilize strategies congruent with their own motivational states more than lower achieving students. Maqsud (1997) investigated the effects of metacognitive skills and nonverbal ability on academic achievement of high school pupils. He found that metacognitive ability tends to associate positively with academic attainment of high school pupils. Rahman et al. (2010) investigated the impact of metacognitive awareness on performance of students in chemistry with a sample of grade x students. Findings indicated that metacognitive awareness was significantly correlated with the performance of students. The highly metacognitively aware science students performed well on the test. The results of the study indicated that metacognition might play an important role in academic achievement of the students. Review of the available literature shown metacognition and academic outcome are positively correlated.
To my knowledge there are very few studies on the relationship between metacognition and academic adjustment in Indian socio-cultural setting. Most of the researches have focused on academic performance but academic adjustment and metacognition are not paid due attention. Researchers have shown that successful academic adjustment reflects students learning behavior and academic performance (Cazan, 2011). The present research attempted to study metacognition as predictors of academic outcome and academic adjustment of the students. In other words, it attempted to see the impact of metacognitive awareness and gender on academic outcome and academic adjustment of the university students. This area of research has been chosen because it has not been investigated before and the present study will be an appreciable contribution to the existing wealth of knowledge on metacognition in relation to academic outcome and academic adjustment of the students. It will also be an important contribution to existing knowledge to the field of educational psychology.

Objectives of the Study
Following were the basic objectives of the study: 1. To study the nature of relationship among metacognition, academic outcome and academic adjustment. 2. To partial out the role of metacognition in predicting the academic outcome and academic adjustment of the participants.

Population and Sample
The present research endeavor employed a corralational research design. The convenient sampling method was employed to select the participants. 522 undergraduate and postgraduate male (M = 20.53, SD = 2.06) and female (M = 20.47, SD = 2.00) students served as the participants. The biographic details of the participants were obtained through scales and inventory. The participants with age range from 17 to 28 years were allowed to take part in the study.

Tools
Following psychometric tools will be employed in the present study:

Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (MAI): A standardized instrument
Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (MAI) designed by Schraw & Dennison (1994) was used in the study to assess the metacognitive awareness of the participants. The MAI instrument consists of 52 statements to which participants will respond by marking a Likert scale with numbers from 1 ("not at all true of me") to 5 ("very true of me"). The statements represent two component categories of metacognition, knowledge and regulation. The knowledge component covered declarative knowledge (knowledge about self and strategies), procedural knowledge (knowledge about strategy use), and conditional knowledge (when and why to use strategies). The regulation component covered planning (goal setting), information management (organizing), monitoring (assessment of learning and strategy), debugging (strategies to correct errors) and evaluation (analysis of performance and strategy effectiveness). The test-retest reliability of this scale is 0.95. 2. Academic Adjustment Scale: This scale measured academic adjustment of the students. This academic adjustment scale was designed by Anderson et al. (2016). The academic adjustment scale represents three dimensional construct of academic adjustment which is academic lifestyle, academic achievement and academic motivation. This scale comprises 9 items. Responses are elicited on five point scale.
The test-retest reliability of this academic adjustment scale is 0.84.

Academic Outcome:
Percentage of marks or grade point average (GPA) of last semester was chosen as the parameter for academic outcome of the students.

Procedure
The data collection for the study was started after the collection of the scales and sample. Various scales were administered and the scoring was carried out as per the guidelines depicted in their manuals. The raw score so obtained was arranged as per the design of the study. When the task of data collection completed, the same were treated with the help of SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences), a software program to analyze the data. The means, standard deviations (SDs), correlations and regression analysis were computed.   The results evinced that there were no gender differences in academic adjustment except academic achievement and academic outcome. The coefficients of correlation among the scores of various components of metacognition and academic adjustment of the male and female participants were computed. The results indicated that there were negative and significant correlations among the scores of planning and academic lifestyle (r = -.120, p = .039) of the males. Conversely, the positive correlations existed among the scores of declarative knowledge, academic achievements (r = .170, p = .003), planning (r = .131, p = .025) overall metacognitive awareness (r = .131, p = .024) of the males. There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of debugging, academic outcome (r = .128, p = .028) of the males participants.
There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of overall metacognitive awareness, academic achievements (r = .234, p = .000) of the female participants. There were positive and significant correlations among the scores of information management, academic outcome (r = .189, p = .004), and debugging (r = .142, p = .032) of the female participants.

DISCUSSION
The result evinced that there were no significant gender differences in the mean scores of metacognition and its components such as declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation and overall metacognitive awareness. The results are collateral with the finding of research study by Zulkiply, (2006) who found no significant gender differences between females and males in overall metacognition awareness. Not much is known about any previous literature that showed clear evidence on gender difference in metacognition. Perhaps more studies need to be done to research on this issue. The mean scores of the male and female participants of academic adjustment and three components also did not show statistical difference except academic achievement and academic outcome.
The scores on declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation components of metacognition and overall metacognitive awareness demonstrated positive correlations with the academic achievements, overall academic adjustment and academic outcome as previous research has also reported that successful academic adjustment reflects students learning behavior and in their academic performance Cazan, (2012). Contrarily, the scores of planning were found to be negatively correlated with the scores of academic lifestyle of the male and all the participants. The scores of evaluation parts of metacognition (self regulation) exhibited negative correlations with scores of academic lifestyle of the female and all the participants.
Researcher found positive correlation between metacognitive awareness and academic achievements in this study that support Swanson, (1990) arguments, metacognition is very important in learning and performance of the individuals. The use of metacognitive strategies ignites one's thinking and can lead to more profound learning and improved performance, especially among learners who are struggling (Swanson, 1990).
The results of the study also demonstrated that the scores on declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation components of metacognition and overall metacognitive awareness accounted for significant variations in the scores of academic lifestyle, academic achievements, overall academic adjustment and academic outcome.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The major conclusion of the study is that metacognition has abiding role in the determination of academic achievements and academic outcome of the students. The present study did not find gender differences in metacognition of the students. The study also evinced that positive aspects of metacognition (declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, conditional knowledge, planning, information management, monitoring, debugging, evaluation components of metacognition and overall metacognitive awareness) exhibited mostly significant correlations with the scores of academic achievements, overall academic adjustment and academic outcome whereas the planning and evaluation demonstrated either significant correlations or negative correlations with the scores of academic lifestyle.

Directions for Future Researchers
There are many stake holders to the academic success and academic adjustment of the students. Academic success is not only determined by metacognitive awareness but selfcompassion, (Verma & Tiwari, 2017a), personality attributes (Verma & Tiwari, 2017b), academic self-concept (Gujare & Tiwari, 2016b;Tiwari, 2011a), mental health symptoms (Gujare & Tiwari, 2016a), emotional intelligence (Tiwari, 2016a) also contribute in shaping it. Positive psychological outcomes and constructs like sustainable behaviors (Tiwari, 2016c); Yogic practices (Tiwari, 2016b), nature of body image (Jain, & Tiwari, 2016a;Jain, & Tiwari, 2016b;Tiwari, & Kumar, 2015), emotion regulation , self-forgiveness and life satisfaction (Mudgal, & Tiwari, 2015) contribute to life outcomes which, in turn, impact human performance including academic success and adjustment. Future researchers must involve these mentioned variables to develop deeper understanding of the dynamics of academic success and academic adjustment of the students. The use of qualitative methods and mixed method would also come up with new findings and will enlighten the dynamics of academic success.