It is assumed that the difference between voluntary and involuntary autobiographical memories lies in the intentionality to retrieve a memory assigned by the experimenter. Memories that are retrieved when people are instructed to do so in response to cues are considered voluntary (VAMs), those that pop up spontaneously are considered involuntary (IAMs). VAMs and IAMs so classified are also found to differ in terms of phenomenological characteristics, such as perceived accessibility, vividness etc. These differences are assumed to be due to differences in intentionality and the different retrieval processes at play. It is possible, however, that these differences (which are subjective attributions of phenomenological characteristics) are the result of metacognitive beliefs of what IAMs and VAMs should be. In two experiments, we investigated the possible role of these metacognitive beliefs. Participants rated IAMs and VAMs on a number of phenomenological characteristics in two conditions, when these memories were presented in blocks that specified whether they were retrieved in a voluntary or involuntary task, or when presented in a mixed list with no information provided. If metacognitive beliefs influence the reporting of memory properties, then the block presentation would increase the differences between the characteristics of the two types of memories. The results showed that, besides replicating the characteristics of IAMs and VAMs already observed in the literature, there were almost no differences between the blocked and the mixed lists. We discuss the results as supporting the idea that the difference in characteristics attributed to IAMs and VAMs reflect a genuine difference in the nature of the retrieval and is not the result of pre-existing metacognitive belief on what a voluntary and an involuntary memory should be.

假设自愿和非自愿自传记忆之间的区别在于检索实验者分配的记忆的意图。当人们被指示这样做以响应提示时检索到的记忆被认为是自愿的（VAMs），那些自发弹出的记忆被认为是非自愿的（IAMs）。如此分类的 VAM 和 IAM 在现象学特征方面也存在差异，例如感知可访问性、生动性等。这些差异被认为是由于意向性差异和不同的检索过程所致。然而，这些差异（这是现象学特征的主观归因）可能是对 IAM 和 VAM 应该是什么的元认知信念的结果。在两个实验中，我们调查了这些元认知信念的可能作用。参与者在两种情况下对 IAM 和 VAM 的许多现象学特征进行评分，当这些记忆以指定它们是在自愿或非自愿任务中检索的块中呈现时，或者在没有提供信息的混合列表中呈现时。如果元认知信念影响记忆属性的报告，那么块呈现会增加两种记忆特征之间的差异。结果表明，除了复制文献中已经观察到的 IAM 和 VAM 的特征外，阻塞列表和混合列表之间几乎没有差异。