When faced with challenging thinking tasks accompanied by a feeling of uncertainty, people often prefer to opt out (e.g., replying “I don’t know”, seeking advice) over giving low-confidence responses. In professions with high-stakes decisions (e.g., judges, medical practitioners), opting out is generally seen as preferable to making unreliable decisions. Contrarily, in educational settings, despite being designed to prepare students for real-life challenges, opting out is often viewed as an indication of low motivation or an avoidance of challenges. Presenting a complementary perspective, metacognitive research dealing with knowledge management and problem-solving shows substantial empirical evidence that both adults and children can use opt-out options to enhance the quality of their responses. Moreover, there are initial signs that strategic opting out can increase the efficiency of self-regulated effort. These opportunities to improve self-regulated learning have yet to be exploited in instructional design. Research guided by Cognitive Load Theory (CLT), which focuses on effort allocation in the face of cognitive challenges, has largely ignored the benefits of opting out as a strategy for improving effort allocation. The present review summarizes advantages and pitfalls within the current state of knowledge. Furthermore, we propose new avenues of inquiry for examining the impact of incorporating explicit opt-out options in instructional design to support knowledge and skill acquisition. As a novel avenue, we urge educators to develop effective opting-out skills in students to prepare them for real-life challenges.

当面对具有挑战性的思维任务并伴有不确定感时，人们通常更愿意选择退出（例如，回答“我不知道”，寻求建议），而不是给出低信心的回答。在做出高风险决策的职业（例如法官、医生）中，选择退出通常被认为比做出不可靠的决定更可取。相反，在教育环境中，尽管旨在让学生为现实生活中的挑战做好准备，但选择退出通常被视为动力不足或逃避挑战的表现。涉及知识管理和问题解决的元认知研究提出了一个互补的观点，它显示了大量的经验证据，表明成人和儿童都可以使用退出选项来提高他们的反应质量。此外，初步迹象表明，战略选择退出可以提高自我监管工作的效率。这些改善自我调节学习的机会尚未在教学设计中得到利用。以认知负荷理论 (CLT) 为指导的研究侧重于面对认知挑战时的努力分配，但在很大程度上忽略了选择退出作为改善努力分配策略的好处。本综述总结了当前知识状况的优点和缺陷。此外，我们提出了新的探究途径，以检验在教学设计中纳入明确的选择退出选项以支持知识和技能获取的影响。作为一种新颖的途径，我们敦促教育工作者培养学生有效的选择退出技能，为他们应对现实生活中的挑战做好准备。