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Metacognition refers to thinking about our own thinking. It has assumed a prominent role in social judgment because our thoughts about our thoughts can magnify, attenuate, or even reverse the impact of primary cognition. Metacognitive thoughts can also produce changes in thought, feeling, and behavior, and thus are critical for a complete understanding of human social behavior. The present volume presents the most important and advanced research areas in social psychology where the role of metacognition has been studied. Specifically, the chapters of this book are organized into four substantive content areas: Attitudes and Decision Making, Self and Identity, Experiential, and Interpersonal. Each section consists in several chapters summarizing much of the work done in recent decades on critical topics, such as attitude strength, persuasion, bias correction, self-regulation, subjective feelings, embodiment, and prejudice, among others. This book also emphasizes interpersonal aspects of metacognition as they play an essential role in close relationships, groups, consumer and clinical interactions. Each chapter is written by an expert in the field, and presents a state-of-the-art view of the many ways metacognition has been examined by social psychologists.

Despite having been around for a decade now, Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) – payment by result contracts funding social programmes – are still a niche instrument. Constituting but a fraction of the overall impact investment sector, they were expected to grow much faster and augur a new model of pursuing social policy objectives. Whilst this has not yet occurred, they nevertheless continue to benefit from a great degree of political support and academic interest. But outside of the practitioner-focused literature, the scholarship investigating SIBs has largely identified financialisation and the erosion of social solidarity as the main dynamics underpinning this development. This article argues that it is important to also attend to SIBs as expressions of transformations occurring within the design and pursuit of social policy objectives. By looking at SIBs as a form of governance of social risks, the article argues that SIBs nurture their own forms of social solidarity. Based on three distinguishing tenets of SIBs, three types of solidarities are emphasised: inter-temporal, cross-sectoral and risk-insurance solidarities. Whilst these can spur social inclusion, innovation and collaboration, the article discusses how they can also be spurious and can come undone.