Metacognition Outperforms the Questionnaire: Item-Level Insights Into Chronotype Assessment

Kühn et al. demonstrate that the “meta” question (“Which chronotype do you think you are?”) outperforms most questionnaire items for classifying individual circadian patterns, at least in healthy aging Germans. This suggests a move toward radically simpler, patient-centered chronotype screening in clinics—a small but quietly subversive result, given the field’s fondness for multistep survey scales. If older adults know themselves, we may need fewer forms and more listening.