Theory about theory — an analysis of the assumptions, methods, and logic underpinning theoretical frameworks within a discipline; metatheoretical awareness is needed in literature reviews that compare frameworks drawn from different, sometimes incompatible, paradigms.
A metatheory is a theory about theory: an account of a theory’s assumptions, structure, scope and standards of justification rather than of the subject matter the theory itself addresses. In logic and mathematics the term is comparatively precise, naming the study of a formal system — its consistency, completeness, expressive reach — conducted from outside that system, with the object language and the language used to talk about it kept carefully apart. In the social sciences the word is used much more loosely, for any reflection on the framing commitments of a field or research programme. Writers move between the two senses without signalling the shift, so the first question to ask of the word is which one is in play.
Why this entry carries no source list. This lexicon cites an official primary source wherever one exists. For a concept used across several traditions at once, no such source exists: there is no body with authority over it, and a signed academic reference — the tier this lexicon would otherwise reach for — has no entry under this headword. Citing one school’s formulation would present a position as a definition. So the entry names the senses in play and the distinction between them, which is the part a reader can actually use.