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9 characteristics of critical thinking (and how you can develop them)

It's no secret that critical thinking is essential for growth and success. Yet many people aren't quite sure what it means — it sounds like being a critic or cynical, traits that many people want to avoid.

However, thinking critically isn't about being negative. On the contrary, effective critical thinkers possess many positive traits. Attributes like curiosity, compassion, and communication are among the top commonalities that critical thinkers share, and the good news is that we can all learn to develop these capabilities.

This article will discuss some of the principal characteristics of critical thinking and how developing these qualities can help you improve your decision-making and problem-solving skills. With a bit of self-reflection and practice, you'll be well on your way to making better decisions, solving complex problems, and achieving success across all areas of your life.

What is critical thinking?

Scholarly works on critical thinking propose many ways of interpreting the concept ( at least 17 in one reference! ), making it challenging to pinpoint one exact definition. In general, critical thinking refers to rational, goal-directed thought through logical arguments and reasoning. We use critical thinking to objectively assess and evaluate information to form reasonable judgments.

Critical thinking has its roots in ancient Greece. The philosopher Socrates is credited with being one of the first to encourage his students to think critically about their beliefs and ideas. Socrates believed that by encouraging people to question their assumptions, they would be able to see the flaws in their reasoning and improve their thought processes.

Today, critical thinking skills are considered vital for success in academia and everyday life. One of the defining " 21st-century skills ," critical thinking is integral to problem-solving, decision making, and goal setting.

Why is it necessary to develop critical thinking skills?

Critical thinking skills help us learn new information, understand complex concepts, and make better decisions. The ability to be objective and reasonable is an asset that can enhance personal and professional relationships.

The U.S. Department of Labor reports critical thinking is among the top desired skills in the workplace. The ability to develop a properly thought-out solution in a reasonable amount of time is highly valued by employers. Companies want employees who can solve problems independently and work well in a team. A desirable employee can evaluate situations critically and creatively, collaborate with others, and make sound judgments.

Critical thinking is an essential component of academic study as well. Critical thinking skills are vital to learners because they allow students to build on their prior knowledge and construct new understandings. This will enable learners to expand their knowledge and experience across various subjects.

Despite its importance, though, critical thinking is not something that we develop naturally or casually. Even though critical thinking is considered an essential learning outcome in many universities, only 45% of college students in a well-known study reported that their skills had improved after two years of classes.

9 characteristics of critical thinking

Clearly, improving our ability to think critically will require some self-improvement work. As lifelong learners, we can use this opportunity for self-reflection to identify where we can improve our thinking processes.

Strong critical thinkers possess a common set of personality traits, habits, and dispositions. Being aware of these attributes and putting them into action can help us develop a strong foundation for critical thinking. These essential characteristics of critical thinking can be used as a toolkit for applying specific thinking processes to any given situation.

Curiosity is one of the most significant characteristics of critical thinking. Research has shown that a state of curiosity drives us to continually seek new information . This inquisitiveness supports critical thinking as we need to constantly expand our knowledge to make well-informed decisions.

Curiosity also facilitates critical thinking because it encourages us to question our thoughts and mental models, the filters we use to understand the world. This is essential to avoid critical thinking barriers like biases and misconceptions. Challenging our beliefs and getting curious about all sides of an issue will help us have an open mind during the critical thinking process.

Actionable Tip: Choose to be curious. When you ask “why,” you learn about things around you and clarify ambiguities. Google anything you are curious about, read new books, and play with a child. Kids have a natural curiosity that can be inspiring.

Pique your curiosity

ABLE is the next-level all-in-one knowledge acquisition and productivity app for avid learners and curious minds.

2. Analytical

Investigation is a crucial component of critical thinking, so it's important to be analytical. Analytical thinking involves breaking down complex ideas into their simplest forms . The first step when tackling a problem or making a decision is to analyze information and consider it in smaller pieces. Then, we use critical thinking by gathering additional information before getting to a judgment or solution.

Being analytical is helpful for critical thinking because it allows us to look at data in detail. When examining an issue from various perspectives, we should pay close attention to these details to arrive at a decision based on facts. Taking these steps is crucial to making good decisions.

Actionable Tip: Become aware of your daily surroundings. Examine how things work — breaking things down into steps will encourage analysis. You can also play brain and puzzle games. These provide an enjoyable way to stimulate analytical thinking.

3. Introspective

Critical thinkers are typically introspective. Introspection is a process of examining our own thoughts and feelings. We do this as a form of metacognition, or thinking about thinking. Researchers believe that we can improve our problem-solving skills by using metacognition to analyze our reasoning processes .

Being introspective is essential to critical thinking because it helps us be self-aware. Self-awareness encourages us to acknowledge and face our own biases, prejudices, and selfish tendencies. If we know our assumptions, we can question them and suspend judgment until we have all the facts.

Actionable Tip: Start a journal. Keep track of your thoughts, feelings, and opinions throughout the day, especially when faced with difficult decisions. Look for patterns. You can avoid common thought fallacies by being aware of them.

4. Able to make inferences

Another characteristic of critical thinking is the ability to make inferences, which are logical conclusions based on reviewing the facts, events, and ideas available. Analyzing the available information and observing patterns and trends will help you find relationships and make informed decisions based on what is likely to happen.

The ability to distinguish assumptions from inferences is crucial to critical thinking. We decide something is true by inference because another thing is also true, but we decide something by assumption because of what we believe or think we know. While both assumptions and inferences can be valid or invalid, inferences are more rational because data support them.

Actionable Tip: Keep an eye on your choices and patterns during the day, noticing when you infer. Practice applying the Inference Equation — I observe + I already know = So now I am thinking — to help distinguish when you infer or assume.

5. Observant

Observation skills are also a key part of critical thinking. Observation is more than just looking — it involves arranging, combining, and classifying information through all five senses to build understanding. People with keen observation skills notice small details and catch slight changes in their surroundings.

Observation is one of the first skills we learn as children , and it is critical for problem-solving. Being observant allows us to collect more information about a situation and use that information to make better decisions and solve problems. Further, it facilitates seeing things from different perspectives and finding alternative solutions.

Actionable Tip: Limit your use of devices, and be mindful of your surroundings. Notice and name one thing for each of your five senses when you enter a new environment or even a familiar one. Being aware of what you see, hear, smell, taste, and touch allows you to fully experience the moment and it develops your ability to observe your surroundings.

6. Open-minded and compassionate

Open-minded and compassionate people are good critical thinkers. Being open-minded means considering new ideas and perspectives, even if they conflict with your own. This allows you to examine different sides of an issue without immediately dismissing them. Likewise, compassionate people can empathize with others, even if they disagree. When you understand another person's point of view, you can find common ground and understanding.

Critical thinking requires an open mind when analyzing opposing arguments and compassion when listening to the perspective of others. By exploring different viewpoints and seeking to understand others' perspectives, critical thinkers can gain a more well-rounded understanding of an issue. Using this deeper understanding, we can make better decisions and solve more complex problems.

Actionable Tip: Cultivate open-mindedness and compassion by regularly exposing yourself to new ideas and views. Read books on unfamiliar topics, listen to podcasts with diverse opinions, or talk with people from different backgrounds.

7. Able to determine relevance

The ability to assess relevance is an essential characteristic of critical thinking. Relevance is defined as being logically connected and significant to the subject. When a fact or statement is essential to a topic, it can be deemed relevant.

Relevance plays a vital role in many stages of the critical thinking process . It's especially crucial to identify the most pertinent facts before evaluating an argument. Despite being accurate and seemingly meaningful, a point may not matter much to your subject. Your criteria and standards are equally relevant, as you can't make a sound decision with irrelevant guidelines.

Actionable Tip: When you're in a conversation, pay attention to how each statement relates to what you're talking about. It's surprising how often we stray from the point with irrelevant information. Asking yourself, "How does that relate to the topic?" can help you spot unrelated issues.

Critical thinking requires willingness. Some scholars argue that the "willingness to inquire" is the most fundamental characteristic of critical thinking , which encompasses all the others. Being willing goes hand in hand with other traits, like being flexible and humble. Flexible thinkers are willing to adapt their thinking to new evidence or arguments. Those who are humble are willing to acknowledge their faults and recognize their limitations.

It's essential for critical thinking that we have an open mind and are willing to challenge the status quo. The willingness to question assumptions, consider multiple perspectives, and think outside the box allows critical thinkers to reach new and necessary conclusions.

Actionable Tip: Cultivate willingness by adopting a growth mindset. See challenges as learning opportunities. Celebrate others' accomplishments, and get curious about what led to their success.

9. Effective communicators

Being a good critical thinker requires effective communication. Effective critical thinkers know that communication is imperative when solving problems. They can articulate their goals and concerns clearly while recognizing others' perspectives. Critical thinking requires people to be able to listen to each other's opinions and share their experiences respectfully to find the best solutions.

A good communicator is also an attentive and active listener. Listening actively goes beyond simply hearing what someone says. Being engaged in the discussion involves:

• Listening to what they say
• Being present
• Asking questions that clarify their position

Actively listening is crucial for critical thinking because it helps us understand other people's perspectives.

Actionable Tip: The next time you speak with a friend, family member, or even a complete stranger, take the time to genuinely listen to what they're saying. It may surprise you how much you can learn about others — and about yourself — when you take the time to listen carefully.

The nine traits above represent just a few of the most common characteristics of critical thinking. By developing or strengthening these characteristics, you can enhance your capacity for critical thinking.

Get to the core of critical thinking

Critical thinking is essential for success in every aspect of life, from personal relationships to professional careers. By developing your critical thinking skills , you can challenge the status quo and gain a new perspective on the world around you. You can start improving your critical thinking skills today by determining which characteristics of critical thinking you need to work on and using the actionable tips to strengthen them. With practice, you can become a great critical thinker.

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16 Characteristics of Critical Thinkers Intuition is trustworthy after you have probed deeper to gain information and insight.

By Deep Patel Edited by Dan Bova Oct 19, 2018

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Albert Einstein, Henry Ford, Marie Curie, Sigmund Freud…these are just a few of the critical thinkers who have shaped our modern lives. Critical thinkers think clearly and rationally, and make logical connections between ideas -- they are crucial to exploring and understanding the world we live in.

Critical thinking is more than just the accumulation of facts and knowledge; it's a way of approaching whatever is presently occupying your mind so that you come to the best possible conclusion. Critical thinkers are focused on constantly upgrading their knowledge, and they engage in independent self-learning. They make some of the best leaders , because they can reach new planes of self-improvement and self-actualization.

If you're hoping to reach your full potential and make your mark on the world, cultivate the following 16 characteristics of critical thinkers.

1. Observation

Observation is one of the earliest critical thinking skills we learn as children -- it's our ability to perceive and understand the world around us. Careful observation includes our ability to document details, and to collect data through our senses. Our observations will eventually lead to insight and a deeper understanding of the world.

Related: 4 Eating Habit Changes That Can Boost Your Critical Thinking

2. Curiosity

Curiosity is a core trait of many successful leaders. Being inherently inquisitive and interested in the world and people around you is a hallmark of leaders who are critical thinkers. Instead of taking everything at face value, a curious person will wonder why something is the way it is.

As we get older, it's easier to put aside what may seem like childish curiosity. Curiosity forces you to keep an open mind and propels you to gain deeper knowledge -- all of which are also fundamental to being a lifelong learner.

3. Objectivity

Good critical thinkers are able to stay as objective as possible when looking at information or a situation. They focus on facts, and on the scientific evaluation of the information at hand. Objective thinkers seek to keep their emotions (and those of others) from affecting their judgment.

However, it's impossible for people to remain completely objective, because we're all shaped by our points of view, our life experiences and our perspectives. Being aware of our biases is the first step to being objective and looking at an issue dispassionately. Once you're able to remove yourself from the situation, you can more thoroughly analyze it.

Related: Use This Simple Math Problem to Kick Critical Thinking Into High Gear

4. Introspection

This is the art of being aware of your thinking -- or, to put it another way, thinking about how you think about things. Critical thinkers need introspection so they're aware of their own degree of alertness and attentiveness, as well as their biases. This is your ability to examine your inner-most thoughts, feelings and sensations. Introspection is closely related to self-reflection, which gives you insight into your emotional and mental state.

5. Analytical thinking

The best analytical thinkers are also critical thinkers, and vice versa. The ability to analyze information is key when looking at any almost anything, whether it is a contract, report, business model or even a relationship.

Analyzing information means to break information down to its component parts and evaluate how well those parts function together and separately. Analysis relies on observation; on gathering and evaluating evidence so you can come to a meaningful conclusion. Analytical thinking begins with objectivity.

6. Identifying biases

Critical thinkers challenge themselves to identify the evidence that forms their beliefs and assess whether or not those sources are credible. Doing this helps you understand your own biases and question your preconceived notions.

This is an important step in becoming aware of how biases intrude on your thinking and recognizing when information may be skewed. When looking at information, ask yourself who the information benefits. Does the source of this information have an agenda? Does the source overlook or leave out information that doesn't support its claims or beliefs?

Related: Most Grads Say College Taught Them Few Critical Thinking Skills

7. Determining relevance

One of the most difficult parts of thinking critically is figuring out what information is the most relevant, meaningful and important for your consideration. In many scenarios, you'll be presented with information that may seem valuable, but it may turn out to be only a minor data point to consider.

Consider if a source of information is logically relevant to the issue being discussed. Is it truly useful and unbiased, or it is it merely distracting from a more pertinent point?

8. Inference

Information doesn't always come with a summary that spells out exactly what it means. Critical thinkers need to assess the information and draw conclusions based on raw data. Inference is the ability to extrapolate meaning from data and discover potential outcomes when assessing a scenario.

It is also important to understand the difference between inference and assumptions . For example, if you see data that someone weighs 260 pounds, you might assume they are overweight or unhealthy. However, other data points like height and body composition may alter that conclusion.

Related: 6 Obstacles to Creative Thinking and How to Overcome Them

9. Compassion and empathy.

Having compassion and empathy may seem like a negative for critical thinkers. After all, being sentimental and emotional can skew our perception of a situation. But the point of having compassion is to have concern for others and to value the welfare of other people.

Without compassion, we would view all information and situations from the viewpoint of cold, heartless scientific facts and data. It would be easy to allow our cynicism to become toxic, and to be suspicious of everything we look at. But to be a good critical thinker, we must always take into account the human element. Not everything we do is about detached data and information -- it's also about people.

10. Humility

Humility is the willingness to acknowledge one's shortcomings and see one's positive attributes in an accurate way. When you have humility, you are aware of your flaws, but also your strengths, and this is an important element in critical thinking and being willing to stretch and open your mind.

When you have intellectual humility , you're open to other people's viewpoints, you recognize when you're wrong and you're willing to challenge your own beliefs when necessary.

11. Willing to challenge the status quo.

Critical thinking means questioning long-established business practices and refusing to adhere to traditional methods simply because that's the way it's always been done. Critical thinkers are looking for smart, thoughtful answers and methods that take into account all the current and relevant information and practices available. Their willingness to challenge the status quo may seem controversial, but it's an essential part of the creative and innovative mind of a critical thinker.

12. Open-mindedness

Being able to step back from a situation and not become embroiled helps critical thinkers see the broader view. Critical thinkers avoid launching into a frenzied argument or taking sides -- they want to hear all perspectives. Critical thinkers don't jump to conclusions. They approach a question or situation with an open mind and embrace other opinions and views.

13. Aware of common thinking errors.

Critical thinkers don't allow their logic and reasoning to become clouded by illusions and misconceptions. They are aware of common logical fallacies , which are errors in reasoning that often creep into arguments and debates. Some common errors in thinking include:

Circular reasoning, in which the premise of an argument or a conclusion is used as support for the argument itself.

Cognitive shortcut bias, in which you stubbornly stick to a favored view or argument when other more effective possibilities or explanations exist.

Confusing correlation with causation. In other words, asserting that when two things happen together, one causes the other. Without direct evidence, this assumption isn't justified.

14. Creative thinking

Effective critical thinkers are also largely creative thinkers . Creative thinkers reject standardized formats for problem solving -- they think outside the box. They have a wide range of interests and adopt multiple perspectives on a problem. They're also open to experimenting with different methods and considering different viewpoints.

The biggest difference between critical thinkers and creative thinkers is that creativity is associated with generating ideas, while critical thinking is associated with analyzing and appraising those ideas. Creativity is important to bringing in novel ideas; critical thinking can bring those ideas into clearer focus.

15. Effective communicators

In many cases, problems with communication are based on an inability to think critically about a situation or see it from different perspectives. Effective communication starts with a clear thought process.

Critical thinking is the tool we use to coherently build our thoughts and express them. Critical thinking relies on following another person's thought process and line of reasoning. An effective critical thinker must be able to relay his or her ideas in a compelling way and then absorb the responses of others.

16. Active listeners

Critical thinkers don't just want to get their point across to others; they are also careful to engage in active listening and really hear others' points of view. Instead of being a passive listener during a conversation or discussion, they actively try to participate.

They ask questions to help them distinguish facts from assumptions. They gather information and seek to gain insight by asking open-ended questions that probe deeper into the issue.

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Critical Thinking

Developing the right mindset and skills.

By the Mind Tools Content Team

We make hundreds of decisions every day and, whether we realize it or not, we're all critical thinkers.

We use critical thinking each time we weigh up our options, prioritize our responsibilities, or think about the likely effects of our actions. It's a crucial skill that helps us to cut out misinformation and make wise decisions. The trouble is, we're not always very good at it!

In this article, we'll explore the key skills that you need to develop your critical thinking skills, and how to adopt a critical thinking mindset, so that you can make well-informed decisions.

What Is Critical Thinking?

Critical thinking is the discipline of rigorously and skillfully using information, experience, observation, and reasoning to guide your decisions, actions, and beliefs. You'll need to actively question every step of your thinking process to do it well.

Collecting, analyzing and evaluating information is an important skill in life, and a highly valued asset in the workplace. People who score highly in critical thinking assessments are also rated by their managers as having good problem-solving skills, creativity, strong decision-making skills, and good overall performance. [1]

Key Critical Thinking Skills

Critical thinkers possess a set of key characteristics which help them to question information and their own thinking. Focus on the following areas to develop your critical thinking skills:

Being willing and able to explore alternative approaches and experimental ideas is crucial. Can you think through "what if" scenarios, create plausible options, and test out your theories? If not, you'll tend to write off ideas and options too soon, so you may miss the best answer to your situation.

To nurture your curiosity, stay up to date with facts and trends. You'll overlook important information if you allow yourself to become "blinkered," so always be open to new information.

But don't stop there! Look for opposing views or evidence to challenge your information, and seek clarification when things are unclear. This will help you to reassess your beliefs and make a well-informed decision later. Read our article, Opening Closed Minds , for more ways to stay receptive.

Logical Thinking

You must be skilled at reasoning and extending logic to come up with plausible options or outcomes.

It's also important to emphasize logic over emotion. Emotion can be motivating but it can also lead you to take hasty and unwise action, so control your emotions and be cautious in your judgments. Know when a conclusion is "fact" and when it is not. "Could-be-true" conclusions are based on assumptions and must be tested further. Read our article, Logical Fallacies , for help with this.

Use creative problem solving to balance cold logic. By thinking outside of the box you can identify new possible outcomes by using pieces of information that you already have.

Self-Awareness

Many of the decisions we make in life are subtly informed by our values and beliefs. These influences are called cognitive biases and it can be difficult to identify them in ourselves because they're often subconscious.

Practicing self-awareness will allow you to reflect on the beliefs you have and the choices you make. You'll then be better equipped to challenge your own thinking and make improved, unbiased decisions.

One particularly useful tool for critical thinking is the Ladder of Inference . It allows you to test and validate your thinking process, rather than jumping to poorly supported conclusions.

Developing a Critical Thinking Mindset

Combine the above skills with the right mindset so that you can make better decisions and adopt more effective courses of action. You can develop your critical thinking mindset by following this process:

Gather Information

First, collect data, opinions and facts on the issue that you need to solve. Draw on what you already know, and turn to new sources of information to help inform your understanding. Consider what gaps there are in your knowledge and seek to fill them. And look for information that challenges your assumptions and beliefs.

Be sure to verify the authority and authenticity of your sources. Not everything you read is true! Use this checklist to ensure that your information is valid:

• Are your information sources trustworthy ? (For example, well-respected authors, trusted colleagues or peers, recognized industry publications, websites, blogs, etc.)
• Is the information you have gathered up to date ?
• Has the information received any direct criticism ?
• Does the information have any errors or inaccuracies ?
• Is there any evidence to support or corroborate the information you have gathered?
• Is the information you have gathered subjective or biased in any way? (For example, is it based on opinion, rather than fact? Is any of the information you have gathered designed to promote a particular service or organization?)

If any information appears to be irrelevant or invalid, don't include it in your decision making. But don't omit information just because you disagree with it, or your final decision will be flawed and bias.

Now observe the information you have gathered, and interpret it. What are the key findings and main takeaways? What does the evidence point to? Start to build one or two possible arguments based on what you have found.

You'll need to look for the details within the mass of information, so use your powers of observation to identify any patterns or similarities. You can then analyze and extend these trends to make sensible predictions about the future.

To help you to sift through the multiple ideas and theories, it can be useful to group and order items according to their characteristics. From here, you can compare and contrast the different items. And once you've determined how similar or different things are from one another, Paired Comparison Analysis can help you to analyze them.

The final step involves challenging the information and rationalizing its arguments.

Apply the laws of reason (induction, deduction, analogy) to judge an argument and determine its merits. To do this, it's essential that you can determine the significance and validity of an argument to put it in the correct perspective. Take a look at our article, Rational Thinking , for more information about how to do this.

Once you have considered all of the arguments and options rationally, you can finally make an informed decision.

Afterward, take time to reflect on what you have learned and what you found challenging. Step back from the detail of your decision or problem, and look at the bigger picture. Record what you've learned from your observations and experience.

Critical thinking involves rigorously and skilfully using information, experience, observation, and reasoning to guide your decisions, actions and beliefs. It's a useful skill in the workplace and in life.

You'll need to be curious and creative to explore alternative possibilities, but rational to apply logic, and self-aware to identify when your beliefs could affect your decisions or actions.

You can demonstrate a high level of critical thinking by validating your information, analyzing its meaning, and finally evaluating the argument.

Critical Thinking Infographic

See Critical Thinking represented in our infographic: An Elementary Guide to Critical Thinking .

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A Crash Course in Critical Thinking

What you need to know—and read—about one of the essential skills needed today..

Posted April 8, 2024 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk

• In research for "A More Beautiful Question," I did a deep dive into the current crisis in critical thinking.
• Many people may think of themselves as critical thinkers, but they actually are not.
• Here is a series of questions you can ask yourself to try to ensure that you are thinking critically.

Conspiracy theories. Inability to distinguish facts from falsehoods. Widespread confusion about who and what to believe.

These are some of the hallmarks of the current crisis in critical thinking—which just might be the issue of our times. Because if people aren’t willing or able to think critically as they choose potential leaders, they’re apt to choose bad ones. And if they can’t judge whether the information they’re receiving is sound, they may follow faulty advice while ignoring recommendations that are science-based and solid (and perhaps life-saving).

Moreover, as a society, if we can’t think critically about the many serious challenges we face, it becomes more difficult to agree on what those challenges are—much less solve them.

On a personal level, critical thinking can enable you to make better everyday decisions. It can help you make sense of an increasingly complex and confusing world.

In the new expanded edition of my book A More Beautiful Question ( AMBQ ), I took a deep dive into critical thinking. Here are a few key things I learned.

First off, before you can get better at critical thinking, you should understand what it is. It’s not just about being a skeptic. When thinking critically, we are thoughtfully reasoning, evaluating, and making decisions based on evidence and logic. And—perhaps most important—while doing this, a critical thinker always strives to be open-minded and fair-minded . That’s not easy: It demands that you constantly question your assumptions and biases and that you always remain open to considering opposing views.

In today’s polarized environment, many people think of themselves as critical thinkers simply because they ask skeptical questions—often directed at, say, certain government policies or ideas espoused by those on the “other side” of the political divide. The problem is, they may not be asking these questions with an open mind or a willingness to fairly consider opposing views.

When people do this, they’re engaging in “weak-sense critical thinking”—a term popularized by the late Richard Paul, a co-founder of The Foundation for Critical Thinking . “Weak-sense critical thinking” means applying the tools and practices of critical thinking—questioning, investigating, evaluating—but with the sole purpose of confirming one’s own bias or serving an agenda.

In AMBQ , I lay out a series of questions you can ask yourself to try to ensure that you’re thinking critically. Here are some of the questions to consider:

• Why do I believe what I believe?
• Are my views based on evidence?
• Have I fairly and thoughtfully considered differing viewpoints?
• Am I truly open to changing my mind?

Of course, becoming a better critical thinker is not as simple as just asking yourself a few questions. Critical thinking is a habit of mind that must be developed and strengthened over time. In effect, you must train yourself to think in a manner that is more effortful, aware, grounded, and balanced.

For those interested in giving themselves a crash course in critical thinking—something I did myself, as I was working on my book—I thought it might be helpful to share a list of some of the books that have shaped my own thinking on this subject. As a self-interested author, I naturally would suggest that you start with the new 10th-anniversary edition of A More Beautiful Question , but beyond that, here are the top eight critical-thinking books I’d recommend.

The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark , by Carl Sagan

This book simply must top the list, because the late scientist and author Carl Sagan continues to be such a bright shining light in the critical thinking universe. Chapter 12 includes the details on Sagan’s famous “baloney detection kit,” a collection of lessons and tips on how to deal with bogus arguments and logical fallacies.

Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments Into Extraordinary Results , by Shane Parrish

The creator of the Farnham Street website and host of the “Knowledge Project” podcast explains how to contend with biases and unconscious reactions so you can make better everyday decisions. It contains insights from many of the brilliant thinkers Shane has studied.

Good Thinking: Why Flawed Logic Puts Us All at Risk and How Critical Thinking Can Save the World , by David Robert Grimes

A brilliant, comprehensive 2021 book on critical thinking that, to my mind, hasn’t received nearly enough attention . The scientist Grimes dissects bad thinking, shows why it persists, and offers the tools to defeat it.

Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know , by Adam Grant

Intellectual humility—being willing to admit that you might be wrong—is what this book is primarily about. But Adam, the renowned Wharton psychology professor and bestselling author, takes the reader on a mind-opening journey with colorful stories and characters.

Think Like a Detective: A Kid's Guide to Critical Thinking , by David Pakman

The popular YouTuber and podcast host Pakman—normally known for talking politics —has written a terrific primer on critical thinking for children. The illustrated book presents critical thinking as a “superpower” that enables kids to unlock mysteries and dig for truth. (I also recommend Pakman’s second kids’ book called Think Like a Scientist .)

Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters , by Steven Pinker

The Harvard psychology professor Pinker tackles conspiracy theories head-on but also explores concepts involving risk/reward, probability and randomness, and correlation/causation. And if that strikes you as daunting, be assured that Pinker makes it lively and accessible.

How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion and Persuasion , by David McRaney

David is a science writer who hosts the popular podcast “You Are Not So Smart” (and his ideas are featured in A More Beautiful Question ). His well-written book looks at ways you can actually get through to people who see the world very differently than you (hint: bludgeoning them with facts definitely won’t work).

A Healthy Democracy's Best Hope: Building the Critical Thinking Habit , by M Neil Browne and Chelsea Kulhanek

Neil Browne, author of the seminal Asking the Right Questions: A Guide to Critical Thinking, has been a pioneer in presenting critical thinking as a question-based approach to making sense of the world around us. His newest book, co-authored with Chelsea Kulhanek, breaks down critical thinking into “11 explosive questions”—including the “priors question” (which challenges us to question assumptions), the “evidence question” (focusing on how to evaluate and weigh evidence), and the “humility question” (which reminds us that a critical thinker must be humble enough to consider the possibility of being wrong).

Warren Berger is a longtime journalist and author of A More Beautiful Question .

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3 Simple Habits to Improve Your Critical Thinking

• Helen Lee Bouygues

But simple doesn’t mean easy.

Too many business leaders are simply not reasoning through pressing issues, and it’s hurting their organizations.  The good news is that critical thinking is a learned behavior. There are three simple things you can do to train yourself to become a more effective critical thinker: question assumptions, reason through logic, and diversify your thought and perspectives. They may sound obvious, but deliberately cultivating these three key habits of mind go a long way in helping you become better at clear and robust reasoning.

A few years ago, a CEO assured me that his company was the market leader. “Clients will not leave for competitors,” he added. “It costs too much for them to switch.” Within weeks, the manufacturing giant Procter & Gamble elected not to renew its contract with the firm. The CEO was shocked — but he shouldn’t have been.

• HB Helen Lee Bouygues is the president of the Paris-based Reboot Foundation . A former partner at McKinsey & Company, she has served as interim CEO, CFO, or COO for more than one dozen companies.

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Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is a widely accepted educational goal. Its definition is contested, but the competing definitions can be understood as differing conceptions of the same basic concept: careful thinking directed to a goal. Conceptions differ with respect to the scope of such thinking, the type of goal, the criteria and norms for thinking carefully, and the thinking components on which they focus. Its adoption as an educational goal has been recommended on the basis of respect for students’ autonomy and preparing students for success in life and for democratic citizenship. “Critical thinkers” have the dispositions and abilities that lead them to think critically when appropriate. The abilities can be identified directly; the dispositions indirectly, by considering what factors contribute to or impede exercise of the abilities. Standardized tests have been developed to assess the degree to which a person possesses such dispositions and abilities. Educational intervention has been shown experimentally to improve them, particularly when it includes dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring. Controversies have arisen over the generalizability of critical thinking across domains, over alleged bias in critical thinking theories and instruction, and over the relationship of critical thinking to other types of thinking.

2.1 Dewey’s Three Main Examples

2.2 dewey’s other examples, 2.3 further examples, 2.4 non-examples, 3. the definition of critical thinking, 4. its value, 5. the process of thinking critically, 6. components of the process, 7. contributory dispositions and abilities, 8.1 initiating dispositions, 8.2 internal dispositions, 9. critical thinking abilities, 10. required knowledge, 11. educational methods, 12.1 the generalizability of critical thinking, 12.2 bias in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, 12.3 relationship of critical thinking to other types of thinking, other internet resources, related entries.

Use of the term ‘critical thinking’ to describe an educational goal goes back to the American philosopher John Dewey (1910), who more commonly called it ‘reflective thinking’. He defined it as

active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it, and the further conclusions to which it tends. (Dewey 1910: 6; 1933: 9)

and identified a habit of such consideration with a scientific attitude of mind. His lengthy quotations of Francis Bacon, John Locke, and John Stuart Mill indicate that he was not the first person to propose development of a scientific attitude of mind as an educational goal.

In the 1930s, many of the schools that participated in the Eight-Year Study of the Progressive Education Association (Aikin 1942) adopted critical thinking as an educational goal, for whose achievement the study’s Evaluation Staff developed tests (Smith, Tyler, & Evaluation Staff 1942). Glaser (1941) showed experimentally that it was possible to improve the critical thinking of high school students. Bloom’s influential taxonomy of cognitive educational objectives (Bloom et al. 1956) incorporated critical thinking abilities. Ennis (1962) proposed 12 aspects of critical thinking as a basis for research on the teaching and evaluation of critical thinking ability.

Since 1980, an annual international conference in California on critical thinking and educational reform has attracted tens of thousands of educators from all levels of education and from many parts of the world. Also since 1980, the state university system in California has required all undergraduate students to take a critical thinking course. Since 1983, the Association for Informal Logic and Critical Thinking has sponsored sessions in conjunction with the divisional meetings of the American Philosophical Association (APA). In 1987, the APA’s Committee on Pre-College Philosophy commissioned a consensus statement on critical thinking for purposes of educational assessment and instruction (Facione 1990a). Researchers have developed standardized tests of critical thinking abilities and dispositions; for details, see the Supplement on Assessment . Educational jurisdictions around the world now include critical thinking in guidelines for curriculum and assessment.

For details on this history, see the Supplement on History .

2. Examples and Non-Examples

Before considering the definition of critical thinking, it will be helpful to have in mind some examples of critical thinking, as well as some examples of kinds of thinking that would apparently not count as critical thinking.

Dewey (1910: 68–71; 1933: 91–94) takes as paradigms of reflective thinking three class papers of students in which they describe their thinking. The examples range from the everyday to the scientific.

Transit : “The other day, when I was down town on 16th Street, a clock caught my eye. I saw that the hands pointed to 12:20. This suggested that I had an engagement at 124th Street, at one o’clock. I reasoned that as it had taken me an hour to come down on a surface car, I should probably be twenty minutes late if I returned the same way. I might save twenty minutes by a subway express. But was there a station near? If not, I might lose more than twenty minutes in looking for one. Then I thought of the elevated, and I saw there was such a line within two blocks. But where was the station? If it were several blocks above or below the street I was on, I should lose time instead of gaining it. My mind went back to the subway express as quicker than the elevated; furthermore, I remembered that it went nearer than the elevated to the part of 124th Street I wished to reach, so that time would be saved at the end of the journey. I concluded in favor of the subway, and reached my destination by one o’clock.” (Dewey 1910: 68–69; 1933: 91–92)

Ferryboat : “Projecting nearly horizontally from the upper deck of the ferryboat on which I daily cross the river is a long white pole, having a gilded ball at its tip. It suggested a flagpole when I first saw it; its color, shape, and gilded ball agreed with this idea, and these reasons seemed to justify me in this belief. But soon difficulties presented themselves. The pole was nearly horizontal, an unusual position for a flagpole; in the next place, there was no pulley, ring, or cord by which to attach a flag; finally, there were elsewhere on the boat two vertical staffs from which flags were occasionally flown. It seemed probable that the pole was not there for flag-flying.

“I then tried to imagine all possible purposes of the pole, and to consider for which of these it was best suited: (a) Possibly it was an ornament. But as all the ferryboats and even the tugboats carried poles, this hypothesis was rejected. (b) Possibly it was the terminal of a wireless telegraph. But the same considerations made this improbable. Besides, the more natural place for such a terminal would be the highest part of the boat, on top of the pilot house. (c) Its purpose might be to point out the direction in which the boat is moving.

“In support of this conclusion, I discovered that the pole was lower than the pilot house, so that the steersman could easily see it. Moreover, the tip was enough higher than the base, so that, from the pilot’s position, it must appear to project far out in front of the boat. Moreover, the pilot being near the front of the boat, he would need some such guide as to its direction. Tugboats would also need poles for such a purpose. This hypothesis was so much more probable than the others that I accepted it. I formed the conclusion that the pole was set up for the purpose of showing the pilot the direction in which the boat pointed, to enable him to steer correctly.” (Dewey 1910: 69–70; 1933: 92–93)

Bubbles : “In washing tumblers in hot soapsuds and placing them mouth downward on a plate, bubbles appeared on the outside of the mouth of the tumblers and then went inside. Why? The presence of bubbles suggests air, which I note must come from inside the tumbler. I see that the soapy water on the plate prevents escape of the air save as it may be caught in bubbles. But why should air leave the tumbler? There was no substance entering to force it out. It must have expanded. It expands by increase of heat, or by decrease of pressure, or both. Could the air have become heated after the tumbler was taken from the hot suds? Clearly not the air that was already entangled in the water. If heated air was the cause, cold air must have entered in transferring the tumblers from the suds to the plate. I test to see if this supposition is true by taking several more tumblers out. Some I shake so as to make sure of entrapping cold air in them. Some I take out holding mouth downward in order to prevent cold air from entering. Bubbles appear on the outside of every one of the former and on none of the latter. I must be right in my inference. Air from the outside must have been expanded by the heat of the tumbler, which explains the appearance of the bubbles on the outside. But why do they then go inside? Cold contracts. The tumbler cooled and also the air inside it. Tension was removed, and hence bubbles appeared inside. To be sure of this, I test by placing a cup of ice on the tumbler while the bubbles are still forming outside. They soon reverse” (Dewey 1910: 70–71; 1933: 93–94).

Dewey (1910, 1933) sprinkles his book with other examples of critical thinking. We will refer to the following.

Weather : A man on a walk notices that it has suddenly become cool, thinks that it is probably going to rain, looks up and sees a dark cloud obscuring the sun, and quickens his steps (1910: 6–10; 1933: 9–13).

Disorder : A man finds his rooms on his return to them in disorder with his belongings thrown about, thinks at first of burglary as an explanation, then thinks of mischievous children as being an alternative explanation, then looks to see whether valuables are missing, and discovers that they are (1910: 82–83; 1933: 166–168).

Typhoid : A physician diagnosing a patient whose conspicuous symptoms suggest typhoid avoids drawing a conclusion until more data are gathered by questioning the patient and by making tests (1910: 85–86; 1933: 170).

Blur : A moving blur catches our eye in the distance, we ask ourselves whether it is a cloud of whirling dust or a tree moving its branches or a man signaling to us, we think of other traits that should be found on each of those possibilities, and we look and see if those traits are found (1910: 102, 108; 1933: 121, 133).

Suction pump : In thinking about the suction pump, the scientist first notes that it will draw water only to a maximum height of 33 feet at sea level and to a lesser maximum height at higher elevations, selects for attention the differing atmospheric pressure at these elevations, sets up experiments in which the air is removed from a vessel containing water (when suction no longer works) and in which the weight of air at various levels is calculated, compares the results of reasoning about the height to which a given weight of air will allow a suction pump to raise water with the observed maximum height at different elevations, and finally assimilates the suction pump to such apparently different phenomena as the siphon and the rising of a balloon (1910: 150–153; 1933: 195–198).

Diamond : A passenger in a car driving in a diamond lane reserved for vehicles with at least one passenger notices that the diamond marks on the pavement are far apart in some places and close together in others. Why? The driver suggests that the reason may be that the diamond marks are not needed where there is a solid double line separating the diamond lane from the adjoining lane, but are needed when there is a dotted single line permitting crossing into the diamond lane. Further observation confirms that the diamonds are close together when a dotted line separates the diamond lane from its neighbour, but otherwise far apart.

Rash : A woman suddenly develops a very itchy red rash on her throat and upper chest. She recently noticed a mark on the back of her right hand, but was not sure whether the mark was a rash or a scrape. She lies down in bed and thinks about what might be causing the rash and what to do about it. About two weeks before, she began taking blood pressure medication that contained a sulfa drug, and the pharmacist had warned her, in view of a previous allergic reaction to a medication containing a sulfa drug, to be on the alert for an allergic reaction; however, she had been taking the medication for two weeks with no such effect. The day before, she began using a new cream on her neck and upper chest; against the new cream as the cause was mark on the back of her hand, which had not been exposed to the cream. She began taking probiotics about a month before. She also recently started new eye drops, but she supposed that manufacturers of eye drops would be careful not to include allergy-causing components in the medication. The rash might be a heat rash, since she recently was sweating profusely from her upper body. Since she is about to go away on a short vacation, where she would not have access to her usual physician, she decides to keep taking the probiotics and using the new eye drops but to discontinue the blood pressure medication and to switch back to the old cream for her neck and upper chest. She forms a plan to consult her regular physician on her return about the blood pressure medication.

Candidate : Although Dewey included no examples of thinking directed at appraising the arguments of others, such thinking has come to be considered a kind of critical thinking. We find an example of such thinking in the performance task on the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA+), which its sponsoring organization describes as

a performance-based assessment that provides a measure of an institution’s contribution to the development of critical-thinking and written communication skills of its students. (Council for Aid to Education 2017)

A sample task posted on its website requires the test-taker to write a report for public distribution evaluating a fictional candidate’s policy proposals and their supporting arguments, using supplied background documents, with a recommendation on whether to endorse the candidate.

Immediate acceptance of an idea that suggests itself as a solution to a problem (e.g., a possible explanation of an event or phenomenon, an action that seems likely to produce a desired result) is “uncritical thinking, the minimum of reflection” (Dewey 1910: 13). On-going suspension of judgment in the light of doubt about a possible solution is not critical thinking (Dewey 1910: 108). Critique driven by a dogmatically held political or religious ideology is not critical thinking; thus Paulo Freire (1968 [1970]) is using the term (e.g., at 1970: 71, 81, 100, 146) in a more politically freighted sense that includes not only reflection but also revolutionary action against oppression. Derivation of a conclusion from given data using an algorithm is not critical thinking.

What is critical thinking? There are many definitions. Ennis (2016) lists 14 philosophically oriented scholarly definitions and three dictionary definitions. Following Rawls (1971), who distinguished his conception of justice from a utilitarian conception but regarded them as rival conceptions of the same concept, Ennis maintains that the 17 definitions are different conceptions of the same concept. Rawls articulated the shared concept of justice as

a characteristic set of principles for assigning basic rights and duties and for determining… the proper distribution of the benefits and burdens of social cooperation. (Rawls 1971: 5)

Bailin et al. (1999b) claim that, if one considers what sorts of thinking an educator would take not to be critical thinking and what sorts to be critical thinking, one can conclude that educators typically understand critical thinking to have at least three features.

• It is done for the purpose of making up one’s mind about what to believe or do.
• The person engaging in the thinking is trying to fulfill standards of adequacy and accuracy appropriate to the thinking.
• The thinking fulfills the relevant standards to some threshold level.

One could sum up the core concept that involves these three features by saying that critical thinking is careful goal-directed thinking. This core concept seems to apply to all the examples of critical thinking described in the previous section. As for the non-examples, their exclusion depends on construing careful thinking as excluding jumping immediately to conclusions, suspending judgment no matter how strong the evidence, reasoning from an unquestioned ideological or religious perspective, and routinely using an algorithm to answer a question.

If the core of critical thinking is careful goal-directed thinking, conceptions of it can vary according to its presumed scope, its presumed goal, one’s criteria and threshold for being careful, and the thinking component on which one focuses. As to its scope, some conceptions (e.g., Dewey 1910, 1933) restrict it to constructive thinking on the basis of one’s own observations and experiments, others (e.g., Ennis 1962; Fisher & Scriven 1997; Johnson 1992) to appraisal of the products of such thinking. Ennis (1991) and Bailin et al. (1999b) take it to cover both construction and appraisal. As to its goal, some conceptions restrict it to forming a judgment (Dewey 1910, 1933; Lipman 1987; Facione 1990a). Others allow for actions as well as beliefs as the end point of a process of critical thinking (Ennis 1991; Bailin et al. 1999b). As to the criteria and threshold for being careful, definitions vary in the term used to indicate that critical thinking satisfies certain norms: “intellectually disciplined” (Scriven & Paul 1987), “reasonable” (Ennis 1991), “skillful” (Lipman 1987), “skilled” (Fisher & Scriven 1997), “careful” (Bailin & Battersby 2009). Some definitions specify these norms, referring variously to “consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further conclusions to which it tends” (Dewey 1910, 1933); “the methods of logical inquiry and reasoning” (Glaser 1941); “conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication” (Scriven & Paul 1987); the requirement that “it is sensitive to context, relies on criteria, and is self-correcting” (Lipman 1987); “evidential, conceptual, methodological, criteriological, or contextual considerations” (Facione 1990a); and “plus-minus considerations of the product in terms of appropriate standards (or criteria)” (Johnson 1992). Stanovich and Stanovich (2010) propose to ground the concept of critical thinking in the concept of rationality, which they understand as combining epistemic rationality (fitting one’s beliefs to the world) and instrumental rationality (optimizing goal fulfillment); a critical thinker, in their view, is someone with “a propensity to override suboptimal responses from the autonomous mind” (2010: 227). These variant specifications of norms for critical thinking are not necessarily incompatible with one another, and in any case presuppose the core notion of thinking carefully. As to the thinking component singled out, some definitions focus on suspension of judgment during the thinking (Dewey 1910; McPeck 1981), others on inquiry while judgment is suspended (Bailin & Battersby 2009, 2021), others on the resulting judgment (Facione 1990a), and still others on responsiveness to reasons (Siegel 1988). Kuhn (2019) takes critical thinking to be more a dialogic practice of advancing and responding to arguments than an individual ability.

In educational contexts, a definition of critical thinking is a “programmatic definition” (Scheffler 1960: 19). It expresses a practical program for achieving an educational goal. For this purpose, a one-sentence formulaic definition is much less useful than articulation of a critical thinking process, with criteria and standards for the kinds of thinking that the process may involve. The real educational goal is recognition, adoption and implementation by students of those criteria and standards. That adoption and implementation in turn consists in acquiring the knowledge, abilities and dispositions of a critical thinker.

Conceptions of critical thinking generally do not include moral integrity as part of the concept. Dewey, for example, took critical thinking to be the ultimate intellectual goal of education, but distinguished it from the development of social cooperation among school children, which he took to be the central moral goal. Ennis (1996, 2011) added to his previous list of critical thinking dispositions a group of dispositions to care about the dignity and worth of every person, which he described as a “correlative” (1996) disposition without which critical thinking would be less valuable and perhaps harmful. An educational program that aimed at developing critical thinking but not the correlative disposition to care about the dignity and worth of every person, he asserted, “would be deficient and perhaps dangerous” (Ennis 1996: 172).

Dewey thought that education for reflective thinking would be of value to both the individual and society; recognition in educational practice of the kinship to the scientific attitude of children’s native curiosity, fertile imagination and love of experimental inquiry “would make for individual happiness and the reduction of social waste” (Dewey 1910: iii). Schools participating in the Eight-Year Study took development of the habit of reflective thinking and skill in solving problems as a means to leading young people to understand, appreciate and live the democratic way of life characteristic of the United States (Aikin 1942: 17–18, 81). Harvey Siegel (1988: 55–61) has offered four considerations in support of adopting critical thinking as an educational ideal. (1) Respect for persons requires that schools and teachers honour students’ demands for reasons and explanations, deal with students honestly, and recognize the need to confront students’ independent judgment; these requirements concern the manner in which teachers treat students. (2) Education has the task of preparing children to be successful adults, a task that requires development of their self-sufficiency. (3) Education should initiate children into the rational traditions in such fields as history, science and mathematics. (4) Education should prepare children to become democratic citizens, which requires reasoned procedures and critical talents and attitudes. To supplement these considerations, Siegel (1988: 62–90) responds to two objections: the ideology objection that adoption of any educational ideal requires a prior ideological commitment and the indoctrination objection that cultivation of critical thinking cannot escape being a form of indoctrination.

Despite the diversity of our 11 examples, one can recognize a common pattern. Dewey analyzed it as consisting of five phases:

• suggestions , in which the mind leaps forward to a possible solution;
• an intellectualization of the difficulty or perplexity into a problem to be solved, a question for which the answer must be sought;
• the use of one suggestion after another as a leading idea, or hypothesis , to initiate and guide observation and other operations in collection of factual material;
• the mental elaboration of the idea or supposition as an idea or supposition ( reasoning , in the sense on which reasoning is a part, not the whole, of inference); and
• testing the hypothesis by overt or imaginative action. (Dewey 1933: 106–107; italics in original)

The process of reflective thinking consisting of these phases would be preceded by a perplexed, troubled or confused situation and followed by a cleared-up, unified, resolved situation (Dewey 1933: 106). The term ‘phases’ replaced the term ‘steps’ (Dewey 1910: 72), thus removing the earlier suggestion of an invariant sequence. Variants of the above analysis appeared in (Dewey 1916: 177) and (Dewey 1938: 101–119).

The variant formulations indicate the difficulty of giving a single logical analysis of such a varied process. The process of critical thinking may have a spiral pattern, with the problem being redefined in the light of obstacles to solving it as originally formulated. For example, the person in Transit might have concluded that getting to the appointment at the scheduled time was impossible and have reformulated the problem as that of rescheduling the appointment for a mutually convenient time. Further, defining a problem does not always follow after or lead immediately to an idea of a suggested solution. Nor should it do so, as Dewey himself recognized in describing the physician in Typhoid as avoiding any strong preference for this or that conclusion before getting further information (Dewey 1910: 85; 1933: 170). People with a hypothesis in mind, even one to which they have a very weak commitment, have a so-called “confirmation bias” (Nickerson 1998): they are likely to pay attention to evidence that confirms the hypothesis and to ignore evidence that counts against it or for some competing hypothesis. Detectives, intelligence agencies, and investigators of airplane accidents are well advised to gather relevant evidence systematically and to postpone even tentative adoption of an explanatory hypothesis until the collected evidence rules out with the appropriate degree of certainty all but one explanation. Dewey’s analysis of the critical thinking process can be faulted as well for requiring acceptance or rejection of a possible solution to a defined problem, with no allowance for deciding in the light of the available evidence to suspend judgment. Further, given the great variety of kinds of problems for which reflection is appropriate, there is likely to be variation in its component events. Perhaps the best way to conceptualize the critical thinking process is as a checklist whose component events can occur in a variety of orders, selectively, and more than once. These component events might include (1) noticing a difficulty, (2) defining the problem, (3) dividing the problem into manageable sub-problems, (4) formulating a variety of possible solutions to the problem or sub-problem, (5) determining what evidence is relevant to deciding among possible solutions to the problem or sub-problem, (6) devising a plan of systematic observation or experiment that will uncover the relevant evidence, (7) carrying out the plan of systematic observation or experimentation, (8) noting the results of the systematic observation or experiment, (9) gathering relevant testimony and information from others, (10) judging the credibility of testimony and information gathered from others, (11) drawing conclusions from gathered evidence and accepted testimony, and (12) accepting a solution that the evidence adequately supports (cf. Hitchcock 2017: 485).

Checklist conceptions of the process of critical thinking are open to the objection that they are too mechanical and procedural to fit the multi-dimensional and emotionally charged issues for which critical thinking is urgently needed (Paul 1984). For such issues, a more dialectical process is advocated, in which competing relevant world views are identified, their implications explored, and some sort of creative synthesis attempted.

If one considers the critical thinking process illustrated by the 11 examples, one can identify distinct kinds of mental acts and mental states that form part of it. To distinguish, label and briefly characterize these components is a useful preliminary to identifying abilities, skills, dispositions, attitudes, habits and the like that contribute causally to thinking critically. Identifying such abilities and habits is in turn a useful preliminary to setting educational goals. Setting the goals is in its turn a useful preliminary to designing strategies for helping learners to achieve the goals and to designing ways of measuring the extent to which learners have done so. Such measures provide both feedback to learners on their achievement and a basis for experimental research on the effectiveness of various strategies for educating people to think critically. Let us begin, then, by distinguishing the kinds of mental acts and mental events that can occur in a critical thinking process.

• Observing : One notices something in one’s immediate environment (sudden cooling of temperature in Weather , bubbles forming outside a glass and then going inside in Bubbles , a moving blur in the distance in Blur , a rash in Rash ). Or one notes the results of an experiment or systematic observation (valuables missing in Disorder , no suction without air pressure in Suction pump )
• Feeling : One feels puzzled or uncertain about something (how to get to an appointment on time in Transit , why the diamonds vary in spacing in Diamond ). One wants to resolve this perplexity. One feels satisfaction once one has worked out an answer (to take the subway express in Transit , diamonds closer when needed as a warning in Diamond ).
• Wondering : One formulates a question to be addressed (why bubbles form outside a tumbler taken from hot water in Bubbles , how suction pumps work in Suction pump , what caused the rash in Rash ).
• Imagining : One thinks of possible answers (bus or subway or elevated in Transit , flagpole or ornament or wireless communication aid or direction indicator in Ferryboat , allergic reaction or heat rash in Rash ).
• Inferring : One works out what would be the case if a possible answer were assumed (valuables missing if there has been a burglary in Disorder , earlier start to the rash if it is an allergic reaction to a sulfa drug in Rash ). Or one draws a conclusion once sufficient relevant evidence is gathered (take the subway in Transit , burglary in Disorder , discontinue blood pressure medication and new cream in Rash ).
• Knowledge : One uses stored knowledge of the subject-matter to generate possible answers or to infer what would be expected on the assumption of a particular answer (knowledge of a city’s public transit system in Transit , of the requirements for a flagpole in Ferryboat , of Boyle’s law in Bubbles , of allergic reactions in Rash ).
• Experimenting : One designs and carries out an experiment or a systematic observation to find out whether the results deduced from a possible answer will occur (looking at the location of the flagpole in relation to the pilot’s position in Ferryboat , putting an ice cube on top of a tumbler taken from hot water in Bubbles , measuring the height to which a suction pump will draw water at different elevations in Suction pump , noticing the spacing of diamonds when movement to or from a diamond lane is allowed in Diamond ).
• Consulting : One finds a source of information, gets the information from the source, and makes a judgment on whether to accept it. None of our 11 examples include searching for sources of information. In this respect they are unrepresentative, since most people nowadays have almost instant access to information relevant to answering any question, including many of those illustrated by the examples. However, Candidate includes the activities of extracting information from sources and evaluating its credibility.
• Identifying and analyzing arguments : One notices an argument and works out its structure and content as a preliminary to evaluating its strength. This activity is central to Candidate . It is an important part of a critical thinking process in which one surveys arguments for various positions on an issue.
• Judging : One makes a judgment on the basis of accumulated evidence and reasoning, such as the judgment in Ferryboat that the purpose of the pole is to provide direction to the pilot.
• Deciding : One makes a decision on what to do or on what policy to adopt, as in the decision in Transit to take the subway.

By definition, a person who does something voluntarily is both willing and able to do that thing at that time. Both the willingness and the ability contribute causally to the person’s action, in the sense that the voluntary action would not occur if either (or both) of these were lacking. For example, suppose that one is standing with one’s arms at one’s sides and one voluntarily lifts one’s right arm to an extended horizontal position. One would not do so if one were unable to lift one’s arm, if for example one’s right side was paralyzed as the result of a stroke. Nor would one do so if one were unwilling to lift one’s arm, if for example one were participating in a street demonstration at which a white supremacist was urging the crowd to lift their right arm in a Nazi salute and one were unwilling to express support in this way for the racist Nazi ideology. The same analysis applies to a voluntary mental process of thinking critically. It requires both willingness and ability to think critically, including willingness and ability to perform each of the mental acts that compose the process and to coordinate those acts in a sequence that is directed at resolving the initiating perplexity.

Consider willingness first. We can identify causal contributors to willingness to think critically by considering factors that would cause a person who was able to think critically about an issue nevertheless not to do so (Hamby 2014). For each factor, the opposite condition thus contributes causally to willingness to think critically on a particular occasion. For example, people who habitually jump to conclusions without considering alternatives will not think critically about issues that arise, even if they have the required abilities. The contrary condition of willingness to suspend judgment is thus a causal contributor to thinking critically.

Now consider ability. In contrast to the ability to move one’s arm, which can be completely absent because a stroke has left the arm paralyzed, the ability to think critically is a developed ability, whose absence is not a complete absence of ability to think but absence of ability to think well. We can identify the ability to think well directly, in terms of the norms and standards for good thinking. In general, to be able do well the thinking activities that can be components of a critical thinking process, one needs to know the concepts and principles that characterize their good performance, to recognize in particular cases that the concepts and principles apply, and to apply them. The knowledge, recognition and application may be procedural rather than declarative. It may be domain-specific rather than widely applicable, and in either case may need subject-matter knowledge, sometimes of a deep kind.

Reflections of the sort illustrated by the previous two paragraphs have led scholars to identify the knowledge, abilities and dispositions of a “critical thinker”, i.e., someone who thinks critically whenever it is appropriate to do so. We turn now to these three types of causal contributors to thinking critically. We start with dispositions, since arguably these are the most powerful contributors to being a critical thinker, can be fostered at an early stage of a child’s development, and are susceptible to general improvement (Glaser 1941: 175)

8. Critical Thinking Dispositions

Educational researchers use the term ‘dispositions’ broadly for the habits of mind and attitudes that contribute causally to being a critical thinker. Some writers (e.g., Paul & Elder 2006; Hamby 2014; Bailin & Battersby 2016a) propose to use the term ‘virtues’ for this dimension of a critical thinker. The virtues in question, although they are virtues of character, concern the person’s ways of thinking rather than the person’s ways of behaving towards others. They are not moral virtues but intellectual virtues, of the sort articulated by Zagzebski (1996) and discussed by Turri, Alfano, and Greco (2017).

On a realistic conception, thinking dispositions or intellectual virtues are real properties of thinkers. They are general tendencies, propensities, or inclinations to think in particular ways in particular circumstances, and can be genuinely explanatory (Siegel 1999). Sceptics argue that there is no evidence for a specific mental basis for the habits of mind that contribute to thinking critically, and that it is pedagogically misleading to posit such a basis (Bailin et al. 1999a). Whatever their status, critical thinking dispositions need motivation for their initial formation in a child—motivation that may be external or internal. As children develop, the force of habit will gradually become important in sustaining the disposition (Nieto & Valenzuela 2012). Mere force of habit, however, is unlikely to sustain critical thinking dispositions. Critical thinkers must value and enjoy using their knowledge and abilities to think things through for themselves. They must be committed to, and lovers of, inquiry.

A person may have a critical thinking disposition with respect to only some kinds of issues. For example, one could be open-minded about scientific issues but not about religious issues. Similarly, one could be confident in one’s ability to reason about the theological implications of the existence of evil in the world but not in one’s ability to reason about the best design for a guided ballistic missile.

Facione (1990a: 25) divides “affective dispositions” of critical thinking into approaches to life and living in general and approaches to specific issues, questions or problems. Adapting this distinction, one can usefully divide critical thinking dispositions into initiating dispositions (those that contribute causally to starting to think critically about an issue) and internal dispositions (those that contribute causally to doing a good job of thinking critically once one has started). The two categories are not mutually exclusive. For example, open-mindedness, in the sense of willingness to consider alternative points of view to one’s own, is both an initiating and an internal disposition.

Using the strategy of considering factors that would block people with the ability to think critically from doing so, we can identify as initiating dispositions for thinking critically attentiveness, a habit of inquiry, self-confidence, courage, open-mindedness, willingness to suspend judgment, trust in reason, wanting evidence for one’s beliefs, and seeking the truth. We consider briefly what each of these dispositions amounts to, in each case citing sources that acknowledge them.

• Attentiveness : One will not think critically if one fails to recognize an issue that needs to be thought through. For example, the pedestrian in Weather would not have looked up if he had not noticed that the air was suddenly cooler. To be a critical thinker, then, one needs to be habitually attentive to one’s surroundings, noticing not only what one senses but also sources of perplexity in messages received and in one’s own beliefs and attitudes (Facione 1990a: 25; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001).
• Habit of inquiry : Inquiry is effortful, and one needs an internal push to engage in it. For example, the student in Bubbles could easily have stopped at idle wondering about the cause of the bubbles rather than reasoning to a hypothesis, then designing and executing an experiment to test it. Thus willingness to think critically needs mental energy and initiative. What can supply that energy? Love of inquiry, or perhaps just a habit of inquiry. Hamby (2015) has argued that willingness to inquire is the central critical thinking virtue, one that encompasses all the others. It is recognized as a critical thinking disposition by Dewey (1910: 29; 1933: 35), Glaser (1941: 5), Ennis (1987: 12; 1991: 8), Facione (1990a: 25), Bailin et al. (1999b: 294), Halpern (1998: 452), and Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo (2001).
• Self-confidence : Lack of confidence in one’s abilities can block critical thinking. For example, if the woman in Rash lacked confidence in her ability to figure things out for herself, she might just have assumed that the rash on her chest was the allergic reaction to her medication against which the pharmacist had warned her. Thus willingness to think critically requires confidence in one’s ability to inquire (Facione 1990a: 25; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001).
• Courage : Fear of thinking for oneself can stop one from doing it. Thus willingness to think critically requires intellectual courage (Paul & Elder 2006: 16).
• Open-mindedness : A dogmatic attitude will impede thinking critically. For example, a person who adheres rigidly to a “pro-choice” position on the issue of the legal status of induced abortion is likely to be unwilling to consider seriously the issue of when in its development an unborn child acquires a moral right to life. Thus willingness to think critically requires open-mindedness, in the sense of a willingness to examine questions to which one already accepts an answer but which further evidence or reasoning might cause one to answer differently (Dewey 1933; Facione 1990a; Ennis 1991; Bailin et al. 1999b; Halpern 1998, Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001). Paul (1981) emphasizes open-mindedness about alternative world-views, and recommends a dialectical approach to integrating such views as central to what he calls “strong sense” critical thinking. In three studies, Haran, Ritov, & Mellers (2013) found that actively open-minded thinking, including “the tendency to weigh new evidence against a favored belief, to spend sufficient time on a problem before giving up, and to consider carefully the opinions of others in forming one’s own”, led study participants to acquire information and thus to make accurate estimations.
• Willingness to suspend judgment : Premature closure on an initial solution will block critical thinking. Thus willingness to think critically requires a willingness to suspend judgment while alternatives are explored (Facione 1990a; Ennis 1991; Halpern 1998).
• Trust in reason : Since distrust in the processes of reasoned inquiry will dissuade one from engaging in it, trust in them is an initiating critical thinking disposition (Facione 1990a, 25; Bailin et al. 1999b: 294; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001; Paul & Elder 2006). In reaction to an allegedly exclusive emphasis on reason in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, Thayer-Bacon (2000) argues that intuition, imagination, and emotion have important roles to play in an adequate conception of critical thinking that she calls “constructive thinking”. From her point of view, critical thinking requires trust not only in reason but also in intuition, imagination, and emotion.
• Seeking the truth : If one does not care about the truth but is content to stick with one’s initial bias on an issue, then one will not think critically about it. Seeking the truth is thus an initiating critical thinking disposition (Bailin et al. 1999b: 294; Facione, Facione, & Giancarlo 2001). A disposition to seek the truth is implicit in more specific critical thinking dispositions, such as trying to be well-informed, considering seriously points of view other than one’s own, looking for alternatives, suspending judgment when the evidence is insufficient, and adopting a position when the evidence supporting it is sufficient.

Some of the initiating dispositions, such as open-mindedness and willingness to suspend judgment, are also internal critical thinking dispositions, in the sense of mental habits or attitudes that contribute causally to doing a good job of critical thinking once one starts the process. But there are many other internal critical thinking dispositions. Some of them are parasitic on one’s conception of good thinking. For example, it is constitutive of good thinking about an issue to formulate the issue clearly and to maintain focus on it. For this purpose, one needs not only the corresponding ability but also the corresponding disposition. Ennis (1991: 8) describes it as the disposition “to determine and maintain focus on the conclusion or question”, Facione (1990a: 25) as “clarity in stating the question or concern”. Other internal dispositions are motivators to continue or adjust the critical thinking process, such as willingness to persist in a complex task and willingness to abandon nonproductive strategies in an attempt to self-correct (Halpern 1998: 452). For a list of identified internal critical thinking dispositions, see the Supplement on Internal Critical Thinking Dispositions .

Some theorists postulate skills, i.e., acquired abilities, as operative in critical thinking. It is not obvious, however, that a good mental act is the exercise of a generic acquired skill. Inferring an expected time of arrival, as in Transit , has some generic components but also uses non-generic subject-matter knowledge. Bailin et al. (1999a) argue against viewing critical thinking skills as generic and discrete, on the ground that skilled performance at a critical thinking task cannot be separated from knowledge of concepts and from domain-specific principles of good thinking. Talk of skills, they concede, is unproblematic if it means merely that a person with critical thinking skills is capable of intelligent performance.

Despite such scepticism, theorists of critical thinking have listed as general contributors to critical thinking what they variously call abilities (Glaser 1941; Ennis 1962, 1991), skills (Facione 1990a; Halpern 1998) or competencies (Fisher & Scriven 1997). Amalgamating these lists would produce a confusing and chaotic cornucopia of more than 50 possible educational objectives, with only partial overlap among them. It makes sense instead to try to understand the reasons for the multiplicity and diversity, and to make a selection according to one’s own reasons for singling out abilities to be developed in a critical thinking curriculum. Two reasons for diversity among lists of critical thinking abilities are the underlying conception of critical thinking and the envisaged educational level. Appraisal-only conceptions, for example, involve a different suite of abilities than constructive-only conceptions. Some lists, such as those in (Glaser 1941), are put forward as educational objectives for secondary school students, whereas others are proposed as objectives for college students (e.g., Facione 1990a).

The abilities described in the remaining paragraphs of this section emerge from reflection on the general abilities needed to do well the thinking activities identified in section 6 as components of the critical thinking process described in section 5 . The derivation of each collection of abilities is accompanied by citation of sources that list such abilities and of standardized tests that claim to test them.

Observational abilities : Careful and accurate observation sometimes requires specialist expertise and practice, as in the case of observing birds and observing accident scenes. However, there are general abilities of noticing what one’s senses are picking up from one’s environment and of being able to articulate clearly and accurately to oneself and others what one has observed. It helps in exercising them to be able to recognize and take into account factors that make one’s observation less trustworthy, such as prior framing of the situation, inadequate time, deficient senses, poor observation conditions, and the like. It helps as well to be skilled at taking steps to make one’s observation more trustworthy, such as moving closer to get a better look, measuring something three times and taking the average, and checking what one thinks one is observing with someone else who is in a good position to observe it. It also helps to be skilled at recognizing respects in which one’s report of one’s observation involves inference rather than direct observation, so that one can then consider whether the inference is justified. These abilities come into play as well when one thinks about whether and with what degree of confidence to accept an observation report, for example in the study of history or in a criminal investigation or in assessing news reports. Observational abilities show up in some lists of critical thinking abilities (Ennis 1962: 90; Facione 1990a: 16; Ennis 1991: 9). There are items testing a person’s ability to judge the credibility of observation reports in the Cornell Critical Thinking Tests, Levels X and Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005). Norris and King (1983, 1985, 1990a, 1990b) is a test of ability to appraise observation reports.

Emotional abilities : The emotions that drive a critical thinking process are perplexity or puzzlement, a wish to resolve it, and satisfaction at achieving the desired resolution. Children experience these emotions at an early age, without being trained to do so. Education that takes critical thinking as a goal needs only to channel these emotions and to make sure not to stifle them. Collaborative critical thinking benefits from ability to recognize one’s own and others’ emotional commitments and reactions.

Questioning abilities : A critical thinking process needs transformation of an inchoate sense of perplexity into a clear question. Formulating a question well requires not building in questionable assumptions, not prejudging the issue, and using language that in context is unambiguous and precise enough (Ennis 1962: 97; 1991: 9).

Imaginative abilities : Thinking directed at finding the correct causal explanation of a general phenomenon or particular event requires an ability to imagine possible explanations. Thinking about what policy or plan of action to adopt requires generation of options and consideration of possible consequences of each option. Domain knowledge is required for such creative activity, but a general ability to imagine alternatives is helpful and can be nurtured so as to become easier, quicker, more extensive, and deeper (Dewey 1910: 34–39; 1933: 40–47). Facione (1990a) and Halpern (1998) include the ability to imagine alternatives as a critical thinking ability.

Inferential abilities : The ability to draw conclusions from given information, and to recognize with what degree of certainty one’s own or others’ conclusions follow, is universally recognized as a general critical thinking ability. All 11 examples in section 2 of this article include inferences, some from hypotheses or options (as in Transit , Ferryboat and Disorder ), others from something observed (as in Weather and Rash ). None of these inferences is formally valid. Rather, they are licensed by general, sometimes qualified substantive rules of inference (Toulmin 1958) that rest on domain knowledge—that a bus trip takes about the same time in each direction, that the terminal of a wireless telegraph would be located on the highest possible place, that sudden cooling is often followed by rain, that an allergic reaction to a sulfa drug generally shows up soon after one starts taking it. It is a matter of controversy to what extent the specialized ability to deduce conclusions from premisses using formal rules of inference is needed for critical thinking. Dewey (1933) locates logical forms in setting out the products of reflection rather than in the process of reflection. Ennis (1981a), on the other hand, maintains that a liberally-educated person should have the following abilities: to translate natural-language statements into statements using the standard logical operators, to use appropriately the language of necessary and sufficient conditions, to deal with argument forms and arguments containing symbols, to determine whether in virtue of an argument’s form its conclusion follows necessarily from its premisses, to reason with logically complex propositions, and to apply the rules and procedures of deductive logic. Inferential abilities are recognized as critical thinking abilities by Glaser (1941: 6), Facione (1990a: 9), Ennis (1991: 9), Fisher & Scriven (1997: 99, 111), and Halpern (1998: 452). Items testing inferential abilities constitute two of the five subtests of the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (Watson & Glaser 1980a, 1980b, 1994), two of the four sections in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level X (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005), three of the seven sections in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005), 11 of the 34 items on Forms A and B of the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (Facione 1990b, 1992), and a high but variable proportion of the 25 selected-response questions in the Collegiate Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017).

Experimenting abilities : Knowing how to design and execute an experiment is important not just in scientific research but also in everyday life, as in Rash . Dewey devoted a whole chapter of his How We Think (1910: 145–156; 1933: 190–202) to the superiority of experimentation over observation in advancing knowledge. Experimenting abilities come into play at one remove in appraising reports of scientific studies. Skill in designing and executing experiments includes the acknowledged abilities to appraise evidence (Glaser 1941: 6), to carry out experiments and to apply appropriate statistical inference techniques (Facione 1990a: 9), to judge inductions to an explanatory hypothesis (Ennis 1991: 9), and to recognize the need for an adequately large sample size (Halpern 1998). The Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005) includes four items (out of 52) on experimental design. The Collegiate Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017) makes room for appraisal of study design in both its performance task and its selected-response questions.

Consulting abilities : Skill at consulting sources of information comes into play when one seeks information to help resolve a problem, as in Candidate . Ability to find and appraise information includes ability to gather and marshal pertinent information (Glaser 1941: 6), to judge whether a statement made by an alleged authority is acceptable (Ennis 1962: 84), to plan a search for desired information (Facione 1990a: 9), and to judge the credibility of a source (Ennis 1991: 9). Ability to judge the credibility of statements is tested by 24 items (out of 76) in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level X (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005) and by four items (out of 52) in the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z (Ennis & Millman 1971; Ennis, Millman, & Tomko 1985, 2005). The College Learning Assessment’s performance task requires evaluation of whether information in documents is credible or unreliable (Council for Aid to Education 2017).

Argument analysis abilities : The ability to identify and analyze arguments contributes to the process of surveying arguments on an issue in order to form one’s own reasoned judgment, as in Candidate . The ability to detect and analyze arguments is recognized as a critical thinking skill by Facione (1990a: 7–8), Ennis (1991: 9) and Halpern (1998). Five items (out of 34) on the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (Facione 1990b, 1992) test skill at argument analysis. The College Learning Assessment (Council for Aid to Education 2017) incorporates argument analysis in its selected-response tests of critical reading and evaluation and of critiquing an argument.

Judging skills and deciding skills : Skill at judging and deciding is skill at recognizing what judgment or decision the available evidence and argument supports, and with what degree of confidence. It is thus a component of the inferential skills already discussed.

Lists and tests of critical thinking abilities often include two more abilities: identifying assumptions and constructing and evaluating definitions.

In addition to dispositions and abilities, critical thinking needs knowledge: of critical thinking concepts, of critical thinking principles, and of the subject-matter of the thinking.

We can derive a short list of concepts whose understanding contributes to critical thinking from the critical thinking abilities described in the preceding section. Observational abilities require an understanding of the difference between observation and inference. Questioning abilities require an understanding of the concepts of ambiguity and vagueness. Inferential abilities require an understanding of the difference between conclusive and defeasible inference (traditionally, between deduction and induction), as well as of the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions. Experimenting abilities require an understanding of the concepts of hypothesis, null hypothesis, assumption and prediction, as well as of the concept of statistical significance and of its difference from importance. They also require an understanding of the difference between an experiment and an observational study, and in particular of the difference between a randomized controlled trial, a prospective correlational study and a retrospective (case-control) study. Argument analysis abilities require an understanding of the concepts of argument, premiss, assumption, conclusion and counter-consideration. Additional critical thinking concepts are proposed by Bailin et al. (1999b: 293), Fisher & Scriven (1997: 105–106), Black (2012), and Blair (2021).

According to Glaser (1941: 25), ability to think critically requires knowledge of the methods of logical inquiry and reasoning. If we review the list of abilities in the preceding section, however, we can see that some of them can be acquired and exercised merely through practice, possibly guided in an educational setting, followed by feedback. Searching intelligently for a causal explanation of some phenomenon or event requires that one consider a full range of possible causal contributors, but it seems more important that one implements this principle in one’s practice than that one is able to articulate it. What is important is “operational knowledge” of the standards and principles of good thinking (Bailin et al. 1999b: 291–293). But the development of such critical thinking abilities as designing an experiment or constructing an operational definition can benefit from learning their underlying theory. Further, explicit knowledge of quirks of human thinking seems useful as a cautionary guide. Human memory is not just fallible about details, as people learn from their own experiences of misremembering, but is so malleable that a detailed, clear and vivid recollection of an event can be a total fabrication (Loftus 2017). People seek or interpret evidence in ways that are partial to their existing beliefs and expectations, often unconscious of their “confirmation bias” (Nickerson 1998). Not only are people subject to this and other cognitive biases (Kahneman 2011), of which they are typically unaware, but it may be counter-productive for one to make oneself aware of them and try consciously to counteract them or to counteract social biases such as racial or sexual stereotypes (Kenyon & Beaulac 2014). It is helpful to be aware of these facts and of the superior effectiveness of blocking the operation of biases—for example, by making an immediate record of one’s observations, refraining from forming a preliminary explanatory hypothesis, blind refereeing, double-blind randomized trials, and blind grading of students’ work. It is also helpful to be aware of the prevalence of “noise” (unwanted unsystematic variability of judgments), of how to detect noise (through a noise audit), and of how to reduce noise: make accuracy the goal, think statistically, break a process of arriving at a judgment into independent tasks, resist premature intuitions, in a group get independent judgments first, favour comparative judgments and scales (Kahneman, Sibony, & Sunstein 2021). It is helpful as well to be aware of the concept of “bounded rationality” in decision-making and of the related distinction between “satisficing” and optimizing (Simon 1956; Gigerenzer 2001).

Critical thinking about an issue requires substantive knowledge of the domain to which the issue belongs. Critical thinking abilities are not a magic elixir that can be applied to any issue whatever by somebody who has no knowledge of the facts relevant to exploring that issue. For example, the student in Bubbles needed to know that gases do not penetrate solid objects like a glass, that air expands when heated, that the volume of an enclosed gas varies directly with its temperature and inversely with its pressure, and that hot objects will spontaneously cool down to the ambient temperature of their surroundings unless kept hot by insulation or a source of heat. Critical thinkers thus need a rich fund of subject-matter knowledge relevant to the variety of situations they encounter. This fact is recognized in the inclusion among critical thinking dispositions of a concern to become and remain generally well informed.

Experimental educational interventions, with control groups, have shown that education can improve critical thinking skills and dispositions, as measured by standardized tests. For information about these tests, see the Supplement on Assessment .

What educational methods are most effective at developing the dispositions, abilities and knowledge of a critical thinker? In a comprehensive meta-analysis of experimental and quasi-experimental studies of strategies for teaching students to think critically, Abrami et al. (2015) found that dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring each increased the effectiveness of the educational intervention, and that they were most effective when combined. They also found that in these studies a combination of separate instruction in critical thinking with subject-matter instruction in which students are encouraged to think critically was more effective than either by itself. However, the difference was not statistically significant; that is, it might have arisen by chance.

Most of these studies lack the longitudinal follow-up required to determine whether the observed differential improvements in critical thinking abilities or dispositions continue over time, for example until high school or college graduation. For details on studies of methods of developing critical thinking skills and dispositions, see the Supplement on Educational Methods .

12. Controversies

Scholars have denied the generalizability of critical thinking abilities across subject domains, have alleged bias in critical thinking theory and pedagogy, and have investigated the relationship of critical thinking to other kinds of thinking.

McPeck (1981) attacked the thinking skills movement of the 1970s, including the critical thinking movement. He argued that there are no general thinking skills, since thinking is always thinking about some subject-matter. It is futile, he claimed, for schools and colleges to teach thinking as if it were a separate subject. Rather, teachers should lead their pupils to become autonomous thinkers by teaching school subjects in a way that brings out their cognitive structure and that encourages and rewards discussion and argument. As some of his critics (e.g., Paul 1985; Siegel 1985) pointed out, McPeck’s central argument needs elaboration, since it has obvious counter-examples in writing and speaking, for which (up to a certain level of complexity) there are teachable general abilities even though they are always about some subject-matter. To make his argument convincing, McPeck needs to explain how thinking differs from writing and speaking in a way that does not permit useful abstraction of its components from the subject-matters with which it deals. He has not done so. Nevertheless, his position that the dispositions and abilities of a critical thinker are best developed in the context of subject-matter instruction is shared by many theorists of critical thinking, including Dewey (1910, 1933), Glaser (1941), Passmore (1980), Weinstein (1990), Bailin et al. (1999b), and Willingham (2019).

McPeck’s challenge prompted reflection on the extent to which critical thinking is subject-specific. McPeck argued for a strong subject-specificity thesis, according to which it is a conceptual truth that all critical thinking abilities are specific to a subject. (He did not however extend his subject-specificity thesis to critical thinking dispositions. In particular, he took the disposition to suspend judgment in situations of cognitive dissonance to be a general disposition.) Conceptual subject-specificity is subject to obvious counter-examples, such as the general ability to recognize confusion of necessary and sufficient conditions. A more modest thesis, also endorsed by McPeck, is epistemological subject-specificity, according to which the norms of good thinking vary from one field to another. Epistemological subject-specificity clearly holds to a certain extent; for example, the principles in accordance with which one solves a differential equation are quite different from the principles in accordance with which one determines whether a painting is a genuine Picasso. But the thesis suffers, as Ennis (1989) points out, from vagueness of the concept of a field or subject and from the obvious existence of inter-field principles, however broadly the concept of a field is construed. For example, the principles of hypothetico-deductive reasoning hold for all the varied fields in which such reasoning occurs. A third kind of subject-specificity is empirical subject-specificity, according to which as a matter of empirically observable fact a person with the abilities and dispositions of a critical thinker in one area of investigation will not necessarily have them in another area of investigation.

The thesis of empirical subject-specificity raises the general problem of transfer. If critical thinking abilities and dispositions have to be developed independently in each school subject, how are they of any use in dealing with the problems of everyday life and the political and social issues of contemporary society, most of which do not fit into the framework of a traditional school subject? Proponents of empirical subject-specificity tend to argue that transfer is more likely to occur if there is critical thinking instruction in a variety of domains, with explicit attention to dispositions and abilities that cut across domains. But evidence for this claim is scanty. There is a need for well-designed empirical studies that investigate the conditions that make transfer more likely.

It is common ground in debates about the generality or subject-specificity of critical thinking dispositions and abilities that critical thinking about any topic requires background knowledge about the topic. For example, the most sophisticated understanding of the principles of hypothetico-deductive reasoning is of no help unless accompanied by some knowledge of what might be plausible explanations of some phenomenon under investigation.

Critics have objected to bias in the theory, pedagogy and practice of critical thinking. Commentators (e.g., Alston 1995; Ennis 1998) have noted that anyone who takes a position has a bias in the neutral sense of being inclined in one direction rather than others. The critics, however, are objecting to bias in the pejorative sense of an unjustified favoring of certain ways of knowing over others, frequently alleging that the unjustly favoured ways are those of a dominant sex or culture (Bailin 1995). These ways favour:

• reinforcement of egocentric and sociocentric biases over dialectical engagement with opposing world-views (Paul 1981, 1984; Warren 1998)
• distancing from the object of inquiry over closeness to it (Martin 1992; Thayer-Bacon 1992)
• indifference to the situation of others over care for them (Martin 1992)
• orientation to thought over orientation to action (Martin 1992)
• being reasonable over caring to understand people’s ideas (Thayer-Bacon 1993)
• being neutral and objective over being embodied and situated (Thayer-Bacon 1995a)
• doubting over believing (Thayer-Bacon 1995b)
• reason over emotion, imagination and intuition (Thayer-Bacon 2000)
• solitary thinking over collaborative thinking (Thayer-Bacon 2000)
• written and spoken assignments over other forms of expression (Alston 2001)
• attention to written and spoken communications over attention to human problems (Alston 2001)
• winning debates in the public sphere over making and understanding meaning (Alston 2001)

A common thread in this smorgasbord of accusations is dissatisfaction with focusing on the logical analysis and evaluation of reasoning and arguments. While these authors acknowledge that such analysis and evaluation is part of critical thinking and should be part of its conceptualization and pedagogy, they insist that it is only a part. Paul (1981), for example, bemoans the tendency of atomistic teaching of methods of analyzing and evaluating arguments to turn students into more able sophists, adept at finding fault with positions and arguments with which they disagree but even more entrenched in the egocentric and sociocentric biases with which they began. Martin (1992) and Thayer-Bacon (1992) cite with approval the self-reported intimacy with their subject-matter of leading researchers in biology and medicine, an intimacy that conflicts with the distancing allegedly recommended in standard conceptions and pedagogy of critical thinking. Thayer-Bacon (2000) contrasts the embodied and socially embedded learning of her elementary school students in a Montessori school, who used their imagination, intuition and emotions as well as their reason, with conceptions of critical thinking as

thinking that is used to critique arguments, offer justifications, and make judgments about what are the good reasons, or the right answers. (Thayer-Bacon 2000: 127–128)

Alston (2001) reports that her students in a women’s studies class were able to see the flaws in the Cinderella myth that pervades much romantic fiction but in their own romantic relationships still acted as if all failures were the woman’s fault and still accepted the notions of love at first sight and living happily ever after. Students, she writes, should

be able to connect their intellectual critique to a more affective, somatic, and ethical account of making risky choices that have sexist, racist, classist, familial, sexual, or other consequences for themselves and those both near and far… critical thinking that reads arguments, texts, or practices merely on the surface without connections to feeling/desiring/doing or action lacks an ethical depth that should infuse the difference between mere cognitive activity and something we want to call critical thinking. (Alston 2001: 34)

Some critics portray such biases as unfair to women. Thayer-Bacon (1992), for example, has charged modern critical thinking theory with being sexist, on the ground that it separates the self from the object and causes one to lose touch with one’s inner voice, and thus stigmatizes women, who (she asserts) link self to object and listen to their inner voice. Her charge does not imply that women as a group are on average less able than men to analyze and evaluate arguments. Facione (1990c) found no difference by sex in performance on his California Critical Thinking Skills Test. Kuhn (1991: 280–281) found no difference by sex in either the disposition or the competence to engage in argumentative thinking.

The critics propose a variety of remedies for the biases that they allege. In general, they do not propose to eliminate or downplay critical thinking as an educational goal. Rather, they propose to conceptualize critical thinking differently and to change its pedagogy accordingly. Their pedagogical proposals arise logically from their objections. They can be summarized as follows:

• Focus on argument networks with dialectical exchanges reflecting contesting points of view rather than on atomic arguments, so as to develop “strong sense” critical thinking that transcends egocentric and sociocentric biases (Paul 1981, 1984).
• Foster closeness to the subject-matter and feeling connected to others in order to inform a humane democracy (Martin 1992).
• Develop “constructive thinking” as a social activity in a community of physically embodied and socially embedded inquirers with personal voices who value not only reason but also imagination, intuition and emotion (Thayer-Bacon 2000).
• In developing critical thinking in school subjects, treat as important neither skills nor dispositions but opening worlds of meaning (Alston 2001).
• Attend to the development of critical thinking dispositions as well as skills, and adopt the “critical pedagogy” practised and advocated by Freire (1968 [1970]) and hooks (1994) (Dalgleish, Girard, & Davies 2017).

A common thread in these proposals is treatment of critical thinking as a social, interactive, personally engaged activity like that of a quilting bee or a barn-raising (Thayer-Bacon 2000) rather than as an individual, solitary, distanced activity symbolized by Rodin’s The Thinker . One can get a vivid description of education with the former type of goal from the writings of bell hooks (1994, 2010). Critical thinking for her is open-minded dialectical exchange across opposing standpoints and from multiple perspectives, a conception similar to Paul’s “strong sense” critical thinking (Paul 1981). She abandons the structure of domination in the traditional classroom. In an introductory course on black women writers, for example, she assigns students to write an autobiographical paragraph about an early racial memory, then to read it aloud as the others listen, thus affirming the uniqueness and value of each voice and creating a communal awareness of the diversity of the group’s experiences (hooks 1994: 84). Her “engaged pedagogy” is thus similar to the “freedom under guidance” implemented in John Dewey’s Laboratory School of Chicago in the late 1890s and early 1900s. It incorporates the dialogue, anchored instruction, and mentoring that Abrami (2015) found to be most effective in improving critical thinking skills and dispositions.

What is the relationship of critical thinking to problem solving, decision-making, higher-order thinking, creative thinking, and other recognized types of thinking? One’s answer to this question obviously depends on how one defines the terms used in the question. If critical thinking is conceived broadly to cover any careful thinking about any topic for any purpose, then problem solving and decision making will be kinds of critical thinking, if they are done carefully. Historically, ‘critical thinking’ and ‘problem solving’ were two names for the same thing. If critical thinking is conceived more narrowly as consisting solely of appraisal of intellectual products, then it will be disjoint with problem solving and decision making, which are constructive.

Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives used the phrase “intellectual abilities and skills” for what had been labeled “critical thinking” by some, “reflective thinking” by Dewey and others, and “problem solving” by still others (Bloom et al. 1956: 38). Thus, the so-called “higher-order thinking skills” at the taxonomy’s top levels of analysis, synthesis and evaluation are just critical thinking skills, although they do not come with general criteria for their assessment (Ennis 1981b). The revised version of Bloom’s taxonomy (Anderson et al. 2001) likewise treats critical thinking as cutting across those types of cognitive process that involve more than remembering (Anderson et al. 2001: 269–270). For details, see the Supplement on History .

As to creative thinking, it overlaps with critical thinking (Bailin 1987, 1988). Thinking about the explanation of some phenomenon or event, as in Ferryboat , requires creative imagination in constructing plausible explanatory hypotheses. Likewise, thinking about a policy question, as in Candidate , requires creativity in coming up with options. Conversely, creativity in any field needs to be balanced by critical appraisal of the draft painting or novel or mathematical theory.

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• Stanovich Keith E., and Paula J. Stanovich, 2010, “A Framework for Critical Thinking, Rational Thinking, and Intelligence”, in David D. Preiss and Robert J. Sternberg (eds), Innovations in Educational Psychology: Perspectives on Learning, Teaching and Human Development , New York: Springer Publishing, pp 195–237.
• Stanovich Keith E., Richard F. West, and Maggie E. Toplak, 2011, “Intelligence and Rationality”, in Robert J. Sternberg and Scott Barry Kaufman (eds.), Cambridge Handbook of Intelligence , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 3rd edition, pp. 784–826. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511977244.040
• Tankersley, Karen, 2005, Literacy Strategies for Grades 4–12: Reinforcing the Threads of Reading , Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
• Thayer-Bacon, Barbara J., 1992, “Is Modern Critical Thinking Theory Sexist?”, Inquiry: Critical Thinking Across the Disciplines , 10(1): 3–7. doi:10.5840/inquiryctnews199210123
• –––, 1993, “Caring and Its Relationship to Critical Thinking”, Educational Theory , 43(3): 323–340. doi:10.1111/j.1741-5446.1993.00323.x
• –––, 1995a, “Constructive Thinking: Personal Voice”, Journal of Thought , 30(1): 55–70.
• –––, 1995b, “Doubting and Believing: Both are Important for Critical Thinking”, Inquiry: Critical Thinking across the Disciplines , 15(2): 59–66. doi:10.5840/inquiryctnews199515226
• –––, 2000, Transforming Critical Thinking: Thinking Constructively , New York: Teachers College Press.
• Toulmin, Stephen Edelston, 1958, The Uses of Argument , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Turri, John, Mark Alfano, and John Greco, 2017, “Virtue Epistemology”, in Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2017 Edition). URL = < https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2017/entries/epistemology-virtue/ >
• Vincent-Lancrin, Stéphan, Carlos González-Sancho, Mathias Bouckaert, Federico de Luca, Meritxell Fernández-Barrerra, Gwénaël Jacotin, Joaquin Urgel, and Quentin Vidal, 2019, Fostering Students’ Creativity and Critical Thinking: What It Means in School. Educational Research and Innovation , Paris: OECD Publishing.
• Warren, Karen J. 1988. “Critical Thinking and Feminism”, Informal Logic , 10(1): 31–44. [ Warren 1988 available online ]
• Watson, Goodwin, and Edward M. Glaser, 1980a, Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal, Form A , San Antonio, TX: Psychological Corporation.
• –––, 1980b, Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal: Forms A and B; Manual , San Antonio, TX: Psychological Corporation,
• –––, 1994, Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal, Form B , San Antonio, TX: Psychological Corporation.
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How to cite this entry . Preview the PDF version of this entry at the Friends of the SEP Society . Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry at the Internet Philosophy Ontology Project (InPhO). Enhanced bibliography for this entry at PhilPapers , with links to its database.

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• The Nature of Critical Thinking: An Outline of Critical Thinking Dispositions and Abilities , by Robert H. Ennis

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• Introduction

Overview of Critical Thinking Skills

• Teaching Observations
• Avenues for Research
• CTS Tools for Faculty and Student Assessment
• Critical Thinking and Assessment
• Conclusions
• Bibliography
• Helpful Links
• Appendix A. Author's Impressions of Vignettes

What is Critical Thinking?

Many researchers, including Facione, Simpson and Courtneay, Banning, Brookfield, Ornstein and Hunkins, Sternberg, Ennis, and Lipman, have defined critical thinking (CT). Researchers debate whether critical thinking can be learned or if it's a developmental process regulated by motivations, dispositions, and personality traits. Despite differences of opinion, many researchers agree that critical thinking is "Purposeful, self-regulatory judgment which results in interpretation, analysis, evaluation, and inference, as well as explanation of the evidential, conceptual, methodological, criteriological or contextual considerations upon which judgment is based. 11

Critical thinking is also regarded as intellectually engaged, skillful, and responsible thinking that facilitates good judgment because it requires the application of assumptions, knowledge, competence, and the ability to challenge one's own thinking. Critical thinking requires the use of self-correction and monitoring to judge the rationality of thinking as well as reflexivity. When using critical thinking, individuals step back and reflect on the quality of that thinking. Simpson and Courtneay point out that critical thinking processes require active argumentation, initiative, reasoning, envisioning and analyzing complex alternatives, and making contingency-related value judgment. 12

According to Banning, critical thinking involves scrutinizing, differentiating, and appraising information as well as reflecting on information to make judgments that will inform clinical decisions. 13  Brookfield asserts that identifying and challenging assumptions and analyzing assumptions for validity are essential to critical thinking skills. He also suggested that because critical thinkers possess curiosity and skepticism, they are more likely to be motivated to provide solutions that resolve contradictions. 14

Others such as Ornstein and Hunkins suggest that critical thinking and thinking skills refer to problem-solving and other related behaviors. 15  For a number of years, dental educators thought teaching problem-solving skills was akin to teaching critical thinking skills. While teaching problem-solving skills is important to the process of learning how to use critical thinking skills, in the absence of other learning activities it may not be enough.

Sternberg, Ennis, and Lipman assert that critical thinking skills are not a fixed entity but a form of intelligence that can be taught. 16-19  The ability to develop critical thinking skills may be likened to Piaget's concrete and formal operations. If students have not yet reached the formal operations stage, their ability to use critical thinking skills may be limited by an inability to handle abstract ideas. It is important to remember that Piaget's stages of cognitive development are also linked to intellectual potential and environmental experiences. If the learning environment is crucial to the development of critical thinking skills, what instructional strategies can be used to promote critical thinking?

Sternberg asserts that critical thinking involves complex mental operations that cannot be broken into discrete styles of thinking. He claims that CT involves students' total intellectual functioning, not a narrowly defined set of skills. He postulates that there are three mental processes fostering critical thinking: meta-components, performance components, and knowledge-acquisition strategies. 20  Meta-components refer to higher-order mental processes that individuals use to plan, monitor, and evaluate what they do. Performance components refer to the actual steps taken or strategies used, while knowledge-acquisition strategies refer to the ways in which individuals relate old to new material and apply new material. Sternberg does not specify a "how" approach to teaching and learning critical thinking skills. Instead, he provides general guidelines for developing or selecting a program or curriculum that will foster CTS. Interestingly, although not surprisingly, Sternberg states that students are not adequately prepared for the problems and critical thinking tasks they will face in everyday life because they are not taught these skills in their formative years. 21  Tasks that stress right answers or truth telling or use objectively scored tests are generally removed from real-world relevance. Thus, it is particularly important that all aspects of dental educational curriculum stress real-world practice, the importance of oral health care, and the relationship of overall oral health care to systemic health by teaching students how to use critical thinking skills.

Lipman, like Sternberg, does not specify a "how to" approach. However, he makes clear distinctions between ordinary thinking and critical thinking. He explains that ordinary thinking is simplistic thinking because it does not rely upon the use of standards or criteria. Examples of ordinary thinking are guessing, believing, and supposing. Lipman describes critical thinking as a complex process based on standards of objectivity, utility, or consistency in which students can reflect upon the certainty of their thinking because critical thinking is self-correcting. 22  In order words, students can defend their thinking with evidence. Ennis asserts that to help students develop critical thinking skills, teachers must understand the cognitive processes that constitute critical thinking and use instructional activities that will develop these processes. He recommends instructors teach students how to define and clarify information, ask appropriate questions to clarify or challenge statements or beliefs, judge the credibility of sources, and solve problems by predicting probable outcomes through logic or deduction. Ennis also suggests that critical thinkers demonstrate particular attributes. Critical thinkers tend to:

Critical thinkers use these skills appropriately and usually without prompting. They are generally predisposed to think critically and to evaluate the outcome of their thought processes. 24

Instructional Strategies and Critical Thinking

Researchers have asserted that how educators teach has a direct influence on what is learned. 25  Thus, the instructional strategies selected must be appropriate to the desired outcomes. For example, strategies of inquiry are contingent upon the problem being investigated and the targeted concepts, so it is essential that they be integrated with the associated processes of inquiry in order for students to see how new knowledge evolves. 26  Researchers have also recommended eliminating superfluous activities and repetitious content and expanding learner-centered active forms of experiences to promote critical thinking skills. 27  If the goal is for students to use critical thinking skills, then the following opportunities should constitute the majority of learning activities:

     a) Engaging in problem-based learning      b) Analyzing case-based scenarios      c) Engaging in debates, role-play, argument mapping, thinking aloud, and simulation among others 28  

The benefit of engaging students in learning experiences that utilize critical thinking skills is the public nature of their thinking. When students engage in CTS, they have an opportunity to examine tacitly held knowledge of one another, make knowledge and think explicitly, respond to questions and comments, and clarify their thinking processes. 29

Several researchers stated the types of instructional strategies that may be used to promote students' critical thinking skills. Weerts suggested that working in groups might reduce students' stress while trying to answer difficult questions. She points out that working together may result in better answers than working alone. 30  Many dental educators might eschew the notion of using groups. However, it is important to acknowledge that even in classes of 80 to 100 dental students, groups of six to eight students could be developed to facilitate learning and inquiry. These groups could be responsible for answering questions about readings by being called upon randomly during class time. For example, instructors can consider writing three to four focus questions that accompany the readings to guide student comprehension. Instructors could also tell students that they should to be able to answer those questions in class. In this way, students can be held responsible for learning some of this discrete information before class. Rather than having the instructor feel responsible for "telling" students what they should know, the instructor can elicit the key concepts from students. Class time can then be used to present a case where the concept is illustrated, and students can work in groups to analyze how that concept is operationalized rather than receiving discrete knowledge through a lecture. Weerts also suggests that student groups can work together and develop critical thinking skills by:

     Identifying issues      Gathering authoritative sources      Identifying potential treatments      Presenting competing points of view      Weighing modalities in light of the presenting case and then agreeing upon the treatment plan 31  

To ensure that students are developing appropriate skills, the instructor and students can use a Likert scale to rate each other on the following criteria:

     Accuracy and relevancy of supporting evidence      Credibility of authoritative knowledge      Depth and breadth of thought      Clarity and soundness of responses

Hendricson et al. suggest several active learning strategies that can be used to develop students' critical thinking skills.

Van Gelder concurs with Hendricson et al. that critical thinking must be deliberately practiced with the intent to improve performance; however, he states that CT is hard and human beings are not naturally critical. 33  Shermer agrees and describes human beings as "pattern-seeking, story-telling animals ... [who] like things to make sense, and the kinds of sense we grasp most easily are simple familiar patterns or narratives" (p. 42). 34  This penchant for the familiar affects how curriculum is designed and implemented.

As a type of thinking that eschews the uncritical acceptance of information, critical thinking should be a deliberate part of the curriculum. Moreover, exposing students to good examples is insufficient to developing critical thinking skills. Students must demonstrate the ability to transfer critical thinking skills from one situation to another. As Kuhn writes:

"The best approach . . . may be to work from both ends at once-from a bottom-up anchoring in the regular practice [of what is being taught] so that skills are exercised, strengthened and consolidated as well as from a top-down fostering of understanding and intellectual values that play a major role in whether these skills will be used." (p. 24). 35

Kuhn's point has implications for teaching critical thinking skills in the basic science courses as well. Even though students are heavily immersed in learning a tremendous amount of information, they should still be presented with critical thinking learning experiences that embed concepts in actual practice-based scenarios. 36

Argument mapping

Van Gelder suggests that students' critical thinking skills improve faster when instruction is based upon argument mapping. He asserts that when arguments are presented in diagrammatic form, students are more capable of following critical thinking procedures. Because argument maps are visual and more transparent, they make the core operations of critical thinking more straightforward. Van Gelder cautions, however, that belief preservation is a human tendency. He states that individuals tend to make evidence secondary to beliefs. Thus, critical thinking runs counter to human tendencies. Humans tend to seek evidence that supports beliefs and ignore evidence that goes against beliefs. Ideally, critical thinkers will recognize this, put extra effort into searching for evidence that contradicts their own beliefs and cultivate a willingness to change when evidence to the contrary begins to mount. 37

To apply argument mapping to clinical reasoning, consider Case #1.

Case #1-Differing Views on Patient Treatment

A 60-year-old woman has internal resorption of the left maxillary lateral incisor. Radiographic exams reveal that saving the tooth is questionable. The student dentist recommends to Professor Marlin that the patient receive a fixed partial denture (FPD). Marlin confers with Professor James, and James recommends a removable partial denture (RPD).

• The students are instructed to use argument mapping to explain the phenomenon.
• Next, students are asked to write about the contradictions that differentiate viewpoints about FPD and RPD and to write about the counterarguments.
• 3. Finally, students are to identify their treatment decisions and provide evidence that supports or justifies their assertions.

Think-aloud seminar

Lee and Ryan-Wenger recommend the use of the "think-aloud seminar" as a teaching tool. Students are presented with a case and asked relevant questions regarding symptoms and presenting signs. Using this approach, students can exclude underlying pathologies based upon the presentation. This process of excluding potential diagnoses aids students' critical thinking by encouraging them to openly verbalize the rationales behind their opinions. 38

Wong and Chung used simulation to develop diagnostic reasoning skills among nursing students. Students were asked to consider the etiological factors, presenting symptoms, and clinical signs of a patient who presented with a particular condition. As they examined the underlying patholophysiology, the CTS they developed were "assessing duration" and "frequency of symptoms and additional triggers." They also were expected to review their understanding of the possible pathophysiological significance. The next set of CTS they focused on was "considering the pros and cons of treatments" and "drug actions and the possible side effects on the patient." Finally they explored the efficacy of the outcomes. CTS developed in this phase were "determining the success of the treatment," "determining complications," "considering the time it took to resolve the clinical signs and symptoms," and "considering reasons for the development of symptoms." 39

Other strategies

Other strategies that can promote critical thinking include particular behaviors, especially asking questions.

Table 3. Strategies that Promote Critical Thinking

Asking particular types of questions also promotes critical thinking.

  Table 4. Questions that Promote Critical Thinking

Also, Facione and Facione (1996) recommend that students begin analyzing their own thinking. For example, "If you were teaching a colleague about this situation, how would you lead him or her through the issues?" 41

Logical Fallacies

While faculty strive to develop students' abilities to use critical thinking, it is also important to communicate the logical fallacies students may demonstrate in their writing or speaking. Engel provides an overview that illustrates the common fallacies. 42 Three common types of fallacies are shown in Table 5.

Table 5. Common Logical Fallacies (Adapted from Engel, 1990)

Allowing Time for Reflection

Teaching students how to use critical thinking skills shifts teaching from a model that largely ignores thinking to an approach that renders it pervasive 43 When content is didactically taught, it is treated as static and students are unlikely to question or think it through. They tend to rely on rote memorization without grasping the logic, supporting evidence and application of what they are trying to memorize. Students who learn through a critical thinking process truly learn content. At every level, students need to learn how to:

Ask questions precisely, define contexts and purposes, pursue relevant information, analyze key concepts, derive sound inferences, generate good reasons, recognize questionable assumptions, trace important implications, and think empathetically within different points of view (p. 20). 44

Critical thinking is difficult and requires overt practice using a variety of learning activities across the dental curriculum. It is also important to recognize the role that reflection plays in its development. Students need time to think about what they are learning and reflect upon that information. However, what they are learning must have an impact on their feelings in order for critical thinking to occur.

Emotions and Critical Thinking 

The role of emotion in learning to use critical thinking skills is yet another area that necessitates research inquiry. As Zull suggests, if we want students to retain concepts we must allow them to put things into their own words, verbally and in writing. 45  Give students time to think before speaking and better construct ideas in their own words. Processing information takes time; stating one's thinking correctly also takes time. If a student cannot do this alone, we can give him or her the opportunity to discuss questions with others. Giving students time to reflect is giving them time to make connections.

Zull explains the process that takes place within the brain. First, the sensory cortex receives sensory input or concrete experiences. Next, the back integrative cortex tries to create meaning and images during the human process of reflection. The frontal integrative cortex is responsible for short-term memory and problem solving, making decisions and language, and making judgments and evaluations. This activity is akin to how learners handle abstractions-manipulating images and language to create new mental arrangements. The motor cortex triggers all coordinated and voluntary muscle contractions. This matches with the action that completes the learning cycle-actively testing abstractions and converting ideas into physical actions. The brain visualizes items in small amounts and all information arrives at the same time, producing an outline of objects and features in the visual field. 46 Thus, the brain can fully see great detail and nuance. Converting ideas into images helps students learn. Images enhance recall and aid in discovery. Sometimes the best teaching is just showing the student how.

To ensure that students learn, educators need to limit the amount of information they give. Instructors should limit or condense to three or four pieces the amount of information they want students to process.

The amygdala is responsible for screening experiences. 47  If something is recognized as dangerous, the amygdale will instinctively cause the body to "freeze." When a student first encounters something new, he or she may have a somewhat negative reaction. The instructor needs to find a way for the student to move into a more positive emotional territory. 48  Making suggestions or showing examples can remind the student what he or she already knows, and then the student can hang newly acquired knowledge on that "scaffolding." The support given by the instructor allows the student some level of success. Recognizing his or her success helps the student feel more hope, interest, and curiosity. At this point, the student is able to assume more control of the learning process. Boyd (2002) concurs and states, "emotions ... constantly regulate what we experience as reality." She also points out, "The limbic system plays an important role in processing emotion and memory and therefore appears to be important in the transfer of short-term memory into long-term memory." 49  Engaging students emotionally and actively strengthens memory.

Teaching students to use CTS during instruction

There is some empirical evidence that a four-year undergraduate experience contributes to modest gains in overall CT. However, there is little scientific evidence that a single course, other than a critical thinking skills course makes a positive measurable difference. 50  Even in the case of a specific CTS course, the evidence is mixed. 51

Recent studies show that limited efforts to infuse critical thinking in instruction can lead to improved scores on the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level Z, a test that is aimed at a sophisticated audience and measures six common critical thinking skills. 52  Allegrettti and Frederick (1995) reported pre- to post-test gains on the Cornell Z for a group of college seniors (n = 24) who took a capstone integrated psychology and philosophy course. 53  Solon (2001) found that a partial treatment group of psychology students (n = 26) improved their scores on the Cornell Z compared to a group of untreated humanities students (n = 26). The results were statistically significant (beyond .001). In 2003, Solon studied three groups to compare coursework effects and reported that the full treatment group (n = 25) significantly outscored both the partial (n = 25) and non-treatment (n = 25) groups on the Cornell Z test. 54  Solon (2007) reported that a group of introductory psychology students (n = 25) received a moderate infusion of critical thinking skills (10 hours instruction and 20 hours homework). Compared to the non-treatment group (n= 26), the experimental group significantly improved their scores on the Cornell Z test. 55  These findings suggest that even a moderate infusion of critical thinking skills instruction can result in enhanced reasoning skills without requiring a significant investment from the instructor. 56

Collins and Onwuegbuzie reported significant relationships between overall CTS and achievement in a graduate level research methodology course at the midterm (r = .34, p < .01) and final (r = .26, p < .01) stages. 57  Onwuegbuzie compared the CTS of master's and doctoral level students. He reported that doctoral level students (n = 19) obtained statistically higher overall CTS using the California Critical Thinking Skills Test than the masters' degree students (n = 101, t = -3.54, p < .01). The effect size (d = 0.92) associated with this difference was extremely large. 58

Teaching CTS requires instruction that uses higher order taxonomic skills. These skills require student demonstration or teacher usage of behaviors classified as analysis, evaluation, and creation (levels 4, 5, and 6 on Bloom's revised taxonomy). When teaching takes place at higher levels of learning, lower order behaviors such as remembering, understanding, and applying are subsumed within instruction. The following table lists behaviors common at each level of learning and examples of related dental education activities.

Table 6. Revised Bloom's Taxonomy, Sample Verbs, and Related Learning Activities 59

Making Critical Thinking Explicit

Teaching for critical thinking is a rational and intentional act. Typically, instructors cannot suddenly decide to teach CTS and develop an appropriate learning activity. An instructor must have a clear understanding of what CTS is, how it is implemented during instruction, and what strategies should be used during particular classroom and predoctoral clinical learning activities. Developing a repertoire of well-honed CTS activities appropriate to your specific discipline is advisable.

Also crucial to the teaching of CTS is an educator announcing to students he or she will teach CTS, how he or she intends to do so, and what will be required of the students as learners. It is important to have an explicit conversation with students about what CTS is, what it looks like, and how educators will model it so students can differentiate the teaching of CTS from lower level learning. Effective teaching of university-age students is characterized by collegial and collaborative processes, not instruction that is ambiguous. In ambiguous instruction, the learner does not know what to expect next or have a clear understanding of what behavioral or skill changes he or she should demonstrate as a result of teacher-student interaction. Teaching explicitly helps ensure that less re-teaching will be necessary. Both teachers and students know their responsibilities as instructors and learners.

Stages of Critical Thinking

Paul and Elder claim that individuals progress through predictable stages of unreflective, challenged, beginning, practicing, advanced, and master thinking. 60  They state that unless educators help students develop an intellectual vocabulary for discussing their thought processes and challenge them to identify the problems in their thinking, the students' cognitive processes will remain invisible to them. The implication for curriculum development: If instructors want students to develop critical thinking skills, then critical thinking must be integrated into the foundations of instruction.

It is also important to recognize that when patient care is task focused, it can obscure the bigger picture and become a barrier to the development of critical thinking skills. Individual personality, background, and position might also limit one's ability to think critically. Additionally, gender, age, religion, and socioeconomic status might influence the development of critical thinking skills. One of the biggest barriers to the development of CTS is our educational system. Although it is important to recognize these attributes as potential barriers, it is more important that dental educators establish the kind of learning environments that will foster the development of CTS.

Case #2-Why Are Mrs. Connor's Teeth Yellow?

Mrs. Connor, a 74-year-old white female, comes to your office as a new patient. She presents you with a complaint that her teeth have become yellowed and unattractive. Her husband died one year prior, and since then she has been drinking 8-10 cups of coffee daily. Her internist diagnosed anemia and high blood cholesterol. She is taking iron and Lipitor. She feels better since she began taking Lipitor, but feels her teeth are too yellow. She recently met a widower who invited her to dinner next week. She is worried about the appearance of her teeth.

• Working in groups of six, students are asked to write at least four hypotheses about why Mrs. Connor's teeth are yellow.
• Students must also determine if whiter teeth are important to the health and well being of geriatric patients.
• Students must discuss if there a relationship between the need of care and the use of dental services by older patients.
• A student group will then outline its recommendations and a rationale for the treatment plan to be presented to Mrs. Connor at her next dental appointment.

Teachers must recognize that not all students will apply critical thinking skills at the same rate they learn these skills. Thus, instructional methods and objectives need to match students' cognitive and experiential abilities while trying to stretch students to their growing edge. 61  Students' capacity for self-directed learning (SDL), which is required to implement reflective judgment, underlies many of the critical thinking skill dispositions. 62  There is evidence that the students who routinely use the "learn by doing" approach to explore problems develop more sophisticated SDL than students in lecture-based curricula. 63  The reflection element of critical thinking is considered essential to clinical judgment. 64  Tanner asserts that using the skills associated with reflective thinking prepares students for ill-structured or ambiguous problems that they are likely to encounter in clinical practice. 65

Problem-based learning (PBL) is a popular instructional strategy for promoting collaboration and reflection and negotiating different and individual constructions of knowledge. Some researchers assert that PBL is best used when problems are unsolvable or when they generate many individual constructions of knowledge that appear valid. 66  However, using only problem-based learning to teach critical thinking skills may not be enough. This instructional strategy does not necessarily equip students with the ability to analyze or critique a given situation or the information with which they are been provided. A variety of instructional strategies that give students the opportunity to think aloud, role play, prioritize alternatives, communicate conclusions effectively, simulate, or defend the logical basis of their thinking is recommended to foster students' ability to use critical thinking.

Asking students to apply their understanding of dental and medical knowledge to treatment planning and diagnosis is not an example of CTS. However, asking students to determine differential diagnoses of caries and periodontal disease among patients at various stages of lung cancer requires the ability to reason and justify particular treatment plans or demonstrate critical thinking skills. Habits of the students who demonstrate critical thinking are:

Case #3-Female with Erythroplakia

Mrs. Jacklin, a 40-year-old female, presents you with a history of SLE and erythroplakia on the left lateral border of the tongue. She states she is experiencing a burning sensation on her tongue. She asks why she is having this discomfort and what she can do to make the sore on her tongue go away. The oral exam shows that Mrs. Jacklin has poor oral hygiene and mild dry mouth (xerostomia) but is otherwise not in danger for oral health concerns.

• Working in groups of four, students are asked to locate the four most recent references on oral lesions.
• Using those resources, they are asked to write five or six reasons that the patient is experiencing a tongue lesion and determine what questions they should ask the patient about her personal and social history.
• Next, they identify questions to ask her about her medical history.
• Using the information they have acquired, they are asked to generate a list of potential treatment plans and the benefits and limitations of each plan.
• What should they tell the patient and why?

Critical thinking is not :

Critical thinking cannot be taught in a learning environment where the dental educator always lectures, tells students what ought to be undertaken during patient treatment, or shows students how to do a procedure correctly. Some habits of students who do not use critical thinking skills are:

Critical thinking skills can be developed with frequent practice and the use of ill-structured problems and situations that require the ability to recall useful knowledge quickly, use pattern recognition, discern pertinent information, think ahead, and anticipate outcomes and problems while remaining composed so that emotions do not hinder decisionmaking skills. However, it is important to recognize CTS do not develop spontaneously or with maturation. Since strong personality components underlie CT dispositions, what happens if students admitted to colleges of dentistry do not already possess these traits?

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

How does self-efficacy, learner personality, and learner anxiety affect critical thinking of students.

• 1 School of Foreign Language, Hubei Engineering University, Xiaogan, Hubei, China
• 2 Department of Management Science, Comsats University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan

The goal of critical thinking for students is to help them learn how to think critically and systematically so they can solve problems and make informed decisions. It aids students in developing their capacity for independent thought, allowing them to generate their own conclusions and base those decisions on facts and evidence. Therefore, one of the key goals of this study was to explore the factors affecting critical thinking of English as foreign language (EFL) learners. This article used social cognitive theory (SCT) to investigate how personal and cognitive factors affect EFL learners’ critical thinking. Data from 305 Chinese EFL learners were collected online, and structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to evaluate the data. The results showed that metacognitive learning strategies (MLS) were positively related to critical thinking and that self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, and learner anxiety were significantly related to MLS. Moreover, MLS mediated the link between self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, learner anxiety, and critical thinking. The findings further indicated that learner proactivity moderated the association between MLS and critical thinking. By applying social cognitive theory to examine the variables influencing EFL learners’ critical thinking, this study adds uniqueness. It does this by emphasizing the moderating influence of learner proactivity and the mediating function of metacognitive learning strategies. The findings of the research have significant ramifications for educators since they emphasize how vital it is to support metacognitive strategies for learning in order to improve EFL learners’ critical thinking abilities. Additionally, to create an atmosphere that is favorable for the development of critical thinking skills in EFL education, policymakers should think about implementing support systems and interventions that focus on learner anxiety, learner proactivity, and self-efficacy.

Introduction

Learning a foreign language is supposed to provide settings that encourage critical thinking (CT). CT has been defined as an individual’s ability to think and draw appropriate conclusions independently ( Tseng, 2019 ). Furthermore, critical thinking has been stated as an intentional choice to accept, reject, or defer judgment regarding a proposition, as well as the degree of assurance with which language learners accept or reject it ( Ennis, 2015 ). To promote ESL learners’ critical thinking, ESL instructors should research or invent the most relevant teaching methods and strategies. One of the interactive methods that lecturers can use is collaborative learning strategies, in which students are required to actively participate in class discussions on any topic connected to life situations ( Lau, 2015 ).

According to academic research, affective factors are crucial in deciding whether or not students successfully acquire a second language in the contexts of English as a second language (ESL) and English as a foreign language (EFL). Metacognitive learning strategies, which can enhance language acquisition and have an impact on critical thinking, are one of the affective factors that have been mentioned in the research. For ESL learners, critical thinking, and metacognitive learning strategies (MLS) are essential because they enable them to monitor and control their cognitive processes, develop self-awareness of the learning process, and successfully perform a variety of language activities. The main goal of the current study is to close the gap in the literature by looking at other variables that may have an impact on these variables when applied to ESL/EFL learners.

Self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism (SOP), and learner anxiety are some of the key affective factors that influence MLS and CT among ESL learners ( Hayat et al., 2020 ). Although SOP has been stated as an important factor in learning context, its importance in relation with MLS and CT has not received much attention in the study of language acquisition, which is more closely related to psychological complications ( Rhéaume et al., 2000 ). One more factor to be examined in this analysis is self-efficacy, which indicates people’s beliefs in their capacities to perform a task with desired outcomes, and it is an essential component of social cognitive theory (SCT). Given that it affects their beliefs in their capacity to complete different language assignments efficiently and to use suitable strategies to track and control their learning process, self-efficacy is a significant variable that impacts MLS and critical thinking among EFL learner ( Razmi et al., 2020 ). In the field of foreign language education, the above three affective factors have been investigated from different aspects, such as the learner’s self-efficacy in writing, and the association between perfectionism and test anxiety for language learners ( Stoeber et al., 2009 ). However, research examining MLS, critical thinking, and above-mentioned factors from the viewpoint of students is rare.

Moreover, social cognitive theory (SCT) states that individual factors are critical for defining outcome variables ( Bandura, 1986 ). Individual personality has been identified as the key factor and boundary condition while exploring the relationship between different factors ( Sun et al., 2016 ; Khan et al., 2019 ; Mehmood et al., 2022 ). Among the individual personalities, some scholars examined the positive relation between learner proactivity and critical thinking. Past studies have used learner proactivity as moderating variable ( Kong et al., 2021 ). Learner proactivity fosters metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking among EFL learners because it impacts their readiness and capacity to take responsibility and take ownership of their own learning process and achievements. Kong et al. (2021) investigated the impact of learner proactivity on self-efficacy. They discovered that learner proactivity impacted the relationship between self-efficacy and academic burnout in undergraduate nursing. As a result, learner proactivity was used as the boundary condition (as a moderating variable) in this investigation ( Khan et al., 2023 ) of the association between metacognitive learning methods (MLS) and critical thinking. This study adds three contributions to the EFL/ESL literature. Firstly, we empirically investigated our conceptual framework using SCT theory to clarify what factors influence students’ critical thinking advancement in EFL. Secondly, in the context of EFL learning, this study incorporates the universal but understudied constructs of academic self-efficacy (SE), self-oriented learning perfectionism, learner anxiety (LA), and critical thinking. Overall, this study’s novelty lies in how it modifies the impact of learner proactivity and highlights the importance of metacognitive strategies while analyzing the factors influencing critical thinking in EFL learners through the lens of social cognitive theory. For educators, legislators, and researchers who are interested in encouraging critical thinking abilities in EFL students, the findings offer insightful information.

The summary of this study is organized as follows: Section 2 reviews previous research on key variables and theory. After that, the conceptual framework and hypotheses are introduced in section 3. The method is explained in section 4. Section 5 then presents the data analysis and testing results for the hypotheses. This paper concludes by discussing the implications for theory and management, along with a few limitations and future research areas.

Literature review

Social cognitive theory.

According to SCT, which has been used in psychology, education, and communication, the components of an individual’s active learning process are strongly influenced by monitoring others in the context of social interactions, experiences, and outside societal factors ( Bandura, 1986 ; Xiongfei et al., 2020 ). Albert Bandura proposed this theory as an extension of his social learning theory. With the incorporation of cognitive approaches to learning, a better balance has emerged between the behaviorist perspective and cognitive science, which is now based on behavioral psychology ( Bandura, 1986 ).

We used SCT as our theoretical basis as both social cognitive theory and critical thinking highlight the significance of cognitive processes in shaping human behavior. Critical thinking requires the use of cognitive processes to evaluate and assess information, whereas social cognitive theory proposes that cognitive procedures are utilized in learning through observation and modeling. Both notions point out the significance of cognitive processes in influencing human behavior, as well as the necessity to nurture these processes to make informed decisions and act effectively.

The key insight of SCT is that three mutually reinforcing factors influence a person’s functioning, namely, personal attributes, behavior, and environment. For example, concerning this study and according to SCT, personal attributes (SE, SOP, LA), behavior (i.e., critical thinking), and a specific environment (i.e., the context of EFL learning at college or university) would act together and consequently influence each other. SCT was used in this study to compare and identify relationships between personal attributes (SE, SOP, LA, and Learner Proactivity), behavioral (critical thinking), and environmental (i.e., the context of EFL learning at college or university) factors. In this analysis, we have proposed MLS as a mechanism between personal attributes (SE, SOP, and LA) and behavior (CT) to elaborate the mediation mechanism between the two. The SCT provides the basic justification of this mechanism as it highlights the role of cognitive processes in determining human behavior and the significance of evolving these processes to think critically and for making optimal decisions.

The conception of self-efficacy, learners’ anxiety, and self-oriented learning perfectionism

Due to the complexity of critical thinking and the problem of describing and quantifying the constructs, researchers have examined its connection to learners’ EFL success and affective factors ( Ghorban Mohammadi et al., 2013 ). Earlier investigations have concentrated on the association between academic self-efficacy, learner anxiety, self-oriented learning perfectionism, and critical thinking.

Self-efficacy has been characterized as people’s views in their capacities to complete a task with desired outcomes ( Khan et al., 2020 ; Wang, 2021 ), and it is an essential component of social cognitive theory (SCT). Self-efficacy beliefs significantly impact many facets of modern life, including decision-making, cognitive processes, and problem-solving techniques ( Dweck and Leggett, 1988 ). Academic self-efficacy describes students’ beliefs and opinions about their academic abilities and their confidence in their skills to accomplish academic duties ( Schunk and Ertmer, 2000 ). Stronger self-efficacy beliefs have been associated with positive learning behaviors, improved motivation, and, ultimately, higher academic accomplishment in studies ( Kong et al., 2021 ; Teng and Yang, 2023 ). A recent study on Chinese university students explored the effects of different aspects of self-efficacy beliefs on academic writing performance by applying SCT theory ( Teng and Wang, 2023 ). In this study, we expected that the self-efficacy of EFL learners would affect academic achievement positively and indirectly enhance critical thinking through learning a foreign language. Based on SCT, we unfold the mechanism through which the self-efficacy of EFL learners affects critical thinking indirectly through metacognitive learning strategies in this study.

Besides self-efficacy, many studies demonstrate that anxiety has a detrimental impact on educational performance ( Ghorban Mohammadi et al., 2013 ; Abbas et al., 2019a , b ). To understand the connection between anxiety and educational performance in language learning, it is critical to differentiate between the role of anxiety in language learning (learner anxiety) and its part in language performance. According to MacIntyre and Gardner (1989) , Learner anxiety is a sensation of stress and worries that is distinctively associated with second language situations, for example speaking, listening, and learning (p. 284). Researchers have long considered learner anxiety a specific type of anxiety that occurs when studying a second or foreign language ( MacIntyre and Gardner, 1989 ; Azhar et al., 2018 ).

In addition, perfectionism (i.e., striving for total completion of tasks) is one of the most important personality variables in educational psychology in terms of being a complex multidimensional trait ( Frost et al., 1990 ). Perfectionism is a personality trait characterized as an individual having excessively high-performance standards and a high level of critical self-evaluation. According to Hewitt et al. ( Filett et al., 1991 ), there are two types of perfectionism: SOP, socially imposed perfectionism, and other-oriented perfectionism. In this study, the concept of self-oriented learning perfectionism was used as it emphasizes the significance of trying for perfection in terms of one’s ideals, and it is associated with having intrinsic motivation for learning. Despite the importance of individual perfectionism in enhancing critical thinking, no previous studies have measured self-oriented learning perfectionism about critical thinking. This study aimed to address this gap. Building on SCT, in this study we unfold the mechanism through which self-oriented learning perfectionism of EFL learners affects critical thinking indirectly through metacognitive learning strategies. We expect a positive role of MLS between SOP and CT.

The mediating role of metacognitive learning strategies between affective factors and critical thinking

Since a critical thinker should be able to consider the justifications for her belief systems and take precautions to guarantee that they are sound, critical thinking should require a certain amount of metacognition ( Lau, 2015 ). The role of MLS in mediating the association between self-efficacy and critical thinking refers to how MLS can alter the connection between a person’s belief in their ability to succeed (self-efficacy) and their capacity to think critically. Studies have shown that MLS has a moderating effect on students’ self-efficacy, positive emotions, and their academic performance ( Hayat et al., 2020 ). According to SCT metacognition governs people’s cognitive processes and overall learning patterns. MLS are learning strategies in which learners actively govern their own cognitive processes. In addition to the relation between metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking, earlier examination suggests that self-efficacy performs an important role in decision-making, cognitive processes, and problem-solving techniques ( Dweck and Leggett, 1988 ; Zhou et al., 2023 ). A recent study by Teng and Yue (2022) examined Chinese university students’ metacognition, critical thinking skills, and academic writing. They stated the importance of CT in academic learning.

SOP is a capacity to set irrationally high expectations for oneself and engage in excessive self-criticism ( Razmi et al., 2020 ). MLS can assist students with learning perfectionism by allowing them to reflect on their own thinking and increase their control over their own learning. This understanding of the learning process improves one’s individual capacity for self-control while controlling one’s own learning desire.

Finally, MLS can aid anxious learners by allowing them to reflect on their own thoughts and increase their authority over their own learning ( soliemanifar et al., 2022 ). Additionally, MLS can help students become more adept at critical thinking by helping them focus more deliberately, reflect on what they already know versus what needs to be learned, identify flaws in their thinking, and create learning habits. The study, therefore, considers metacognitive learning methods as a mediating factor between academic self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, LA, and critical thinking, drawing on SCT. We expect the extended model of SCT through the mediation mechanism of metacognitive learning strategies would better explain the relationship between personal attributes (SE, LA, and SOP) and behavior (CT).

The moderating role of LP between MLS and critical thinking

Besides the affective factors, another crucial personality factor that can influence college students’ critical thinking is the learner’s proactive personality (or learner proactivity in the context of this study). Bateman and Crant (1993) defined proactivity refer to a dispositional inclination to influence one’s surroundings via personal activities. Previous research has found that proactivity strongly affects students’ MLS, learning-related emotions, and educational achievement ( Hayat et al., 2020 ). Personality characteristics can affect language learning in exciting, difficult, and possibly unanticipated ways. Despite numerous studies on personality characteristics and proficiency in second language acquisition conducted over many years, a complete picture of the relationship between personality qualities and proficiency in second language acquisition is still lacking. As a result, learner initiative may be reflected in learning preferences, which then motivate learning strategies and provide a particular learning outcome ( Heinström, 2012 ). For example, deep learning has been linked to personality qualities including openness, conscientiousness, and emotional stability. Deep learning shows intrinsic drive and frequently yields a positive study outcome ( Heinström, 2012 ). To help understand how student critical thinking develops, using the SCT lens, learner proactivity was examined as a moderating component in this study as it is a significant variable for forecasting EFL learning ( Kong et al., 2021 ). Thus, corroborating the moderating role of learner proactivity in the relationship between metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking is necessary to comprehend the EFL learning process better.

The present study

Considering the important role of critical thinking in English language learning as mediated by metacognitive learning strategies, we examined the mediating role of metacognitive learning strategies on academic self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, and learner anxiety on the development of critical thinking among EFL learners. Moreover, we proposed learner proactivity as a boundary condition between metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking relationships, as shown in Figure 1 .

Figure 1 . Study model.

The research questions for this study were as follows:

• Does MLS mediate the link between self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, learner anxiety, and critical thinking in the context of EFL learning?

• Is there any association between metacognitive learning strategies and the development of critical thinking in EFL learning?

• Does learner proactivity moderate the association between metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking in EFL learning?

Concerning these three study questions, the subsequent hypotheses were articulated:

H1 : Academic self-efficacy has a positive relation with MLS.

H2 : Self-oriented learning perfectionism has a positive relation with MLS.

H3 : Learner anxiety has a negative relation with MLS.

H4 : MLS has a positive relation with critical thinking.

H5 : MLS mediates the relationship between (H5a) academic SE, (H5b) SOP, and (H5c) learner anxiety and critical thinking.

H6 : Learner proactivity moderates the connection between MLS and critical thinking in such a way that this association will be stronger for students with a high level of proactivity than for those with low proactivity.

Research methodology

Participants and procedure.

The participants in this study were Chinese adolescents who have been learning English as a second language since kindergarten. A total of 305 Chinese students were recruited through the web-based survey tool Wen Juan Xing ( https://www.wjx.cn/ ). With the use of the online survey tool Wen Juan Xing, researchers can design, administer, gather, and evaluate data for their studies. The researchers were able to contact a greater number of subjects effectively and conveniently by using Wen Juan Xing. Because the survey tool was web-based, participants could complete it whenever it was convenient for them and there was no need for data collecting to take place in person. The sample was almost equally distributed between girls (155) and boys (150). The mean age of the participants was 18.5 years (standard deviation [SD] = 2.70), and all were studying in different colleges and universities in Central China. Ethical approval was obtained from the relevant authorities before conducting the online survey. The respondents were protected during the research process by having their details anonymized. They were aware that their involvement in the survey was entirely voluntary and that they could opt out at any time. To ensure accuracy, the questionnaires were translated into Chinese by an English language teacher and then back into English by a second English language teacher.

We utilized the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling sufficiency to determine the sample size’s suitability for model validation ( Hair et al., 2010 ; Bano et al., 2019 ; Khan, 2021a ). This measurement produced a value for our sample size of 0.92. According to previous research a value between 0.80 and 1.0 denotes that the sample size is sufficient for testing the model. We also utilized the G*Power analysis ( Faul et al., 2007 ), which assessed sample adequacy at a value of 0.15 and a threshold for significance of 0.05, to further establish sample size sufficiency. According to the G* Power test, a sample size of 305 participants was sufficient to examine the impact of independent factors on variables (critical t = 1.99, p < 0 .05). These results lead us to the conclusion that the sample of 305 participants.

Instruments

Unless otherwise specified, a five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (“strongly disagree”) to 5 (“strongly agree”), was used to measure the learners’ responses. This study used five-point Likert scale as these are easy to understand and use for both survey administrators and respondents. Moreover, five-point Likert scales provide a good balance between reliability and validity and are widely used in research ( Khan and Ali, 2018 ; Pitafi et al., 2020a , b ; Xiongfei et al., 2020 ), which makes it easier to compare results across different studies ( Cao et al., 2018 ; Raza et al., 2020 ; Khan and Khan, 2021 ; Ali and Khan, 2023 ).

Academic SE was measured using a four-item scale taken from the study of ( Artino et al., 2010 ). A sample item included was: “Even in the face of difficulties, I am certain I can learn the material presented in the English learning course.” The instrument showed satisfactory internal reliability (α = 0.86). SOP was measured using the Almost Perfect Scale-Revised (APS-R) standard subscale ( Slaney et al., 2001 ). A sample item of this seven-item scale included: “I have a strong need to strive for excellence.” This scale showed good internal reliability (α = 0.91). We used a four-item English LA scale developed by Hong et al. (2014) to measure LA concerning English language learning. One of the sample items included: “I worry that my proficiency in English will affect my English learning.” The internal reliability (α = 0.85) of this scale was acceptable.

A scale to measure MLS was taken from a previous study ( Pintrich and De Groot, 1990 ) involving 13 Likert-type items on a 5-point scale (with “1” equivalent to “not at all true of me” and “5” equivalent to “very true of me”). One example of a statement from the scale included: “When I study English, I put important ideas into my own words.” The scale showed acceptable internal reliability (α = 0.95). Critical thinking was measured using a 10-item scale developed by Erawan (2010) . The sample items from the ten-item scale included: “have related thinking and reasonable thinking.” This scale proved to have satisfactory internal reliability (α = 0.94). Learner proactivity was measured using a four-item scale created by Ashford and Black (1996) . One example of the sample items included: “I am always looking for better ways to do things.” The internal reliability (α = 0.87) for this scale was adequate.

Data analysis

By analyzing the skewness (Sk) and kurtosis (Ku) values, we first verified that our data had a normal distribution. As in previous research ( Khan et al., 2021 ; Ju and Wang, 2023 ), the values were below the suggested cut-offs (|Sk| < 2 and |Ku| < 7), indicating that the normalcy assumptions were met by our data. Table 1 shows the correlations among the main variables of this study. The patterns of the relationships among the variables followed the hypothesized direction. We used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to verify the latent constructs. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to address the study hypotheses. SEM is a statistical technique for examining complex associations between variables. While SEM is frequently employed in social science research ( Xiongfei et al., 2019 ; Khan, 2021b ; Li and Khan, 2022 ), it is also applicable in other domains, including psychology, business, and education ( Mehmood et al., 2020 ; Pitafi et al., 2020a , b ; Ali et al., 2021 ). Research questions with several variables and intricate interactions can benefit from the application of SEM. AMOS (Version 24.0) software was used to estimate all CFA and SEM results using full information maximum likelihood estimation. The CFA results showed good model fit (normed fit index = 0.905; comparative fit index = 0.914; root mean square error of approximation = 0.059), with these values being higher than the threshold. Individual item reliability, internal consistency reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity were used to confirm the reflective constructs.

Table 1 . Descriptive statistics, square roots of average variance extracted (AVE), and correlation matrix.

Table 2 shows that the minimum factor loading was 0.667 and that the maximum value was 0.880, both of which were greater than the standard lower limit of 0.50 ( Hair et al., 2010 ), indicating that there were no issues with individual item reliability in the analysis. If the value of a factor loading is greater than 0.40 but less than 0.50, an item can be retained if it does not affect the composite reliability (CR) and average variance extracted (AVE). Internal consistency reliability must be evaluated to determine the CR of each variable. According to Hair et al. (2010) , the CR construct should be higher than 0.60. As shown in Table 2 , all CR values were greater than the threshold, confirming the reliability of all constructs. Convergent validity was assessed using AVE values, as shown in Table 2 , and the AVE values exceeded the acceptable range of 0.50 ( Fornell and Larcker, 1981 ), confirming the convergent validity benchmark.

Table 2 . Items loadings, composite reliability, and average variance extracted of all variables.

We also found that the AVE of each variable was larger than the sum of its correlations with the other constructs ( Fornell and Larcker, 1981 ), indicating sufficient discriminant validity. This study also investigated the variance influence factors (VIF), which were found to be below the recommended value of 10 (highest VIF = 1.98), indicating that there was no serious problem with multicollinearity ( Hair et al., 2010 ). Reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity measurements were sufficient. Moreover, we applied Harman’s single-factor technique to assess CMB in the data. The results showed that the first factor had only 36.5% of the total variance, which was lower than the threshold of 50, confirming that there was no issue with CMB ( Bahadur et al., 2020 ; Hui and Khan, 2022 ; Khan, 2022 ).

Results of hypotheses testing

Hypothesis 1 stated that SE is positively related to MLS. As depicted in Figure 2 showed that academic SE was positively related to MLS (β = 0.41, p < 0.001), supporting hypothesis 1. Hypothesis 2 stated that SOP has a direct effect on MLS. The results showed that SOP was positively related to MLS (β = 0.18, p < 0.01), thus supporting hypothesis 2. Hypothesis 3 stated that LA has a direct effect on MLS. As shown in Figure 2 supported hypothesis 3 (β = −0.20, p < 0.01), as LA was negatively related to MLS, the variance explained by these factors into MLS was R 2 = 0.42. Hypothesis 4 stated that MLS has a positive effect on CT, which the results showed to be the case (β = 0.75, p < 0.001), thus supporting hypothesis 4; furthermore, the overall variance explained in CT was R 2 = 0.59. Moreover, age and gender were added as control variables in the studied model; however, their role was insignificant.

Figure 2 . Result of path analysis; * p < 0.05, ** < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.

Following the recommendations of ( Preacher et al., 2007 ), the bootstrapping method was applied concerning indirect effects to assess the mediation hypothesis. The findings as depicted in Table 3 showed that the following effects: SE → MLS → CT (β = 0.238, p < 0.001), SOP → MLS → CT (β = 0.237, p < 0.001), and LA → MLS → CT (β = −0.214, p < 0.001) were all significant. The bias-corrected 95% confidence intervals did not show any intervals straddling a zero, thus further validating the research results. Therefore, hypotheses 5a, 5b, and 5c were also supported.

Table 3 . Bootstrap test results for the mediating relationship.

Finally, the moderating hypothesis was tested in relation to hypothesis 6, which stated that LP moderates the effect of MLS on CT. As depicted in Figure 2 , the results of the moderating analysis showed an interaction effect of LP and MLS on CT (β = 0.140, p < 0.05), supporting hypothesis 6. We also graphically presented these effects in Figure 3 . The results showed that the direct effects of MLS on CT were stronger at higher levels (β = 0.810, p < 0.001) of LP than at lower levels (β = 0.510, p < 0.001).

Figure 3 . Interaction graph of metacognitive learning strategies (MLS) and learner proactivity in relation to critical thinking.

Affective factors have been put forth as important contributing factors to EFL learning. Earlier research has examined the relationship between the two ( Artino et al., 2010 ). Others also have argued for its role in thinking ( Ghorban Mohammadi et al., 2013 ). The present research intended to assess the impacts of self-efficacy, SOP, and learner anxiety on critical thinking and the mediating role of MLS in the link between self-efficacy, SOP, learner anxiety, and critical thinking. We also assessed the moderating effects of learner proactivity on the positive association between MLS and critical thinking.

The potential effects of SE, SOP, and LA on critical thinking

It has been suggested that self-efficacy might influence EFL students’ critical thinking in some way. According to the literature review, many studies have been conducted on CT, self-efficacy, and learning techniques, as well as their correlations with numerous variables. However, very little information was discovered, particularly among Chinese EFL learners, regarding the issue of whether the three factors are interrelated or not and how the association between them can be considered. The findings of this research showed that Chinese EFL learners’ CT skills are significantly influenced by their sense of self-efficacy ( Schunk and Ertmer, 2000 ).

These findings are consistent with data taken from prior investigations. For example, Fahim and Nasrollahi-Mouziraji (2013) discovered a significant positive association between leaners’ academic self-efficacy and their CT inclinations. Past studies have shown that perfectionism is a significant personality trait that influences the language performance of Chinese college students: the more perfectionism tendencies, the lower the amount of learning language skills, especially in listening and speaking. The evidence reported in this study fills the gap in the correlation between self-oriented perfectionism and critical thinking in EFL teaching, explaining at least that the interaction of metacognitive instruction and perfectionism status had a direct relation on the development of EFL learners’ critical thinking, with perfectionists being more affected by metacognitive instruction than non-perfectionists.

Based on prior findings, it may be stated that if we wish to improve the language abilities of EFL learners or reduce their anxiety, we must enhance their critical thinking. But the current finding holds that LA was negatively related to metacognitive learning strategies supports the proposition that when learning a foreign language, students with high-level anxiety may feel lost and cannot use effective learning strategies to monitor the learning process and adjust themselves, which will lead to poor performance in critical thinking and language acquisition.

The mediation of MLS between SE, SOP, LA, and critical thinking

Another finding worth highlighting is that Chinese EFL students who demonstrate self-efficacy and self-oriented perfectionist tendencies employ more metacognitive learning approaches than students who do not, and as a result, experience less anxiety when learning a new language. At this point, the critical thinking of perfectionist learners who set high expectations for themselves to promote English learning can be vastly enhanced when they have a solid and tenacious attitude toward sticking to the norms. Following prior studies, metacognitive learning strategies are related positively to critical thinking for language learning ( Ku and Ho, 2010 ), the present investigation expands on prior research that found MLS to be a mediator between self-oriented perfectionism, self-efficacy, and critical thinking.

The moderating role of learner proactivity between MLS and critical thinking

Finally, our findings related to our moderation hypothesis showed that learner proactivity enhanced the positive relationship between metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking. Although no previous study has tested the moderating role of learner proactivity in the context of metacognitive learning strategies and critical thinking, this finding is similar to findings in other fields where researchers have assessed the moderating effects of individuals’ personalities in different contexts ( Sun et al., 2016 ; Ali et al., 2019 ). It is important to note that motivated people are worried about the caliber of their work, both professionally as well as personally ( Lebni et al., 2020 ; Moin et al., 2021 ; Meng et al., 2023 ), and it is essential to evaluate the effect this has on the growth of critical thinking setting and in EFL class in general.

Implications

By applying SCT, this study clarified how affective factors associated with cognitive factors can influence EFL learners’ critical thinking. The outcome of this research is in accordance with prior research assessment of cognitive factors in the context of EFL learners. More precisely, our study’s findings showed that self-efficacy significantly moderated the relationship between self-efficacy and EFL learners’ critical thinking, accounting for the majority of the variance in MLS. This finding is consistent with SCT and shows that self-efficacy and metacognitive learning methods may be the main origins of EFL learners’ critical thinking. Learners with high levels of self-efficacy have been reported to use effective metacognitive learning strategies ( Hayat et al., 2020 ) and such strategies enable EFL learners to think critically about making optimal present and future decisions ( Halpern, 2014 ).

Our findings showed that self-oriented perfectionists were more likely to use several MLS that are typically related to constructive educational outcomes and demonstrate determined motivation to attain self-imposed high standards to think critically for academic success ( Mills and Blankstein, 2000 ). Considering the direct negative relationship between learner anxiety and MLS and the related indirect effects on EFL learners’ critical thinking, teachers need to deal appropriately with students’ learner anxiety while they are working on a learning task. Overall, incorporating creative learning with minimal teacher intervention may allow learners to engage in the learning process more effectively, experience the learning benefits of the activity more comprehensively, and reduce their anxiety about the learning task more successfully ( Abbas et al., 2019a , b ; Aqeel et al., 2022a , b ; Moin and Khan, 2023 ).

Finally, our results showed that LP enhanced the positive relationship between MLS and EFL learners’ critical thinking. Personality is the key element concerning learning new things and thinking critically ( Mills and Blankstein, 2000 ). Our results suggest that parents and universities should provide psychological interventions to foster certain types of personality development among students to encourage critical thinking. Students’ interpersonal skills are also influenced by critical thinking.

Limitations

This study has several limitations. First, only a self-reported survey was used to collect the data. Different techniques, including classroom interviews and observations, could be used in future studies to strengthen the study’s findings. Second, this study did not comprise a large sample size. The data were obtained from only one country; therefore, further studies involving larger sample sizes and data obtained from other countries would help clarify and confirm the association between the variables of interest in this study. Third, this study only examined the mediating role of metacognitive learning strategies on affective factors and critical thinking. Other potential explanatory variables could be investigated and identified in future studies (e.g., interactive classroom activities in critical thinking development). Fourth, this study did not measure causality but only correlational relationships. Finally, teacher-parent support has been investigated in student learning and stress settings ( Moin et al., 2022 ; Wijaya et al., 2022 ; Aqeel et al., 2022a , b ), therefore, this study suggested that future researcher may look at the possible influences of teacher-parent support on critical thinking.

To sum up, this research study represents a first step toward a more thorough comprehension of critical thinking in the context of EFL. It draws attention to the necessity of learner proactivity, the influence of personal characteristics, and the importance of metacognitive strategies for learning. By taking care of these issues, educators and policymakers may help EFL students develop into self-sufficient thinkers who are capable of navigating the challenges of the contemporary world.

Data availability statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

Ethics statement

The studies involving humans were approved by Management committee of School of foreign language, Hubei Engineering University. The studies were conducted in accordance with the local legislation and institutional requirements. Written informed consent for participation in this study was provided by the participants' legal guardians/next of kin.

Author contributions

JF: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Validation, Writing – original draft. YD: Investigation, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft. KN: Methodology, Project administration, Validation, Writing – original draft. GZ: Methodology, Software, Writing – review & editing.

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. The research on teaching reform of critical thinking English classroom with ChatGPT in local universities. Project Number: 2023007. Fund support Hubei Engineering University.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary material

The Supplementary material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1289594/full#supplementary-material

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Keywords: metacognitive learning strategies, critical thinking, academic self-efficacy, self-oriented learning perfectionism, learner anxiety, learner proactivity

Citation: Fu J, Ding Y, Nie K and Zaigham GHK (2023) How does self-efficacy, learner personality, and learner anxiety affect critical thinking of students. Front. Psychol . 14:1289594. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1289594

Received: 15 September 2023; Accepted: 06 November 2023; Published: 01 December 2023.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2023 Fu, Ding, Nie and Zaigham. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Ghulam Hussain Khan Zaigham, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

What is a Critical Personality Type?

If there is one word to describe the Critical personality type, it would be “discerning.”

These individuals are inquisitive and analytical, always looking for ways to improve their skills and knowledge.

If you’re curious about the Critical personality type or want to know how best to work with them, read on!

This article covers everything you need to know about this rare personality type.

Quick Navigation

So, what is a Critical personality and what does it mean?

Here’s a quick definition:

A critical personality type is someone who is quick to find fault in others and is often negative or pessimistic.

This type of person may seem nitpicky and difficult to please.

They may have high standards that are hard for others to meet.

Or, they may simply enjoy being critical for the sake of it.

They are also highly perfectionistic, which can sometimes lead to self-criticism.

Critical personality types can be frustrating to deal with, but they can also be funny, insightful, and even charming in their own way.

The key is to not take their criticisms too personally.

After all, they’re just trying to help you see the world more clearly – even if it isn’t always in a nice way.

What Are Critical Personality Characteristics & Traits?

Here are some of the most common characteristics and traits of someone who has a Critical personality type:

• People with a Critical personality type are perfectionists who always want things done perfectly
• They are very analytical and often have a scientific mind-set
• They tend to be very critical of themselves and others, and can be quite judgmental
• They like to be in control of everything and often have difficulty dealing with change
• They are usually independent, strong-willed, and highly motivated individuals
• Although they may seem cold and unapproachable at first, once you get to know them they are actually very loyal friends

Critical Personality Examples

People with Critical personality types are often known for their sharp minds and their ability to see both the good and the bad in people and situations.

They are often quick to judge and are not afraid to voice their opinions.

While this can sometimes be seen as a negative trait, it can also be a strength.

People with Critical personalities are often able to see things that others miss and they are often very honest.

Some famous people who have Critical personalities include: Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney, Ellen DeGeneres, and Tina Fey.

Each of these people is known for their quick wit and their ability to see both the positive and the negative in people and situations.

While Critical personalities can sometimes be seen as harsh, they can also be very insightful and honest.

How Can You Tell If You Have a Critical Personality Type?

There are several ways to tell if you have a Critical personality type.

One way is to look at your work habits.

People with this personality type tend to be perfectionists who are never satisfied with their work.

They are also highly independent and often work long hours to meet deadlines.

Another way to tell if you have a Critical personality type is to examine your relationships.

People with this personality type often have difficulty forming close personal relationships and may be seen as cold or aloof by others.

Finally, people with a Critical personality type tend to be highly analytical and logical in their thinking.

If you exhibit these tendencies, it’s possible that you have a Critical personality type.

Benefits of Having a Critical Personality Type

People with a Critical personality type are often seen as skeptical and harsh in their evaluations.

However, there are many benefits to this way of thinking.

For one, people with a Critical personality type are usually very truthful.

They are not afraid to speak their mind, even if it means pointing out flaws in other people’s ideas.

As a result, they can be invaluable in helping to make sure that projects are well-planned and executed.

In addition, people with a Critical personality type tend to be very detail-oriented.

They notice things that others might overlook, and they are not satisfied with anything less than perfection.

This attention to detail can be critical in fields such as medicine and engineering, where even small errors can have disastrous consequences.

Finally, people with a Critical personality type tend to be analytical and objective in their thinking.

They are not easily swayed by emotion or persuasion, and they prefer to make decisions based on facts and logic.

This type of thinking is essential in professions such as law and finance, where the stakes are often high and emotions can cloud judgment.

While some see the Critical personality type as cold and unforgiving, there is no denying that this way of thinking has its advantages.

Challenges of Having a Critical Personality Type

One of the challenges that come with having a Critical personality type is that people tend to see you as negative or always looking for faults.

This can make it difficult to form close relationships, as people may feel like they are constantly being judged.

Another challenge is that you may have difficulty seeing the positive side of things, and this can lead to feeling pessimistic and discouraged.

However, it is important to remember that everyone has their own unique perspective, and that your Critical personality type can be an asset in many ways.

For example, you are likely to be very detail-oriented and able to spot problems that others may miss.

You also tend to be very honest and direct, which can be refreshing for those who are used to dealing with people who sugarcoat things.

Ultimately, the key is to strike a balance between using your critical thinking skills to help solve problems and being open to different points of view.

Flowing Cents

Is 21 Too Young for Marriage? Here are 10 Considerations

Posted: May 27, 2024 | Last updated: May 27, 2024

Early adulthood is a phase where an individual’s cerebrum develops improved critical thinking skills and social and emotional development. Our intellect continues to increase throughout the mid and late 20s. Still, people are generally considered emotionally mature and capable of forming complex social relationships with others in the late adolescent period.

Monetary Security

Financial stability allows couples to adapt to unexpected changes in monthly financial duties, including costly medical bills, regressing economics, or job loss. It adds reassurance in a marriage’s life-long commitment and provides peace of mind to spouses, knowing they can navigate through their marriage’s ups and downs without worrying about income.

Personality Growth and Individualism

Young adults are likely to go through massive changes in their ideologies. The alterations may cause hurdles in marriage and limit a person’s journey to self-exploration. From an individual’s view, entering a lifelong commitment immediately after entering adulthood is not worth it. Identical political, religious, and philosophical views play a major role in holding marriages together.

Lack of Experience

At the ripe age of 21, many students have just jumped out of their full-time education commitment and are still finding ways to settle in the flux. Their lack of experience could make handling disputes within matrimonial bonds challenging. A commentator jokes that one should marry at 21 if they are not in a hurry but halt the marriage if they’re in a hurry.

Educational Pursuits

Many people prefer continuing education after 21, which may cause difficulties in balancing both marital responsibilities and the emotional stress that comes with it. Moreover, with only a high school or college degree, one cannot guarantee a steady income and career to help with finances in a marriage.

Divorce Rates

Studies have shown higher divorce rates in young couples. It is advised to wait till 25 as it’s the age when your frontal cortex is further matured and evolved. Lack of pre-marital counseling and lack of relationship experience are a common addition to this cause. Differences in family backgrounds may cause tensions in marriages, especially if the couple hasn’t talked through it.

Social Networks and Emotional Support

Friends and mentors within one’s circle are valuable when it comes to seeking guidance from a third-person perspective; they can act as a means of solace in emotional turmoil. Diverse social networks can be a part of celebrating marriage milestones together, enriching your experiences, and acting as mediators when resolving conflicts.

Missing on Life’s Adventures

It is advised for individuals to go through various destinations alone solely to understand the world better. Marrying young may inhibit one from embracing life’s richness and taking on individual routes to destinations.

Responsibilities

Marriages come with great commitments and conjugal responsibilities that early adults might not be able to take on, e.g., spouse duties, house chores, effective nonverbal communication, expressing emotions honestly, and solving conflicts.

Societal influence or Cultural Expectations

Societal pressure that comes from cultural or traditional expectations such as gender roles, family planning, career choices, and free will in bodily autonomy might cause conflicts if they do not align with individual personal goals and values. At the given age, people are inexperienced at solving clashing standpoints. Many individuals may feel coerced into thinking that their partner is the right person for them or that it is the right age for marriage, therefore clouding their ability to judge situations fairly.

Resilience and Self-Assurance

The ability to withstand differing opinions and criticism from the public improves as a person ages. At an older age, a person is confident and emotionally mature so as to not waver from others’ opinions of them. A viewer pointed out an outstanding perspective, saying that the fact that the questioner needed to ask the public’s opinion showed their understanding of the world. Strong marriages can grow back from conflicts and build upon healthy mutual understanding of one another.

15 Women From the 90’s Everyone Loved

In the 1990s, actresses like Jennifer Aniston, Demi Moore and Julia Roberts were some of the most popular women in the world. They starred in blockbuster films, graced the covers of magazines, and had legions of fans. While their careers have changed over the years, these women remain iconic figures from the 1990s. Here is a look at 15 women from the 90s that everyone had a crush on.

• 15 Women From the 90’s Everyone Had a Crush On

“No More Woke Garbage” 10 Iconic Black and White Movies That Are Actually Good

Black and white movies may not be as popular as modern-day movies, but they are classics. Every connoisseur of cinema should watch them at least once. Recently, in a platform discussion, people have shared black and white movies that are a must-watch for any film enthusiast.

10 Movies/TV Shows That Ruined the Entire Franchise

Franchise owners and filmmakers work tirelessly to produce hit movies and television shows that keep fans engaged and coming back for more. But sometimes, a single misstep can cause a franchise to crash and burn. On a popular online forum, users discussed the movies and television episodes that killed franchises. Here are the top ten responses:

• “That Movie Is Destined To Suck” 10 Cringe Actors Who Instantly Ruin Movies

Actors and actresses can make or break a movie with their performances. While some are beloved by audiences and critics alike, others are criticized for their lackluster acting skills and ability to ruin an otherwise good film. Recently, in a discussion on a platform, people have shared actors and actresses who can instantly ruin movies with their performances.

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