Critical Thinking Resources

There are various definitions developed in the critical thinking literature. One critical thinking definition that is often quoted is that by Robert Ennis: ‘Critical thinking is reasonable and reflective thinking that is focused upon deciding what to believe or do’.
The significance of what constitutes ‘reasonable and reflective thinking’ is often seen as needing some unpacking and a further definition seeks to provide more detail. This is from Peter Facione: ‘Critical thinking is ‘purposeful, self-regulatory judgment which results in interpretation, analysis, evaluation, and inference, as well as explanation of evidential, conceptual, methodological, criteriological, or contextual considerations upon which that judgment is based.’

Whatever you are doing right now, whatever you feel, whatever you want--all are determined by the quality of your thinking. If your thinking is unrealistic, your thinking will lead to many disappointments. If your thinking is overly pessimistic, it will deny you due recognition of the many things in which you should properly rejoice. For most people, most of their thinking is subconscious, that is, never explicitly put into words. The problem is that when you are not aware of your thinking you have no chance of “correcting” it. When thinking is subconscious, you are in no position to see any problems in it. And, if you don't see any problems in it, you won't be motivated to change it.

Critical thinking is one of the most important skills deemed necessary for college graduates to become effective contributors in the global workforce. The first part of this article provides a comprehensive review of its definitions by major frameworks in higher education and the workforce, existing assessments and their psychometric qualities, and challenges surrounding the design, implementation, and use of critical thinking assessment. In the second part, we offer an operational definition that is aligned with the dimensions of critical thinking identified from the reviewed frameworks and discuss the key assessment considerations when designing a next-generation critical thinking assessment. This article has important implications for institutions that are currently using, planning to adopt, or designing an assessment of critical thinking.

Structured analytic techniques (SATs) are a key part of the rigorous analytic tradecraft the Intelligence Community (IC) has pursued in recent years, but so far these techniques have received little systematic evaluation. This report argues that the assessment of SATs is essential, albeit difficult; suggests specific questions that should be part of that assessment; and proposes several methods for ascertaining the practical value of SATs. The report also offers the results of a pilot study that explored conducting such an evaluation via structured interviews with analytic practitioners and a qualitative assessment of a body of IC products to examine the incidence and utility of SATs. These preliminary efforts do not offer definitive conclusions about the value of SATs but illustrate how the IC might evaluate them more systematically.

Evaluative thinking (ET) is an increasingly important topic in the field of evaluation, particularly
among people involved in evaluation capacity building (ECB). Yet it is a construct in need of clarification, especially if it is to be meaningfully discussed, promoted, and researched. To that end, we
propose that ET is essentially critical thinking applied to contexts of evaluation. We argue that ECB,
and the field of evaluation more generally, would benefit from an explicit and transparent appropriation of well-established concepts and teaching strategies derived from the long history of work on critical thinking. In this article, based on previous work in the fields of education, cognitive science, and critical thinking, as well as on our experience as ECB practitioners, we propose several guiding principles and specific strategies for teaching ET that draw directly from research on the teaching of critical thinking.

Structured analytic techniques (SATs) are intended to improve intelligence analysis by checking
the two canonical sources of error: systematic biases and random noise. Although both goals are
achievable, no one knows how close the current generation of SATs comes to achieving either of
them. We identify two root problems: (1) SATs treat bipolar biases as unipolar. As a result, we
lack metrics for gauging possible over-shooting—and have no way of knowing when SATs that
focus on suppressing one bias (e.g., over-confidence) are triggering the opposing bias (e.g.,
under-confidence); (2) SATs tacitly assume that problem decomposition (e.g., breaking
reasoning into rows and columns of matrices corresponding to hypotheses and evidence) is a
sound means of reducing noise in assessments. But no one has ever actually tested whether
decomposition is adding or subtracting noise from the analytic process—and there are good
reasons for suspecting that decomposition will, on balance, degrade the reliability of analytic
judgment. The central shortcoming is that SATs have not been subject to sustained scientific of
the sort that could reveal when they are helping or harming the cause of delivering accurate
assessments of the world to the policy community.

Previous publications used the term critical thinking (CT) skills and critical thinking practice interchangeably. This article describes the difference between them, defining skills as prerequisite abilities, while practices as real activities. People may have skills, but they do not always use them in everyday life. The question is what triggers people to practice CT given they already have skills and dispositions. To answer this, we will need to understand the roles of CT skills and dispositions in each stage of CT process. This article explains the position of the skill dimension as described by Halpern and twelve dispositions (derived from Dwyer's research) in the three stages of CT process (Pennycook, Fugelsang, and Koehler). Realizing the implication of practicing CT when people were in the detecting conflict stage is important to determine whether a person is going to think critically or not.