Introduction and definition of critical thinking - Research Paper Example

Introduction and definition of critical thinking Critical thinking is a complex concept that warrants several definitions because one-line definitions tend to be incomplete and restrictive. It may be defined as an attitude in which problems and topics within the realm of one’s experiences are considered in a thoughtful way. Sariolghalam and Noruzi (2010) observed that critical thinking encompasses one’s capacity to conjure up critical issues and problems by collecting and appraising relevant information as well as utilizing abstract ideas to effectively decode information. Even though other definitions of critical thinking are true and relevant, this particular definition is more compatible with the goals of research. This paper will discuss the benefits of critical thinking and cite some of the people who did not complete college and yet became successful because they applied critical and creative thinking. The conditions for creating critical thinking and its impediments will also be discussed as well as need for improving critical thinking in education system. Benefits of critical thinking Critical thinking motivates people to judge things and situations hence improving the world. A critical thinker is intentional and autonomous. These characteristics help to cultivate skepticism and open-minded approach to situations. One is self-critical and takes into account multiple alternatives. Critical thinking enhances one’s problem solving abilities and recognizes one’s defective thinking as well as instituting truth over social approval (Connell-Carrick, 2006). Sariolghalam and Noruzi (2010) observed that critical thinking is important in enhancing personal skills, realistic intelligence, competence, and life fitness. Critical thinking is objective, responds to, and guided by intellectual benchmarks including accuracy, clarity, precision, depth, breadth, and relevance. A critical thinker is able to cultivate intellectual characteristics including integrity, endurance, self-discipline, endurance, and humility. Critical thinking enables one to recognize thought aspects characterizing any problem so that a logical connection is established between the thought aspects and the problem at hand. Critical thinking provides one with the incentive of critically assessing his/her thoughts entirely as well as analyzing one’s thoughts. Critical thinking imparts integrity because it predisposes the thinker to make commitments at cultivating intellectual humility, perseverance, sense of justice and fairness, and courage. In this way, the thinker is able to avoid fallacious thinking, misconceptions, prejudice, superficial, and defective thinking. Furthermore, critical thinking results to logical conclusions and well-reasoned outcomes, hence achieving productivity. In addition, critical thinking enables people to make well-informed and thoughtful decisions (Sariolghalam and Noruzi 63). Are there people who never graduated from high school but have become great successes? A number of rich and most successful people in the world did not graduate from college. Some went for initial semesters then dropped out while others never went to college at all. This has proven wrong the myth that success in life would come by going to college. Forbes for example, ranked Bill Gates the richest person in world twenty-seven times yet a college dropout. Bill invented the Microsoft two years after drop out from the college. Andrew Jackson, the sixth US president was the military governor, Army commander congressional representative, and attorney. He achieved this despite having not been in college. John Rockefeller dropped out of high school. He was the first American Billionaire. He is regarded as the richest man of all time. He founded the Standard Oil in 1870. Halle Berry never went to college. The Oscar-winning actress preferred to move to Chicago and become a model and actress. She was able to mobilize greater advertising fee after winning the Academy Award. Michael Dell was a college drop out who had started Dell, Inc. while in college. His worth was $ 12.3 billion in 2009. Rachel Ray hosted several cooking shows that featured in Food Network, best selling cookbooks in New York Times and launch of her magazine. She was ranked 76th among 100 Celebrity in 2008 (Financial Planning para 1). Is it always a good thing to think critically? Critical thinking has been identified as scientific thinking. The practice of thinking critically is essential in conducting science. This is because people are conditioned to follow those in authority from birth without questioning their judgments. Parents and teachers often use dogmatic approach that has both positive and negative consequences. Critical thinkers lead happier lives because they process reliable knowledge and live in purposeful existence, rather than leading ignorant lives characterized by processing false beliefs (Schafersman 6). Best possible conditions for generating critical thinking Critical thinking encompasses both cognitive skills and dispositions. Dispositions are often regarded as attitudes of mind. Such dispositions include fair-mindedness, inquisitiveness, resilience, reason seeking, desire for information, and open-mindedness, that is, respect and willingness to accommodate diverse viewpoints (Lai 3). Carey and McCardie (2011) observed that critical thinking is cultivated through self-awareness practice and tolerating uncertainties when in situations of ethical dilemmas, and application of knowledge one obtains from various sources. Empirical evidence shows that attaining critical thinking is increasingly becoming difficult due to changes in the social environment. The linking of classroom theories to practical life experiences has become more difficult to enact due to changes in agencies and academic programs during the last decade. Connell-Carrick (2006) argued that critical thinking skills demands one’s comparison of an advice against an existing benchmark, which may be an empirical evidence from a trusted source or a person’s own beliefs and moral principles. Professional literature provides resource although the relevance of such literature must be ascertained to determine its merit (Carey and McCardie 359). Why and how do those conditions help to produce it? The practice of self-awareness and tolerance towards ambiguities are attitudinal and develop gradually with time. Environmental factors, peers, and adults primarily influence the dispositions of critical thinking. The propensity for critical thinking serves as strong antecedents for critical thinking although can be altered and are gradual. These dispositions provide the gateway for an individual’s mind to get involved in thinking process. In order to increase the probability of an individual to successfully handle complex questions, seek multiple alternatives, question decisions, or look for solutions to practical problems, the dispositions for critical thinking must be high enough (Irani, Rudd and Gallo 8). Can living in different cities affect the way we think? Has living in San Diego affected your critical thinking? Living in different cities tends to affect our critical thinking because paradigms are different. It changes in social environment because human behaviors vary from one city to the other. Due to different cultures, the critical thinking, both written and spoken tend to differ. Paradigm analysis therefore, is very important in critically evaluating many views one explores for their consistency (Carey and McCardie 358). What are some personal barriers that prevent us from thinking at our best? Dover (2008) indicated that people who base their arguments on emotions tend to ignore valuable evidence and often prefer a friend. Engaging in critical thinking involves putting aside one’s emotion towards another person and concentrate on the facts or evidences at hand. Giving credulity to particular opinions based on authority of somebody is fallacious. The tendency to support an argument because a person admires or is in authority can be misleading because his/her argument may not be necessarily correct. Instead, people should focus on researching claims on their own. Most people have the propensity to lend credibility to the things that many people witness, do in their lives, or things they often see or hear. This ad populi argument demonstrated by majority can be misleading. The fact that something appears normal and popular among people does not make it right (Dover para 3). Another impediment is in people’s lack of memory understanding. This is the most important of barriers. The bizarreness of human memory makes it difficult for many people to understand. People tend to assume that their minds can remember everything perfectly which in reality our memories are not that great. The unconscious alteration, elaboration, and making up of memories by people can be fallacious. Our memories tend to be plastic in nature. People tend to put a lot of trust in their memory. Lack of understanding of human memory gives credibility to insufficient evidence. It is possible that two memories can amalgamate to form a third memory. Information that is not sufficiently backed up with evidence cannot be trusted because our memories are not dependable (Dover 3). Do fears and emotions, including passion; have any place in critical thinking? Does critical thinking require "selflessness"? Grewal and Salovey (2005) observed that emotion and intelligence are inseparable. People tend to concentrated on the logical advantages and disadvantages of multiple alternatives that they face during decision-making. Empirical evidence shows that the outcomes of decision-making process devoid of feelings may not be effective. Decision-making tends to get impaired when emotions and feelings are not connected. There is a close relationship between emotions and cognitive processes of the brain. This disapproves the Stoic and Cartesian concepts that thinking and feeling are distinct, and that this separation may underlie catastrophic outcomes. Selflessness comes because of strong perception of feeling (Assanova and McGuire 8). Should it be a priority of government or industry or colleges to create such conditions? Colleges are charged with responsibilities of creating conditions that facilitate student success in colleges. Educational institutions and governments are involved in critical thinking training. Riedel, Morath and McGonigle (2000) observed that mentoring influences our critical thinking. Educational practitioners use classification of information processing skills of students to teaching and appraising student’s high thinking skills. Analytical, synthesis, and evaluation are the three highest levels that serve as tools often used to demonstrate critical thinking by students. The educational approach to critical thinking is important bases for arguments on years of classroom practice and observations of learning of students (Lai 8). Critical Thinking has become a common goal in most colleges and universities over the last 10-15 years. But how can it be measured? Florida Test for Critical Thinking Skills (UF/CTS) is scientific method used to measure critical thinking abilities. The instrument uses analysis, evaluation, and inference as the basis of measurements. The three skills are used to indicate the overall set of skills for critical thinking of an individual. Questions within the context of knowledge being examined are used to reflect critical thinking skills of an individual. The Qualitative Florida Scale for Critical Thinking Skills (UF/QCTS) approach consists of prompting questions, a score sheet, and a rubric. These components examine the critical thinking abilities when an individual criticizes editorials present in newspapers, Internet, or magazine (Irani, Rudd, and Gallo 15). Does getting an "A" in a class mean that the student is a good critical thinker? Lai (2011) observed that student’s background knowledge is important in indicating his/her critical thinking abilities. Background knowledge enables a student to have something to think about critically. Getting an “A” therefore does not determine students’ critical thinking abilities because learning, specific disciplines, and application of critical thinking skills in different contexts demands domain-specific knowledge. A critical thinking student is able to interpret methodological principles and competencies essential in engaging practices that are usually regulated and which are fundamentals of reasonable judgments within that particular context (Lai 12). Should the typical high school, college, and university curricula change to increase critical thinking? There is need for change in education curricula to increase critical thinking. Science educators and textbook writers believe that imparting as much factual information as possible to students within a specific time underlie the larger textbooks and reinforce education curricula. Students have had to memorize and learn more factual information. The education systems have prioritized procurement of scientific methods and concepts at the expense of learning scientific methods and theories (Kuh, Kinzie and Buckley 6). This has led to loss of crucial accompanying duties of imparting the methodology of appropriate appraisal, decoding, and investigation of all scientific data. In other words, students are increasingly becoming deficient in critical thinking. The consequences of loss of critical thinking in education curricula are more pervasive in primary and secondary education. The ability of students in math and science in the US has experienced sharp decline towards the end of twentieth century in comparison to other industrialized nations. Students in the US tend to have their science and math abilities begin on the same level with students of other countries, and continuously decline as they progress through US educational system. The students’ math and science aptitude would be the lowest among industrialized nations by the time students finish high school. Colleges have to deal with scientific and critical thinking deficiencies in high school students (Schafersman 4). If it needs to be changed what classroom techniques would help? Schafersman (1991) observed that lecturing is not effective in teaching critical thinking. This is because critical thinking requires that a student to be active. Listening is a passive process. Actual performance of high-order thinking skills is important for learning critical thinking skills. Administration of classroom instructions, homework, and examination of students in areas of analysis, reflection, evaluation, and synthesis should therefore, ensure intellectual participation by the student. Critical thinking can be enhanced during lecture by stopping and asking students questions that are seeking and thoughtful from time to time during lecture. The questions should be about the lecture that had just been presented. The lecturer should allow appropriate time to react to these questions. The lecturer is not supposed to answer the questions immediately as doing so would not allow students sufficient time to think through their answer before responding. The lecturer should also learn students’ names much quicker and ask them questions. If the student finds it difficult to answer the question, the lecturer should simplify the question and guide these specific students through the process of thinking (Schafersman 8). Are there particular relationships between teachers and students that should be promoted? Peer coaching is important in ensuring critical thinking strategies are implemented successfully by teachers. Peer coaches or teachers are usually organized in groups of twos, threes or even larger group and often visit the class of another teacher for observational learning, which aids in suggestions for improvement. Peer visits are at least four times annually and eight to nine times at most. There is increased communication between teachers and students, and learning is strengthened during in service sessions. This increases the probability of imparting knowledge and skills to students (Cotton 3). Are there differences in various kinds of intelligence, like social intelligence, emotional intelligence and physical intelligence? Mueller (2012) observed that physical intelligence entails the ability to be wisely responsive to slight stimuli that one’s body provides. It encompasses the appropriate time one needs to stop pushing oneself and taking a break. Emotional intelligence is a person’s capacity to study and regulate his/her emotions. This engenders a personal initiative towards identifying and managing other people’s emotions. An emotionally intelligent person would notice how one would respond when reprimanded or praised and would adapt his arguments to invoke other person’s positive emotions and resolve the negative emotions. Social intelligence involves individuals who have attained self-actualization and look beyond the scope of their own needs. Socially intelligent people tend to concentrate on the need for success by individuals or groups. A socially intelligent individual has the ability to assess the emotional atmosphere and its effects on the group and then react with positive interrelationship. In other words, a socially intelligent person is an effective team leader as he/she is good at leading a group to make correct decisions, promotes team cohesiveness, and has good problem solving abilities (Mueller para 3). If so, can we “translate” accomplishments in those fields to traditional academic intelligence? The concept of emotional intelligence represents a fundamental accomplishment of new concepts of intelligence. The traditional intelligence has primarily focused on the relationship between thought and emotions. Assanova and McGuire (2009) observed that the traditional form of intelligence including intelligence quotient (IQ) fail to address thought processes of people fully. The Stoics of ancient Greece and Rome asserted that emotions were highly controversial and uncertain concerning rational thought. Stoics believed that emotions are strongly linked to women and thus represented the weak, inferior humanity aspects. This stereotype of regarding women as the more emotional gender is still persistent. Several theories of intelligence have been advanced during the twentieth century that has revolutionized modern psychology. Thorndike’s theory of social intelligence asserted people’s ability to perceive the inner states, stimulus, and behaviors of their own and others, and respond accordingly. Since the 1980s, seven distinct aspects of intelligence have been defined. The Gardner’s concepts of intrapersonal and interpersonal intelligence are analogous to the present conceptualization of emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is regarded as form of social intelligence. Managing emotions has fundamental consequences to social relationships although it contributes to other life aspects (Grewal and Salovey 332; Assanova and McGuire 8). What are the differences between the left and right hemispheres, and how do they affect the link between creative thinking and critical thinking? There has been a remarkable diffusion of new evidences concerning the cognitive development and organization of the human brain. Andres (2003) observed that the left and right brain hemispheres have different functions in thinking, perception, memory, and feeling. Current investigations into brain lateralization illustrate increase in understanding of how an individual’s brain develops and enacts visual creativity. Empirical evidence shows that the cerebral hemispheres of the brain determine how an individual’s perception of color, perspective, shape, texture, pattern, and the correlation of different light shades. Visual creativity is not entirely localized in the brain. Both right and left cerebral hemispheres contribute to a person’s visual creativity in different ways. The right hemisphere for instance, tends to contour an object, whereas the left hemisphere helps in details (Andres para 2). Robin (2009) observed that brain’s left hemisphere is fundamentally objective and analytical, and it handles effectively math, written and spoken words, critical thinking, and analytical thinking of the physical science type. On the contrary, the right hemisphere primarily subjective and intuitive, and is actively involved in creativity in music, arts, conception and insight as well viewing objects in three-dimension. Moreover, the several sections of the right hemisphere can work in harmony in combining information that is of kinesthetic, visual, proprioceptive, and interoceptive nature concerning the posture and movement of the body. The right cerebral hemisphere is also responsible for personality traits, emotions, language that is not literal, and sense of humor (Robin 100). Conclusion Critical thinking has several definitions. Many authors have offered higher-level thinking definition. All humans have been conditioned from birth to follow authorities dogmatically without questioning their statements. This conditioning continues to adulthood. The conditioning makes it difficult for most people to think for themselves. A critical thinker often assesses the gathered information using the relevant benchmarks in order to draw well-reasoned conclusions and solutions. Paradigm analysis involves thinking about thinking. Education curricula have mainly focused on increasing amount of factual information rather than learning scientific methods and theories. This has led to loss of crucial accompanying duties of imparting the methodology of appropriate appraisal, decoding, and investigation of all scientific data. Success in life does not necessarily come to people who have gone to college. Works Cited Andres, Amy. Visual Creativity & Brain Lateralization Bibliography. August 2003. 21 April 2012. Assanova, Maiya and Michael McGuire. "Applicability Analysis of the Emotional Intelligence Theory." Research Thesis 12 September 2009: 1-31. Carey, Maureen E and Melissa McCardie. "Field Note:Can observational field model enhance critical thnking and generalist practice skills?" Journal of Social Work Education 47.2 (2011): 357-366. Connell-Carrick, Kelli. "Trends in Popular Parenting Books and the Need for Parental Critical Thinking." Child Welfare League of America 85.5 (2006): 819-836. Cotton, Kathleen. 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