How to improve your critical thinking skills in 7 steps
Critical thinking is self-guided, self-disciplined thinking which attempts to reason at the highest level of quality in a fair-minded way. People who think critically consistently attempt to live rationally, reasonably, emphatically. They use the intellectual tools that critical thinking offers — concepts and principles that enable them to analyse, assess, and improve thinking. They work diligently to develop the intellectual virtues of intellectual integrity, intellectual humility, intellectual civility, intellectual empathy, intellectual sense of justice and confidence in reason.
Critical thinking is a rich concept that has been developing throughout the past 2,500 years. Critical thinking is the process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing or evaluating information gathered through observation, experience, empathy, reasoning and communication. Critical thinking, which is very useful in problem-solving, is a unique tool for generating creative ideas. Critical thinking is essential, especially for science. But it would be wrong to say that it is used only in science.
Especially people who have a career goal and want to be successful should be able to apply the critical thinking process at every stage of their lives. Everyone can use different critical thinking methods about the problem they are dealing with or trying to solve. Whatever you’re dealing with, here are the common points of critical thinking in general.
1. To be able to see both sides of a subject.
2. Being open to thoughts that falsify your thoughts.
3. Requesting ideas supported by evidence.
4. To draw conclusions from the facts that can be reached, to understand and to solve the problem.
Thinking critically is actually not easy. Even in the academic field, a person may not be an effective critical thinker in all situations. Critical thinking is not a skill that can only be taught through education. First of all, it is necessary to have a curious tendency toward thinking.
Only people willing to think can get into the critical thinking phase. Those people;
- must be resistant to misdirection,
- be able to overcome confusion,
- make judgments based on evidence,
- seek connections between problems,
- be intellectually independent
- and must be honest with himself.
At this point, people who want to think critically should improve themselves in the following:
1. Breaking an existing problem into small pieces and putting them back together in different ways.
2. Searching and gathering all kinds of information, facts and evidence regarding each part of the problem.
3. Understanding the importance of the information obtained and revealing what it means
4. Foreseeing a plan and putting it into practice
Steps of Critical Thinking
1. Identify the problem or question
Be as precise as possible: the narrower the issue, the easier it is to find solutions or answers.
2. Gather data, opinions, and arguments
Try to find several sources that present different ideas and points of view.
3. Analyze and evaluate the data
Are the sources reliable? Are their conclusions data-backed or just argumentative? Is there enough information or data to support the given hypotheses?
4. Identify assumptions
Are you sure the sources you found are unbiased? Are you sure you weren’t biased in your search for answers?
5. Establish the significance
What piece of information is most important? Is the sample size sufficient? Are all opinions and arguments even relevant to the problem you’re trying to solve?
6. Make a decision/reach a conclusion
Identify various conclusions that are possible and decide which (if any) of them are sufficiently supported. Weigh the strengths and limitations of all possible options.
7. Present or communicate
Once you’ve reached a conclusion, present it to all stakeholders.
Questions to Fire Up Our Critical Thinking Skills
Interpretation
• What does this mean?
• What’s happening?
• How should we understand that (e.g., what he or she just said)?
• What is the best way to characterize/categorize/classify this?
• In this context, what was intended by saying/doing that?
• How can we make sense out of this (experience, feeling, or statement)?
Analysis
• Please tell us again your reasons for making that claim.
• What is your conclusion/What is it that you are claiming?
• Why do you think that?
• What are the arguments pro and con?
• What assumptions must we make to accept that conclusion?
• What is your basis for saying that?
Inference
• Given what we know so far, what conclusions can we draw?
• Given what we know so far, what can we rule out?
• What does this evidence imply?
• If we abandoned/accepted that assumption, how would things change?
• What additional information do we need to resolve this question?
• If we believed these things, what would they imply for us going forward?
• What are the consequences of doing things that way?
• What are some alternatives we haven’t yet explored?
• Let’s consider each option and see where it takes us.
• Are there any undesirable consequences that we can and should foresee?
Evaluation
• How credible is that claim?
• Why do we think we can trust what this person claims?
• How strong are those arguments?
• Do we have our facts right?
• How confident can we be in our conclusion, given what we now know?
Explanation
• What were the specific findings/results of the investigation?
• Please tell us how you conducted that analysis.
• How did you come to that interpretation?
• Please take us through your reasoning one more time.
• Why do you think that (was the right answer/was the solution)?
• How would you explain why this particular decision was made?
Self-Regulation
• Our position on this issue is still too vague; can we be more precise?
• How good was our methodology, and how well did we follow it?
• Is there a way we can reconcile these two apparently conflicting conclusions?
• How good is our evidence?
• OK, before we commit, what are we missing?
Source: © 2014 User Manual for the California Critical Thinking Skills Test, published by Insight Assessment.