Critical Decision Making 

There are many definitions and descriptions of Critical Thinking (CT), owing to the emphasis on critique in traditional western philosophy and to experts like Glaser, Delphi, and Dewey. This is in addition to the definition arrived at by the American Philosophical Association, which convened an authoritative panel of 46 experts to produce a definitive account of the concept. A few of those definitions are included in this section.  CT was defined by Drs. Richard Paul and Michael Scriven in their statement given at the 8th Annual International Conference on Critical Thinking and Education Reform in 1987:  Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness. A more succinct definition is available from Chapter 2 of Dr. Richard Paul's anthology, ‘Critical Thinking: What Every Person Needs to Survive in a Rapidly Changing World,’ where Paul defined CT as “Thinking about your thinking while you’re thinking in order to make your thinking better.” These definitions are taken from the website criticalthinking.org, which contains a reservoir of resources (courses, conferences, library, events, assessment tools) on the subject and is the official website for The Foundation of Critical Thinking started by Dr. Paul and Dr. Linda Elder. Another widely adopted definition of CT is offered by Ennis (1993): "Critical thinking is reasonable reflective thinking focused on deciding what to believe or do” (p. 180). Ennis elaborated on the characteristics of a critical thinker as someone who can do the following: - Judge the credibility of sources. - Identify conclusions, reasons, and assumptions. - Judge the quality of an argument, including the acceptability of its reasons, assumptions, and evidence. - Develop and defend a position on an issue. - Ask appropriate clarifying questions. - Plan experiments and judge experimental designs. - Define terms in a way appropriate for the context. - Be open-minded. - Try to be well-informed. - Draw conclusions when warranted but with caution. Thus, CT is a broad concept rather than a specific skill of judgment or argument, or reflection. The concept has been refined further by Richard Paul and Linder Elder into the Paul-Elder framework of CT, which has three main components: - Analysis of thinking by focusing on the parts or structures of thinking ("the Elements of Reason") - Evaluation of thinking by focusing on the quality ("the Universal Intellectual Standards") - Improvement of thinking by using what you have learned ("the Intellectual Traits")