Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation
Critical Thinking
Critical thinking can be defined as the intellectual reasoning where a person analyzes synthesizes and considers all information within a subject before making decisions about an issue. Critical thinking involves the ability to take an issue with an objective manner and understanding the logical connections of the ideas involved in every circumstance. While critical thinking involves an extensive evaluation of the information available about a subject, it does doesn’t involve accumulation of information. Instead, critical thinking involves identification of problems, construction of the options around a problem and evaluation of the alternatives, with a view of making the right decision. Critical thinking is the intellectual process of conceptualizing of the factors surrounding a problem, circumstance, or a problem, and reflecting on the decision to be made (Critical Thinking Community, 2015).
Critical thinking involves skillful conceptualization of factors, analyzing the situation and intellectual evaluation of issues to reach a conclusion. At the same time, critical thinking involves disciplined thinking that applies an open minded approach that allows a person to be objective. According to the Critical Thinking Community (1); “Critical thinking is self-guided, self-disciplined thinking which attempts to reason at the highest level of quality in a fair-minded way” (Critical Thinking Community, 2015).
The disciplined aspect of the thinking is as a result of the ability of a person to focus on the evaluation of the subjects being thought about and focus on the circumstances. This leads to the application of rationality, without the use of subjective perspectives that limits critical thinking. Discipline in the thought processes further makes a person engage in a comprehensive analysis of an issue without focusing on other aspects that may limit the critical evaluation of one the alternatives to a problem (Facione, 2011). This is because critical thinking includes a commitment to use reasoning in making decisions about an issue or a circumstance.
Critical thinking, therefore takes time to evaluate the situation, analyze the alternatives and make decisions based on the rational objectives. As a result, critical thinking makes the decision making process a longer process, but more effective one. However, the critical thinking process does not necessarily mean that the decision making process will be challenging. This is because the process is objective, rational and intellectually rational, which makes the decision reached to be a well thought one (Facione, 2011). The main part of the critical thinking process is the ability of the thinker to acknowledge the situation and consider every decision that is to be made. This consideration of an issue and evaluation of the outcome tends to make the critical thinking process a time consuming or lengthy process (Moore & Parker, 2012).
As a result of the application of critical thinking, people tend to make better decisions than when not critically thinking. Most people who are considered to be successful tend to make better decisions than those who are considered to be unsuccessful. This is because the result of the decisions that people make is the achievements that people make in the future (Facione, 2011). By applying critical thinking a person makes better decisions and is more likely to be successful in whatever he or she does. This is because critical thinking involves all the aspects of thinking and intellectual evaluation of decisions before making them. Therefore, critical thinking is good and is worth the practice of a person.
References
Critical Thinking Community, 2013, Defining Critical Thinking. Retrieved From, <http://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/defining-critical-thinking/766> July 25, 2015
Facione, P.A. (2011). Critical Thinking: What It Is and Why It Counts. Retrieved From, <http://www.student.uwa.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/1922502/Critical-Thinking-What-it-is-and-why-it-counts.pdf> July 25, 2015
Moore, B.N. & Parker, R. (2012). Critical Thinking, 10th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill