Teaching Critical Thinking in Psychology: A Handbook of Best Practices

Report 1

Best and Worst: Learning to Think

Like a Psychologist

Dana Gross

Teachers of psychology, like instructors in other fields, endeavor to alter students’ patterns

of thinking in ways that reflect disciplinary assumptions and emphases (Bransford &

Donovan, 2005; Middendorf & Pace, 2004). Compared to students who major in natural

sciences and humanities, students in psychology and the social sciences show significantly

greater increases in statistical and methodological reasoning (Lehman & Nisbett, 1990).

When and how does this cognitive transformation occur? One likely place in the psychol-

ogy curriculum is a course in research methods that critically evaluates published reports

of empirical research (Hubbard & Ritchie, 1999; VanderStoep & Shaughnessy, 1999).

The two-part assignment described in this report engages students’ higher order thinking

skills by challenging them to evaluate published empirical research at the beginning of a research

methods course. In completing the assignment, students articulate an initial set of criteria and,

at the end of the course, revisit and reflect on their original answers in light of their experience.

The Assignment: Best and Worst, Part I

The first part of the Best/Worst assignment contains intentionally ambiguous instructions

directing students to choose four articles that exemplify the “best” and “worst” problems

or research questions and the “best and “worst” research methods. Although students

often request specific criteria for each of these categories, the instructor provides no fur-

ther information, beyond the instruction to find and summarize four articles and provide

a rationale for placing each in its particular category.

The next time that the class meets, students discuss their selections and criteria in small

groups. Each group then decides which of the entire set of exemplars are the absolute best

and worst in each category and shares those choices with the rest of the class by writing

them on a white/blackboard. The entire class and instructor look for and discuss similarities

Teaching Critical Thinking in Psychology: A Handbook of Best Practices Edited by D. S. Dunn, J. S. Halonen, and R. A. Smith