Abstract:

Critical thinking—the ability to make judgments, to identify facts and assumptions, to deduce, to judge the information, to evaluate arguments, or to interpret information (Bensley, 2010; Watson & Glaser, 2000)—should be an essential part of the apparatus of (future) teachers. The critical thinking, inter alia, protects people from unfounded beliefs, such as paranormal, pseudoscience and conspiracy beliefs that may have health, political and social consequences. In Slovakia, the level of critical thinking seemed to be significantly lower in comparison to other countries (the results of PISA testing). So, the main aim of the study was to measure the level of critical thinking of pedagogical students and to point out the link between critical thinking and unfounded beliefs. A total of 199 pedagogical students in age 16-29 years (M=20.76; SD=2.15) completed the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (Watson & Glaser, 2000; M=53.98%; SD=9.09%) measuring the level of critical thinking and its components - inference, recognition of assumptions, deduction, interpretation, and evaluation of arguments. 93 of participants completed also Epistemically Unfounded Beliefs Scale (Halama, 2018; M=46.07; SD=12.20) measuring conspiracy, pseudoscience, and paranormal beliefs. The future teachers solved only 54% of critical thinking tasks correctly – it was very similar to other Slovak pedagogical students (Kosturková, 2013, 2014, 2017, 2018); moreover, Slovak future teachers were significantly weaker (t=35.35; p<.001; d=2.51) in comparison to British pedagogical students (76.75% success rate; Watson & Glaser, 2000). Critical thinking negatively correlated with unfounded beliefs (r=-.217; p=.037). Specifically, there were weak significant negative correlations (r=-.205 – -.242) between a) critical thinking and conspiracy beliefs, b) between recognition of assumptions and unfounded beliefs, conspiracy beliefs, and pseudoscience beliefs, and c) between deduction and unfounded beliefs. Linear regression revealed that a) critical thinking predicted unfounded beliefs (F(1,91)=4.50; p=.937; accounted for 4.7% of the variation) and conspiracy beliefs (F(1,91)=3.97; p=.049; accounted for 4.2% of the variation), b) recognition of assumptions predicted unfounded beliefs (F(1,91)=5.25; p=.024; accounted for 5.5% of the variation), conspiracy beliefs (F(1,91)=4.05; p=.047; accounted for 4.3% of the variation), and pseudoscience beliefs (F(1,91)=5.65; p=.019; accounted for 5.9% of the variation), and c) deduction predicted unfounded beliefs (F(1,91)=4.10; p=.046; accounted for 4.3% of the variation). The findings support the hypothesis that critical thinking could reduce the susceptibility to unfounded beliefs. We should develop critical thinking in students from primary schools to universities, and we should pay special attention to future teachers. Teachers are those who transfer their knowledge and skills to their students, and without critical thinking, they could not teach how to think critically.

Keywords:

Critical thinking, unfounded beliefs.