Mark A. Sarvary
Christina M. Schmidt- 1Investigative Biology Teaching Laboratories, Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, Cornell University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Ithaca, NY, United States
- 2Office of Curriculum Development and Instructional Support, Cornell University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Ithaca, NY, United States
Critical thinking is an essential skill in higher education, vital for students’ academic success and their ability to address complex, real-world problems in the era of AI and misinformation. This study employs both quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate how critical thinking is taught and assessed in undergraduate courses at a research university, with a focus on faculty perceptions and teaching practices in gateway and non-gateway courses. The authors developed and validated a survey to investigate faculty perceptions of teaching critical thinking, utilizing 14 critical thinking skills identified in the literature. Faculty survey responses reveal discrepancies between how critical thinking skills are included in learning outcomes and how they are taught, highlighting the importance of explicit critical thinking training, particularly in gateway courses. Gateway courses show noticeable gaps in students’ perceived preparedness for critical thinking compared to non-gateway courses. The faculty employed many creative active learning techniques and group work to teach critical thinking. Non-graded activities were preferred to assess students’ critical thinking skills. A qualitative survey with the faculty also identified barriers, including student and faculty attitudes, their abilities to learn and teach critical thinking effectively, and a lack of resources, including time and institutional support. The findings highlight the need for explicit but not time-consuming critical thinking instruction, particularly in gateway courses, to help students build a strong intellectual foundation, positioning undergraduates for academic success and preparation for their future careers.
1 Introduction
Critical thinking skills are foundational for learning because they empower individuals to be skeptical, examine their environment critically, analyze issues from diverse angles, articulate multiple viewpoints, and develop more effective solutions. Critical thinking is a skill that can bridge disciplines (Tsui, 2002; Lennon, 2014; Brookfield, 2015) and has been highly sought after by employers (Burnett, 2003; McMurtrey et al., 2008) along with other transferable skills, such as communication (Biango-Daniels and Sarvary, 2021) and science literacy (Kelp et al., 2023; Sarvary and Ruesch, 2023).
Over the past decade, critical thinking has assumed a new and important role: helping to identify misinformation produced by either humans or artificial intelligence (AI). “Fake news” first became the word of the year in 2016, highlighting its essential role in shaping information distribution and further emphasizing how critical thinking skills, particularly those that focus on information literacy, are essential for identifying trustworthy information (Machete and Turpin, 2020). More recently, the increasing use of large language models (LLMs) and generative artificial intelligence (GAI) showed the need for AI literacy training, because AI often “hallucinates” and generates incorrect outputs (Sarkar et al., 2024). Without critical thinking training, students will struggle to identify biases or misinformation that their human or AI collaborator provides them (Comer et al., 2019, Machete and Turpin, 2020).
In the era of fake news and generative AI, it is more important than ever for students to receive adequate critical thinking training. This study aimed to explore how critical thinking is taught and assessed in undergraduate courses and to identify the challenges faced by critical thinking education. Understanding the landscape of critical thinking education can aid in developing universal solutions to address these emerging issues.
1.1 Demand and supply: a review of critical thinking education
The message about the importance of critical thinking and other transferable skills in students’ post-graduate lives has been consistent in the past decades. In 2014, the Hart Research Associates conducted a survey for the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU). The survey included 318 executives from private and non-profit sectors, emphasizing the importance of communication, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills for employees (Hart Research Associates, 2015). These skills were deemed more essential than the specific major or field of an undergraduate degree. The 2014 AACU survey showed that 81% of employers wanted critical thinking to be more emphasized in higher education, and 79% of the surveyed college students agreed that it should be one of the top learning outcomes (Hart Research Associates, 2015). These employers advocated for colleges to place a greater focus on critical thinking and problem-solving training (Finley, 2023). Consequently, in the same year, 60% of provosts from 1202 colleges in the USA stated that teaching critical thinking would be among their main goals (Kuh et al., 2014). Follow-up surveys showed that this trend holds, with critical thinking remaining among the top skills. For example, it was identified as a “very important” skill possessed by strong job candidates by 81% of employers in 2018 and 79% of employees in 2023 (Finley, 2023). This ongoing trend clearly indicates that critical thinking skills remain highly sought after, and colleges aiming to provide a well-rounded education for their undergraduates must incorporate critical thinking into their programs to help graduates succeed in the workforce.
Identifying these needs has prompted numerous initiatives in various fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) to focus on critical thinking. For example, the AAAS Vision and Change initiative emphasizes the incorporation of transferable skills into undergraduate biology education to better prepare students for diverse career paths (Bauerle et al., 2011). This pivotal report emphasizes critical competencies, including critical thinking, communication, quantitative reasoning, and problem-solving, as vital components of an effective biology curriculum. By promoting a student-centered framework, Vision and Change urges educators to design learning experiences that weave these essential skills throughout all levels of instruction. This has served as a foundation for many ongoing education research projects (Deane-Coe et al., 2017) and for the movement to integrate these transferable skills into undergraduate education (Harvey et al., 2016; Auerbach and Schussler, 2017). Institutions responded by incorporating transferable skills, such as communication, critical thinking, and quantitative reasoning, into their learning outcomes (Clark and Hsu, 2023; Sullivan et al., 2024; Silva et al., 2025). Table 1 provides examples of critical thinking skills in learning outcomes at Cornell University, where this study was conducted.
Table 1. Learning outcome examples related to skills in critical thinking at the university level, college level, and course level.
Critical Thinking and other transferable skills should not be an afterthought, but rather an integrated part of undergraduate education, especially at the introductory level (Boyd et al., 2017; Biango-Daniels and Sarvary, 2021; Sarvary and Ruesch, 2023). Teaching critical thinking involves equipping students with the ability to reason and reflect on issues requiring analysis and evaluation. First-year students have many concerns as they enter higher education (Meaders et al., 2020, 2021), and making a good first impression by setting expectations for higher-level thinking and equipping them with problem-solving skills in introductory gateway courses will benefit them throughout their careers (Tsui, 2002; Halx and Reybold, 2017; Lane et al., 2021).
1.2 Lack of definition is a challenge in critical thinking education
While it is clear that critical thinking skills should be taught early in undergraduates’ academic careers, faculty face many practical challenges in doing so (Lennon, 2014; Silva et al., 2025). One of the major challenges is the lack of a clear definition of critical thinking. Since many argue that critical thinking is most effectively taught within the context of a specific discipline (Donald, 2002; Willingham, 2007; Heim et al., 2023), the definition of critical thinking often becomes discipline-specific (Willingham, 2007). Facione et al. (1994) published a definition created by 46 theoreticians, stating that critical thinking is looked at as a process that is interactive and reflective with purposeful, self-regulatory judgment. Paul and Heaslip (1995), promoting a metacognitive approach, stated that critical thinking is the ability to monitor one’s own thinking by focusing on key components and assessing one’s own accuracy. Halpern (2001) argued that deciding the credibility and sources of information is the essential critical thinking skill in this internet age, highlighting information literacy in critical thinking. Moore and Parker (2009) identified critical thinking in a variety of ways, including as a deliberate determination of whether a claim should be accepted, rejected, or we should suspend judgment about a claim and analyze our degree of confidence. Levy (2009) describes it as a cognitive strategy that is active and systematic. Halx and Reybold (2017) stated that it sits at the top of the thinking hierarchy, encompassing all other forms of thinking. While Heim et al. (2023) stated that critical thinking is students’ decision of what to trust and what to do, and their decisions must be based on evidence.
Because of the lack of agreement about the definition, the instruments that were developed to assess critical thinking are similarly diverse (Rear, 2019). Critical thinking is assessed by The California Critical Thinking Skills Test (Facione, 1990), The California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory (Facione et al., 1994), The Ennis-Weir Critical Thinking Essay Test (Ennis, 1989), The Cornell Critical Thinking Tests (Leach et al., 2020), The Halpern Critical Thinking Assessment (Butler et al., 2012), and many more (Stassen et al., 2011; Rear, 2019).
1.3 Critical thinking and the hidden curriculum.
The differences in definitions, the range of assessment instruments, and the lack of experience in teaching critical thinking (Boyd et al., 2017) often make it challenging for faculty to integrate critical thinking instruction into their curriculum (Halx and Reybold, 2006). This inevitably leads to a diverse array of teaching approaches (Tsui (2001, 2002); Liu and Pasztor, 2022. Beyond the challenges faced by the faculty (Lennon, 2014; Silva et al., 2025), students also encounter their own difficulties. They often prefer memorization compared to higher-level thinking (Halx and Reybold, 2006, 2017), perceive active-learning environments and evidence-based teaching practices negatively (Hood et al., 2021), and avoid expressing opinions that may be considered controversial (Levine and Cureton, 1998).
When students and faculty face so many challenges in teaching and learning an important skill or concept, it can easily become part of the hidden curriculum (i.e., content and resources that are not explicitly stated within a classroom and therefore do not benefit all students equally) (Bergenhenegouwen, 1987; Margolis, 2001; Alsubaie, 2015). Teaching critical thinking implicitly can hinder students’ ability to recognize and articulate their critical thinking training. Therefore, while critical thinking is identified as an essential skill for employment, students cannot speak about the training they received unless it was explicitly taught. For example, if during their studies students recognize biases in reasoning or assess information but aren’t explicitly told that these are applications of their critical thinking skills, they will be at a disadvantage compared to those who have received explicit instruction about critical thinking and can articulate that in internship applications or job interviews.
1.4 The theoretical framework of critical thinking education
Evidence-based teaching practices have been shown to be the best approach to develop these skills in college students (Colthorpe et al., 2015; Breytenbach et al., 2017; Njie-Carr et al., 2017; Goradia et al., 2023; Miller and Favelle, 2024). Many pedagogical theories, including Constructivism and Metacognition Theory, are particularly relevant in guiding instruction in this area. Constructivist approaches encourage learners to develop their own conclusions through problem-solving and inquiry-based learning and reflect on them to improve retention (Sjøberg, 2010). Metacognition Theory involves thinking about one’s own thinking processes, helping students become more aware of their learning processes, biases, and assumptions (Tempelaar, 2006; Ellerton, 2015). Promoting metacognition in the classroom can lead to the development of higher-level thinking among undergraduates (Tanner, 2012). These theories, when applied in educational contexts, can help create strategies that foster the development of critical thinking skills in students, preparing them to tackle complex problems and make informed, reasoned decisions.
The purpose of this study was to explore how critical thinking is taught and assessed in undergraduate-level courses. The five objectives of this study were:
1. Assess the faculty’s perception of their students’ initial critical thinking skills.
2. Examine whether components of critical thinking are explicitly included in course learning outcomes, and if they are, whether these skills are being taught.
3. Explore whether critical thinking is part of the hidden curriculum and is being taught implicitly without being included in the learning outcomes.
4. Determine the different teaching and assessment methods that faculty use to incorporate critical thinking into their course curriculum.
5. Identify the challenges the faculty face when they think about integrating critical thinking training into their curriculum.
Specific attention was paid to the comparison of gateway and non-gateway courses to compare how students receive explicit or implicit critical thinking instruction at the beginning of their careers and how this may change in courses taken later. A gateway course was defined as a first credit-bearing college-level course in a program of study. By addressing these issues, we aim to provide actionable insights into improving the integration and instruction of critical thinking skills in the curriculum.
2 Materials and methods
2.1 Survey development, validation, and dissemination
The study was conducted at a large, research-focused university with an R1 Carnegie Classification in the northeastern United States (Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education®, 2025). The authors developed and validated a survey instrument to explore the faculty’s perceptions of teaching critical thinking explicitly and their self-evaluation of their teaching and assessment practices. To address the challenge of the absence of a single interdisciplinary definition of critical thinking, rather than pursuing a universal definition, we identified 14 skills from the literature (Facione, 1990; Facione et al., 1994; Association of American Colleges and Universities, 2009; Lai et al., 2011; Abrami et al., 2015).
1. Inferring and drawing well-reasoned conclusions and solutions from relevant information or data.
2. Accessing, evaluating and analyzing information or data.
3. Relating and applying academic knowledge to larger-scale/big-picture issues.
4. Accepting ambiguity or uncertainty (i.e., there is no one correct solution or answer).
5. Identifying and applying sufficient, credible, relevant information or data.
6. Identifying or raising vital questions and problems and the factors that influence them.
7. Identifying implications and consequences of lines of reasoning.
8. Developing and testing solutions to complex questions or problems.
9. Evaluating and applying information that opposes as well as supports a line of reasoning.
10. Synthesizing relationships between academic disciplines.
11. Identifying and evaluating relevant points of view.
12. Identifying biases in reasoning.
13. Examining relevant points of view fairly and empathetically.
14. Identifying logical fallacies and avoid using them.
This approach identified measurable components of critical thinking, rather than simply asking, “Are you teaching critical thinking?” as that is far from assessable, given the lack of consensus on what that actually means. Survey questions were written and presented to a group of graduate and undergraduate student teaching assistants (n = 25) in the Investigative Biology Laboratory course, where they gain pedagogical training and teach multiple laboratory sections (Sarvary et al., 2022). Their teaching experience made them well-informed for validation; they were asked to provide feedback about each question, identify any unclear questions, and improve the language therein. The questions were provided in advance of the meeting with the validators, and feedback was provided both in writing and orally (Ouimet et al., 2004; Vogt et al., 2004). Discussion and modifications were made in response to their feedback, if necessary.
Faculty participants were recruited during the Fall semester of 2021. The survey was administered using the Qualtrics online survey tool (Qualtrics, Provo, UT, United States) and distributed to the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences faculty email list, which includes approximately 590 faculty members, of whom not all teach courses. Some faculty members co-teach courses, and only one response per course was accepted. The survey was anonymous, most questions could be skipped, and participation was completely voluntary. The survey included categorical, multi-select, multiple-choice and open-ended questions. The beginning of the survey explored the course size, percentage of the first-year students, and the course category (gateway or not). The next block focused on the faculty’s perceived preparedness of the students in critical thinking, the learning outcomes, and the explicit teaching of the listed critical thinking skills. These questions were followed by conditional questions on explicitly teaching and assessing each critical thinking skill. At the end of the survey, an open-ended exploratory question was designed to identify potential challenges the faculty may face. The survey instrument is published in Supplementary Material 1.
2.2 Statistical analysis
The faculty’s perception of the students’ critical thinking skills at the beginning of their classes was analyzed. In addition, we compared the preference for specific teaching and assessment techniques. In both cases, Chi-squared tests using a binomial function to compare two proportions, with the null hypothesis that the selection of one answer was not favored over the other, were applied to the survey data (Crawley, 2012) and were analyzed in the R statistical software (v.4.3.0) (R Core Team, 2023). The alpha level was set at 0.05. Faculty responses to the open-ended question about the challenges were emergently coded [inductive reasoning (Saldaña, 2013)] through several readings (Fereday and Muir-Cochrane, 2006) to develop six categories and 20 subcategories. Initial coding was performed by a single party, with categorical verification performed by another. Discussions led to modifications to the categories until 100% agreement was reached. Once categories had been finalized, all responses were coded by all parties and compared until the two coders reached 100% agreement on all responses. The two coders reached complete agreement, making Cohen’s kappa inter-rater reliability undefined and not applicable, since the denominator in the formula kappa = [P(observed)-P(expected)]/[1-P(expected)] is zero.
3 Results
3.1 Course descriptions
The authors received 97 answers from faculty in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University. That included some answers that were used to further validate the survey instrument, incomplete answers that provided only course information, and faculty who did not consent to have their answers published. After data clean-up, 79 individual answers were used, representing 79 courses taught at Cornell University. Out of the 79 different courses that were described by survey respondents, 18 were identified as gateway courses following the provided definition of a gateway course as being the “first credit-bearing college-level course in a program of study.” Gateway courses had an estimated total of 3,070 students per semester, with an average of 170.55 students, while non-gateway courses were much smaller, averaging 39.81 students, with an estimated total enrollment of 2,429 per semester. In gateway courses, based on the instructors’ estimations, an average of 53.70% of students were first-year students, with the highest estimated percentage at 93%. In contrast, non-gateway courses had an average of 5.2% first-year students, with 50% being the highest estimate. The survey reached faculty in 28 different programs at Cornell University. The academic program and the number of courses participating from each program can be found in Supplementary Material 2.
3.2 Do students possess critical thinking skills?
Faculty perceptions of student skills in critical thinking varied between gateway and non-gateway courses. In gateway courses, 15 out of the 18 instructors who answered this question indicated that their students lack sufficient critical thinking skills when they begin their courses. Two instructors responded affirmatively, and one was unsure. Only 57 of the 61 non-gateway course instructors provided answers to this question. Of these 57, 19 stated that their students do not start with adequate critical thinking skills. The remaining responses included 14 who answered, “I don’t know,” and 24 who answered “yes.” The percentages for each category were calculated in Table 2. There was a significant difference in the perceptions of faculty regarding the sufficiency of students’ critical thinking skills when comparing gateway and non-gateway courses (X-squared = 4.5145, df = 1, p = 0.03361). A notably smaller percentage (11.11%) of gateway course faculty felt that their students had critical thinking skills when they started the semester, compared to non-gateway faculty (42.11%). Similar disparities were noted in the percentage of students with insufficient critical thinking skills at the beginning of classes, with 83.33% in gateway courses versus 33.33% in non-gateway courses (X-squared = 11.856, df = 1, p < 0.001).
Table 2. The percentage of answers “Yes,” “No,” and “I don’t know” to the question “Do students possess sufficient critical thinking skills upon entering your course?”.
3.3 Are the critical thinking skills in the learning outcomes? Are they being taught?
Nine out of the 14 identified critical thinking skills have been included in the learning outcomes of fewer than 50% of the classes that participated in the survey. It means that the majority of the courses do not explicitly mention most of these skills in their learning outcomes. Notably, three of the five critical thinking skills that are mentioned in more than half of the learning outcomes are related to information literacy, focusing on how to find, evaluate, and use information. We see the same pattern about teaching these skills explicitly, with the same five critical thinking skills being taught in over 50% of the courses, while the remaining nine are only taught in less than half of the courses. This means that while students may receive information literacy training in multiple courses, other aspects of critical thinking may never cross their academic paths.
Overall, “Inferring and drawing well-reasoned conclusions and solutions from relevant information or data” is a critical thinking skill that appears the most frequently in learning outcomes (83.54%) and at the top of the list for both the gateway (83.3%) and non-gateway (83.6%) course learning outcomes (Table 3). “Identifying logical fallacies and avoiding using them” is the least selected learning outcome, with only 22.7% of courses including it, and it is at the bottom of the list for gateway (27.7%) and non-gateway (21.3%) courses. However, there are some differences between the two course categories. For example, while “Relating and applying academic knowledge to larger-scale/big-picture issues” is only the third most selected learning outcome with 66.57% in non-gateway courses, the gateway course instructors have it in their learning outcomes with a much higher percentage (83.3%), sharing the first place for the most frequently used learning outcome. Some other striking differences are “Identifying biases in reasoning” and “Synthesizing relationships between academic disciplines,” which were selected by over 60% of the gateway instructors but were only listed by 31.1 and 45.9% of the non-gateway instructors. But a pattern in the other direction can be noticed too. More than half of the non-gateway instructors list “Identifying and applying sufficient, credible, relevant information or data” as a learning outcome, but only 38.8% of the gateway instructors selected it.
Table 3. Percentages of the courses that include the 14 critical thinking skills in their learning outcomes (LOs) and explicitly teach them.
While course instructors self-identified many of these critical thinking skills as part of their course learning outcomes, they admitted that they do not always teach these skills explicitly. The survey showed that not every course that includes a critical thinking skill in its learning outcomes teaches that skill, and vice versa, some courses teach the skill without explicitly including it in their learning outcomes. In gateway courses, only four of the skills that were mentioned in the learning outcomes were taught in the courses that mentioned them. Three skills, “Accessing, evaluating and analyzing information or data,” “Identifying and applying sufficient, credible, relevant information or data,” and “Developing and testing solutions to complex questions or problems,” were taught in some of the gateway courses without being listed in their learning outcomes.
These numbers were slightly different for non-gateway courses. While four critical thinking skills were mentioned in learning outcomes and simultaneously taught in every course, there was only one overlap in this category with gateway courses: “Examining relevant points of view fairly and empathetically” (see Table 3). The other three skills were not taught despite being in the learning outcomes of the non-gateway courses. Similar to gateway courses, not all non-gateway instructors explicitly included “Identifying and applying sufficient, credible, relevant information or data” in their learning outcomes, despite teaching it. However, in non-gateway courses, this was the only skill in this category (Table 3).
The most frequently mentioned critical thinking skill, “Inferring and drawing well-reasoned conclusions and solutions from relevant information or data,” is taught in fewer non-gateway courses (63.93%) than those 83.61% that include it in their learning outcomes. Every gateway course that included this learning outcome has also taught this most frequently mentioned critical thinking skill (Table 3).
3.4 How are they being taught and assessed?
A variety of teaching and assessment methods are used by the courses to help students gain the listed critical thinking skills. The frequency of the teaching approach used in the class depends on the skills being taught. Tables and a figure providing the exact percentages of the combined courses and separate gateway and non-gateway courses using these teaching and assessment methods for each critical thinking skill are published in Supplementary Material 3.
To enhance visualization and comparison, we normalized the percentages of the listed teaching methods so that their total sums to 100%. It has been shown that “Assigned readings” appear to be used more frequently (22% of the teaching methods) than videos (6.25%). Critical thinking skills are taught using “In-class activities” (29.93%) more often than activities outside of the class (11.3%), and students learn critical thinking skills both individually (13.1% of all teaching methods) and through group activities (15.85%) (see Figure 1).
Figure 1. The normalized percentages of the teaching methods (A) and assessment methods (B). To help the visualization of the frequency of the different methods, the percentages were calculated to represent the ratios. Therefore, they add up to 100% for both teaching and assessment. More detailed tables and a figure of these data are published in Supplementary Material 3.
Pairwise comparison of the different teaching categories has shown that assigned readings are a significantly more preferred teaching method by the instructors over videos (X-squared = 143.83, df = 1, p < 0.01), and in-class activities are strongly preferred over outside of the class work (X-squared = 138.29, df = 1, p < 0.01). There is only a weak preference for teaching critical thinking via group work over individual assignments (X-squared = 4.0166, df = 1, p = 0.045).
The comparison of the frequencies of the assessment methods showed that the least utilized assessment methods are quiz questions (4.86%). Faculty favored graded homework (27.37%) over quizzes (X-squared = 187.78, df = 1, p < 0.01). In class, critical thinking skills are frequently assessed through both graded (16.69%) and ungraded activities (22.37%), with faculty giving a preference to ungraded work (X-squared = 9.5934, df = 1, p < 0.01). A preference (X-squared = 8.6721, df = 1, p <0.01) has also been given to exam questions during the semester (11.83%) rather than assessing students’ critical thinking skills during a final exam (7.94%).
When it comes to teaching and assessment of critical thinking skills, instructors find many creative methods, as shown in the “Other teaching” and “Other Assessment” categories. Examples of the methods shared by the instructors are included in Supplementary Material 4.
3.5 Why is it challenging to have critical thinking in the curriculum?
The open-ended question was answered by 57 instructors, who in their answers identified 80 challenges. Four of them reported no challenges. After coding, the responses were categorized into six main categories that faculty found as challenging aspects of teaching critical thinking (see Figure 2). These challenges included “Student skills/knowledge,” “Student attitudes,” “Their own (faculty) skills/knowledge,” “Their own (faculty) attitudes,” and “Available resources.” The student skills/knowledge category notes that students struggle with critical thinking due to specific skills, such as not understanding the definition of critical thinking, difficulty evaluating literature, or lacking foundational knowledge of critical thinking to apply it. The statements in this category were student-focused, highlighting the students’ skills rather than those of the faculty. Student attitudes were placed in a separate category, which noted either pushback or reluctance to think critically, evaluate information, or formulate counterarguments. The statements addressed student attitudes rather than skills. The category of faculty skills and knowledge was based on responses indicating challenges with either teaching or assessing critical thinking, or a lack of sufficient knowledge of critical thinking to teach it effectively. Faculty attitudes centered on their recognition of their own inability to think critically as a challenge. Resources, or the lack thereof, were categorized as external factors preventing faculty from teaching critical thinking. Each main category included multiple subcategories that were agreed upon by the coders (see Figure 2).
Figure 2. Faculty answered the open-ended question “What is the most challenging aspect of teaching critical thinking (CT) for you?” categorized into six main categories and 20 subcategories. The numbers represent the answers in each category (n = 80) by the 57 faculty members who answered this question. The outer ring of the sunburst chart shows the main categories that emerged from the coding, with the number of answers (out of 80) listed. The inner ring shows the sub-categories. The size of each category is related to the number of answers within that category or sub-category.
Faculty identified the limits of their own skills and knowledge as their most challenging aspect of teaching critical thinking (25 responses). Within that, the primary challenge was their teaching skills in this area (16), including, for example, “Developing effective active learning structures to facilitate critical thinking skills” and “Teaching science students who believe all scientific research and statistics are certain facts.” The second main challenge involved student attitudes (22 responses), particularly reluctance (14). Faculty shared worries about “Students” reluctance to challenge authority” and “Students entering my class with critical but preconceived perspectives.” The third significant concern was about student skills and knowledge (18), especially regarding science literacy (9). One faculty member described it as a challenge of “Conveying that there is a sequence of analytical steps that must be completed in the correct order across available relevant information to reach any kind of conclusion - there seems to be an inherent tendency to see one piece of information and immediately formulate a conclusion.” Some faculty were concerned about resources (11 responses), particularly time (6), noting that “Balancing the time needed to develop and implement critical activities with the time required to assimilate and learn content” is challenging.
4 Discussion
Instead of providing one definition to the faculty in the survey, the authors identified 14 skills within the critical thinking category (Facione et al., 1994; Association of American Colleges and Universities, 2009; Lai et al., 2011; Abrami et al., 2015). The responses represent 79 separate courses in 28 different undergraduate programs, and within them, a total of 18 gateway courses were studied with an estimated enrollment of 3070 students per semester. On average, more than half of the students in these gateway courses were first-year students, with some courses having 80–90% of their enrollment comprised of those just beginning their studies in higher education. The remaining 61 courses were classified as “non-gateway,” with approximately 2,429 students enrolling in them each semester. This distinction was necessary as foundational instruction in gateway courses can influence how students succeed in their more discipline-specific courses as juniors and seniors (Halx and Reybold, 2017).
4.1 Do students possess critical thinking skills?
While 83.33% of the instructors in gateway courses stated that their incoming students do not possess critical thinking skills, this perception was only shared by 33.33% of the non-gateway course instructors. This difference in faculty perception may be based on the learning stages of the students (first year vs. upper division). However, assuming that upper-division students possess more skills can be misleading, as students’ academic experience does not always align with their transferable skills (Biango-Daniels and Sarvary, 2021). The non-gateway course instructors’ estimation of 2/3rd of their students possessing critical thinking skills is more optimistic than what employers experience. An AACU survey reported in 2023 that while 79% of employers consider critical thinking a very important skill, only 49% find that the students who apply for positions with their companies possess this skill (Finley, 2023). Since, on average, more than half of the students are estimated to be first-year students in gateway courses (vs. 5.2% in non-gateway courses), establishing critical thinking training in these introductory courses would have a long-lasting effect on the academic career of the students (Tsui, 2002). These introductory courses have a larger enrollment than the more discipline-specific non-gateway courses, and it is not uncommon that 70-80% of the enrolled students are in their first year (Asgari et al., 2021; Sarvary et al., 2022).
4.2 Are the critical thinking skills in the learning outcomes?
Learning outcomes provide a clear pathway for a course, informing the students about what they will learn and what skills they will gain (Orr et al., 2022). That is why learning outcomes for courses or learning goals for academic programs have been emphasized in the past decade (Orr et al., 2024). Curriculum committees should not accept new course proposals without learning outcomes, as they also help lift some topics out of the hidden curriculum (Margolis, 2001; Alsubaie, 2015) and explicitly inform the students about a skill or knowledge being shared with them in class (McTighe and Wiggins, 1999).
The faculty survey about the learning outcomes highlighted how courses primarily focus on information literacy skills when it comes to teaching the students about critical thinking. When examining the combined 79 courses, the top two skills found in the learning outcomes were information literacy skills: “Inferring and drawing well-reasoned conclusions and solutions from relevant information or data” and “Accessing, evaluating, and analyzing information or data.” When we looked at which skills were included in the learning outcomes in more than half of the courses, only five skills were in 50% or more, and three of those five were related to information literacy. This domination of information literacy training is not surprising. Science and information literacy are components of many courses because learning how to find, evaluate, and process information is a fundamental skill for scientists in all disciplines (Kelp et al., 2023; Sarvary and Ruesch, 2023), especially in this digital age (Brookfield, 2015). Instructors may feel more comfortable teaching information literacy, since this is the most relevant to their scientific careers, and they can help students connect these skills to their own lives too.
Sadly, it means that many other important critical thinking skills may get neglected. Nine of the 14 skills were mentioned in fewer than half of the course learning outcomes. Some of them, such as “Examining relevant points of view fairly and empathetically” and “Identifying logical fallacies and avoiding using them,” were mentioned in less than 1/5th of the learning outcomes, despite being very important skills for students to possess. It is possible that while information literacy skills are more familiar to faculty, they feel more comfortable including those in the learning outcomes, while they do not feel qualified to teach about logical fallacies or fair and empathetic examination of all sides of an argument. Those concepts can be more complicated to teach and assess, and therefore, they do not make it to the learning outcomes of most courses.
This study identified some nuanced differences between the gateway and non-gateway course learning outcomes. In gateway courses, the “Relating and applying academic knowledge to larger-scale/big-picture issues” shares the top spot with “Inferring and drawing well-reasoned conclusions and solutions from relevant information or data,” both being mentioned in 83.3% of the learning outcomes, but the latter is only the third of the most used critical thinking skills in learning outcomes in non-gateway courses, with only 65.5%. This may be due to the differences between gateway and non-gateway courses: gateway courses are introductory and have a high enrollment of first-year students, providing foundational knowledge and skills within their fields. But students can be reluctant to retain knowledge or learn a new skill if they do not know why they are doing it, and it is often hard to see the practical application of basic scientific knowledge. Helping students relate what they learn in these courses to big-picture issues fits into the expectancy-value theory framework (Hoose, 2020; Wang and Xue, 2022). When students see the relevance of a subject, especially connected to their own lives, they are more motivated to learn and perform better academically (Hulleman and Harackiewicz, 2009). Gateway course instructors may focus on this more, while non-gateway courses, which are often elective courses chosen by the students and are not required, do not need to be explicit about connecting knowledge to big-picture ideas, as students do it naturally.
The priorities of what to explicitly include in learning outcomes differ for other critical thinking skills, too. For example, while some critical thinking skills, such as “Identifying and applying sufficient, credible, relevant information or data,” seem to be important for more than half of the non-gateway courses, it was selected by only 38.8% of gateway course instructors.
This survey shows that students can go through their undergraduate program without meeting many of these critical thinking skills explicitly mentioned in their course learning outcomes. Therefore, they either receive implicit critical thinking training, without being in the learning outcomes, or do not gain these skills during their undergraduate education at all. Coordinating what gateway and non-gateway courses have in their learning outcomes, so students could learn critical thinking skills in a scaffolded form, as they go through their academic career, would be ideal, but it is often administratively impossible. Another solution could be to include all of these learning outcomes in gateway courses, but that would raise the issue of what discipline-specific fundamental topics would need to be removed to make room for critical thinking training. A third solution could be the development of a course module that explicitly discusses all 14 critical thinking skills without significantly impacting class time or replacing other important course materials.
4.3 Are the critical thinking skills being taught?
Ideally, all courses that list a skill or knowledge in their learning outcomes should teach and assess that skill and knowledge. In our study, 7 of the 14 critical thinking skills in gateway courses and 9 in non-gateway courses were not taught in every course that listed them in its learning outcomes. For example, while 61.11% of the gateway courses listed “Identifying biases in reasoning” as a learning outcome, only 50% actually taught it in class. Including a skill or knowledge area in the learning outcomes without explicitly teaching it can mislead students. It can also complicate the evaluation of courses as part of a larger program, such as a major or a minor (Clark and Hsu, 2023).
Some instructors do not include these critical thinking skills in their learning outcomes, even though they teach them in their courses. For example, an important information literacy component of critical thinking, “Assessing, evaluating and analyzing information or data,” has been taught in 77.78% of the gateway courses in our study but included in only 72.22% of the learning outcomes, indicating that students may be unaware in some of these courses that this skill will be taught. Three of the 14 skills in the gateway and one in the non-gateway courses fell into this category. If students are unaware that they are learning critical thinking skills, it can negatively affect them. For instance, if they are asked in a job interview when they last learned or applied critical thinking skills, they may struggle to provide an answer. In summary, either failing to “advertise” in the learning outcomes that critical thinking skills are being taught or teaching them implicitly without students recognizing what they are learning can be detrimental to students’ education. However, our findings show that most critical thinking skills are both listed in the learning outcomes and explicitly taught, which is a significant improvement compared to trends from a few decades ago. Paul et al. (1997) reported that while 89% of the faculty highlighted critical thinking as an objective of their course, only 19% could explain what critical thinking was and only 9% taught it (Paul et al., 1997).
4.4 How are they being taught and assessed?
When it comes to teaching and assessing critical thinking skills, the instructors bring great creativity, and they share many techniques. Selection from a list of a priori teaching methods, faculty’s preference toward readings, in-class activities, especially group activities, was shown. Students learn better by doing, and when it comes to teaching critical thinking skills, active learning should be part of the teaching approach (Mumtaz and Latif, 2017; Driessen et al., 2020). Group work (Asgari et al., 2024) has been shown to be an effective way of emphasizing peer-teaching, which can be a useful tool, especially when discussing challenging and controversial topics in critical thinking. The pedagogy literature supports these ideas for actively engaging the students in the learning process when teaching critical thinking (Freeman et al., 2014; Styers et al., 2018; González-Cacho and Abbas, 2022). However, these techniques require the faculty to have sufficient teaching skills and time to develop and implement these interventions into their courses.
In this study, non-graded activities were preferred by the faculty to assess students’ critical thinking skills. One reason may be that students often feel uncomfortable when asked to discuss uncertainty or answer questions without knowing the correct answers (Levine and Cureton, 1998). Performance-based feedback has also been shown to have a positive impact on students’ learning (Kohn and Blum, 2020). If students feel that they can be wrong while applying critical thinking skills (Rapchak et al., 2023; Gorichanaz, 2024), it can help them combat their challenges with ambiguity. In graded assignments, faculty favored giving homework assignments to students to test their critical thinking skills and assess them throughout the semester rather than on a final exam. The a priori examples did not cover all the potential assessment methods, and many faculty chose other creative options that we shared in Supplementary Material 3.
4.5 Why is it challenging to have critical thinking in the curriculum?
Removing friction is known to be the path toward success. Instructors often teach courses within their research fields or areas of expertise. When it comes to teaching transferable skills outside of their expertise, such as science literacy, science communication, or critical thinking, faculty can face extra challenges, since these topics are often not directly related to their disciplines. Faculty in this study expressed a variety of reasons why teaching critical thinking can be difficult (see Supplementary Material 5).
Many cited their lack of trust in their teaching skills in critical thinking education as a challenge to teaching critical thinking. It has been shown that the faculty’s knowledge of the critical thinking concepts is lacking (Stedman and Adams, 2012), which can decrease self-confidence in teaching it. Since faculty already struggle with defining critical thinking (Lennon, 2014), developing effective teaching and assessment methods can be challenging. (Haas and Keeley, 1998; Halx and Reybold, 2006). Participating in professional development and familiarizing themselves with modern pedagogical methods, evidence-based teaching practices, and active learning exercises can help instructors build confidence in their teaching (Sarvary et al., 2025).
A similarly frequently mentioned barrier was students’ attitudes, especially their reluctance to learn and apply critical thinking skills. Students need to invest in learning critical thinking; they cannot simply consume the information taught by the instructor. This can be a time-consuming and energy-intensive learning process. In addition, students may be hesitant to challenge authority; they are afraid of presenting their point of view, and they often prefer to work through a problem rather than discuss ambiguity. This presents a significant challenge when teaching a topic like critical thinking, where student participation is key. This is not a new issue in the classroom. Levine and Cureton (1998) showed that over half of the students in their study felt uncomfortable expressing their opinions if they perceived them as controversial or unpopular.
Students may show resistance because they did not develop a growth mindset during their education (Romero, 2015; Canning et al., 2024; Svensen, 2025), believing that they cannot think critically (Halx and Reybold, 2006). Creating a welcoming, open, and inclusive learning environment can be a good start to overcome this challenge (Hogan and Sathy, 2022; Ruesch and Sarvary, 2024, 2025).
Other challenges that the faculty identified included the lack of students’ skills. As shown in the quantitative survey, most faculty do not believe that their students have critical thinking skills when they enter their courses. The qualitative results emphasized that finding. While many of the faculty developed creative assessment methods, they also emphasized the challenges of teaching and assessing critical thinking skills. Finding the time, a valuable resource, is also on their minds, and curricula are often already full, with a focus on the discipline. Finding the time to teach and assess critical thinking as part of a class can be extremely challenging. By identifying these challenges and removing some of these barriers, critical thinking could be brought into explicit instruction using evidence-based teaching practices.
This study shows that pedagogical approaches, faculty attitudes, and beliefs shape how critical thinking instruction is introduced to higher education. Evidence-based pedagogies that allow students to explore and engage with them using active learning to encourage participation, and promote self-directed learning are the pillars of facilitating critical thinking education (Tsui, 2002, 2008).
The authors acknowledge that the study’s limitations include its single-institutional setting and reliance on faculty self-reporting. However, other studies have also shown that faculty at different institutions encounter similar challenges when teaching critical thinking (Sullivan et al., 2024; Silva et al., 2025), which supports the broader applicability of our findings. Triangulation with data from students regarding their perceived learning of critical thinking skills in the same courses, along with direct observations of teaching these skills, would enhance the findings in future research. This approach could also reveal any potential discrepancies between perceived and actual teaching of these skills, as it has been shown before that while faculty may be confident about their teaching of critical thinking, students do not always share that sentiment (Sullivan et al., 2024).
5 Conclusion
While it is widely accepted that critical thinking is a skill all students should possess, higher education is struggling to determine the best ways for students to acquire this and other transferable skills. This study underscores the necessity for comprehensive, explicit critical thinking training for undergraduate students. While it is a transferable skill that is sought after by employers and can be essential for every person in the age of generative AI and misinformation, our study showed that there is plenty of room for improvement in critical thinking training at the undergraduate student level.
Previous studies show that the unclear definitions of critical thinking can make instruction challenging; therefore, we identified 14 skills that are the most valuable based on the published literature. Faculty perceptions of students’ possession of these critical thinking skills upon enrolling in their classes are grim. Despite the diverse approaches to teaching and assessment, faculty face challenges in conveying critical thinking skills. The main obstacles include the faculty’s lack of self-confidence in their teaching abilities, coupled with students’ perceived attitudes toward learning a skill that is difficult to define. Additionally, finding the time and resources to incorporate critical thinking training into their courses hinders faculty. The emphasis is often on information literacy training, while other dimensions of critical thinking are not discussed in classes.
Critical thinking training is also frequently embedded in the hidden curriculum, being referenced in learning outcomes but not explicitly taught or indirectly taught, leaving students unaware of when they are learning and applying critical thinking skills. If the critical thinking training can be lifted from the hidden curriculum (Alsubaie, 2015) and taught explicitly, a pedagogical intervention to teach critical thinking should target early-career, first-year students in large courses, so the training has a greater impact, and students can build on this fundamental knowledge throughout their careers.
Based on the findings of this study, the authors propose that a stand-alone online module or course, easily accessible to all students, should fulfill this need. In this scenario, these students would apply these critical thinking skills in their upper-level discipline-specific courses. By the time of graduation, they would not only possess but would also comfortably apply these skills, improving the current negative perception of employers about students’ critical thinking skills after graduation (Finley, 2023). Since gateway courses have higher enrollment and can equip students with critical thinking skills at the onset of their academic careers, such an intervention would be most impactful at the introductory course level. This explicit critical thinking training at the introductory level, however, should be designed so that it does not pose a substantial extra time commitment to the faculty but addresses all aspects of critical thinking, not only information literacy. In addition, this course should be discipline-independent, so the impact can be broad. After this critical thinking training course, instructors could focus on their discipline-specific critical thinking training at a level that makes them comfortable, since students would arrive with sufficient foundational critical thinking skills. A follow-up paper by the same authors will discuss the assessment of a stand-alone course that explicitly teaches critical thinking skills, thereby lifting the training out of the hidden curriculum without requiring additional time commitment from instructors.
Data availability statement
The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.
Ethics statement
The studies involving humans were approved by the Cornell Institutional Review Board for Human Participants, Protocol ID 1906008897. The studies were conducted in accordance with the local legislation and institutional requirements. The participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.
Author contributions
MS: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. CS: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing.
Funding
The author(s) declared that financial support was received for this work and/or its publication. The Center for Teaching Innovation at Cornell University supported this study through an Innovative Teaching and Learning Award.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the faculty of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University for their participation in the survey. The authors are grateful to the Center for Teaching Innovation at Cornell University for their initial support of the study. The help of the Investigative Biology Laboratory course undergraduate and graduate teaching assistants with survey validation, and the staff with qualitative data organizing and coding contributed significantly to this work.
Conflict of interest
The author(s) declared that this work was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Generative AI statement
The author(s) declared that generative AI was not used in the creation of this manuscript.
Any alternative text (alt text) provided alongside figures in this article has been generated by Frontiers with the support of artificial intelligence and reasonable efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, including review by the authors wherever possible. If you identify any issues, please contact us.
Publisher’s note
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.
Supplementary material
The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2026.1689764/full#supplementary-material
References
Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Waddington, D. I., Wade, C. A., and Persson, T. (2015). Strategies for teaching students to think critically: A meta-analysis. Rev. Educ. Res. 85, 275–314. doi: 10.3102/0034654314551063
Alsubaie, M. A. (2015). Hidden curriculum as one of current issue of curriculum. J. Educ. Pract. 6, 125–128.
Asgari, M., Cardace, A. E., and Sarvary, M. A. (2024). Demographic isolation and attitudes toward group work in student-selected lab groups. PLoS One 19:e0310918. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0310918
Asgari, M., Miles, A. M., Lisboa, M. S., and Sarvary, M. A. (2021). COPUS, PORTAAL, or DART? Classroom observation tool comparison from the instructor user’s perspective. Front. Educ. 6:740344. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2021.740344
Association of American Colleges and Universities (2009). Critical Thinking Value Rubric. Washington, D.C: AACU.
Auerbach, A. J., and Schussler, E. E. (2017). Curriculum alignment with vision and change improves student scientific literacy. LSE 16:ar29. doi: 10.1187/cbe.16-04-0160
Bauerle, C. M., American Association for the Advancement of Science, National Science Foundation (U.S.), Division of Undergraduate Education, National Science Foundation (U.S.), and Directorate for Biological Sciences (2011). Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action?: Final Report of a National Conference. Washington, D.C.: American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Bergenhenegouwen, G. (1987). Hidden curriculum in the University. High. Educ. 16, 535–543. doi: 10.1007/BF00128420
Biango-Daniels, M., and Sarvary, M. (2021). A challenge in teaching scientific communication: Academic experience does not improve undergraduates’ ability to assess their or their peers’ writing. Assess. Eval. High. Educ. 46, 809–820. doi: 10.1080/02602938.2020.1812512
Boyd, B. L., Dooley, K. E., and Kurten, J. S. (2017). Creating a faculty cadre of critical thinking fellows. NACTA J. 61, 202–207.
Breytenbach, C., ten Ham-Baloyi, W., and Jordan, P. J. (2017). An integrative literature review of evidence-based teaching strategies for nurse educators. Nurs. Educ. Perspect. 38:193. doi: 10.1097/01.NEP.0000000000000181
Brookfield, S. D. (2015). Teaching students to think critically about social media. New Direct. Teach. Learn. 2015, 47–56. doi: 10.1002/tl.20162
Burnett, S. (2003). The future of accounting education: A regional perspective. J. Educ. Bus. 78, 129–134. doi: 10.1080/08832320309599709
Butler, H. A., Dwyer, C. P., Hogan, M. J., Franco, A., Rivas, S. F., Saiz, C., et al. (2012). The halpern critical thinking assessment and real-world outcomes: Cross-national applications. Think. Skills Creat. 7, 112–121. doi: 10.1016/j.tsc.2012.04.001
Canning, E. A., White, M., and Davis, W. B. (2024). Growth mindset messages from instructors improve academic performance among first-generation college students. LSE 23:ar14. doi: 10.1187/cbe.23-07-0131
®nmCarnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education® (2025). Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. Available online at: https://carnegieclassifications.acenet.edu/ (accessed January 29, 2025).
Clark, N., and Hsu, J. L. (2023). Insight from biology program learning outcomes: Implications for teaching. learning, and assessment. LSE 22:ar5. doi: 10.1187/cbe.22-09-0177
Colthorpe, K., Zimbardi, K., Burgarcic, A., and Smith, A. (2015). Progressive development of scientific literacy through assessment in inquiry-based biomedical science curricula. Intern. J. Innov. Sci. Mathemat. Educ. 23, 52–64.
Comer, R. D., Schweiger, T. A., and Shelton, P. (2019). Impact of students’ strengths, critical thinking skills and disposition on academic success in the first year of a PharmD program. Am. J. Pharmaceut. Educ. 83:6499. doi: 10.5688/ajpe6499
Crawley, M. J. (2012). The R Book, 1st Edn. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, doi: 10.1002/9781118448908
Deane-Coe, K. K., Sarvary, M. A., and Owens, T. G. (2017). Student performance along axes of scenario novelty and complexity in introductory biology: Lessons from a unique factorial approach to assessment. LSE 16:ar3. doi: 10.1187/cbe.16-06-0195
Donald, J. G. (2002). Learning to Think: Disciplinary Perspectives. The Jossey-Bass Higher and Adult Education Series. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, Inc.
Driessen, E. P., Knight, J. K., Smith, M. K., and Ballen, C. J. (2020). Demystifying the meaning of active learning in postsecondary biology education. LSE 19:ar52. doi: 10.1187/cbe.20-04-0068
Ellerton, P. (2015). “Metacognition and critical thinking: Some pedagogical imperatives,” in The Palgrave Handbook of Critical Thinking in Higher Education, eds M. Davies and R. Barnett (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan US), 409–426. doi: 10.1057/9781137378057_25
Ennis, R. H. (1989). Critical thinking and subject specificity: Clarification and needed research. Educ. Res. 18, 4–10. doi: 10.2307/1174885
Facione, N. C., Facione, P. A., and Sanchez, C. A. (1994). Critical thinking disposition as a measure of competent clinical judgment: The development of the california critical thinking disposition inventory. J. Nurs. Educ. 33, 345–350. doi: 10.3928/0148-4834-19941001-05
Facione, P. A. (1990). The California Critical Thinking Skills Test – College Level Technical Report #1 Experimental Validation and Content Validity. Milbrae, CA: California Academic Press.
Fereday, J., and Muir-Cochrane, E. (2006). Demonstrating rigor using thematic analysis: A hybrid approach of inductive and deductive coding and theme development. Intern. J. Qual. Methods 5, 80–92. doi: 10.1177/160940690600500107
Finley, A. P. (2023). The Career Ready Graduate: What Employers Say About the Difference College Makes. Washington, D.C: Association of American Colleges & Universities.
Freeman, S., Eddy, S. L., McDonough, M., Smith, M. K., Okoroafor, N., Jordt, H., et al. (2014). Active learning increases student performance in science, engineering, and mathematics. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 111, 8410–8415. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1319030111
González-Cacho, T., and Abbas, A. (2022). Impact of interactivity and active collaborative learning on students’ critical thinking in higher education. IEEE Rev. Iberoamericana Tecnol. Aprendizaje 17, 254–261. doi: 10.1109/RITA.2022.3191286
Goradia, T., Blackley, S., Southam, D. C., and Lareu, R. R. (2023). The effectiveness of evidence-based teaching practices in biomedical sciences on students’ learning experience: A systematic literature review. Intern. J. Innov. Sci. Mathemat. Educ. 31, 55–66. doi: 10.30722/IJISME.31.01.005
Gorichanaz, T. (2024). “It made me feel like it was okay to be wrong”: Student experiences with ungrading. Act. Learn. High. Educ. 25, 67–80. doi: 10.1177/14697874221093640
Haas, P. F., and Keeley, S. M. (1998). Coping with faculty resistance to teaching critical thinking. College Teach. 46, 63–67. doi: 10.1080/87567559809596238
Halpern, D. F. (2001). Assessing the effectiveness of critical thinking instruction. J. General Educ. 50, 270–286. doi: 10.1353/jge.2001.0024
Halx, M. D., and Reybold, L. E. (2006). A pedagogy of force: Faculty perspectives of critical thinking capacity in undergraduate students. J. General Educ. 54, 293–315. doi: 10.1353/jge.2006.0009
Halx, M. D., and Reybold, L. E. (2017). Undergraduate critical-thinking development: Permitted, prompted, or pushed? J. General Educ. 66, 114–135. doi: 10.5325/jgeneeduc.66.3-4.0114
Hart Research Associates (2015). Falling Short? College Learning and Career Success. Washington, D.C: Hart Research Associates.
Harvey, C., Eshleman, K., Koo, K., Smith, K. G., Paradise, C. J., and Campbell, A. M. (2016). Encouragement for faculty to implement vision and change. LSE 15:es7. doi: 10.1187/cbe.16-03-0127
Heim, A. B., Esparza, D., Holmes, N. G., and Smith, M. K. (2023). Comparing study features is easy but identifying next steps is hard: Evaluating critical thinking through the biology lab inventory of critical thinking in ecology. Ecol. Evol. 13:e10071. doi: 10.1002/ece3.10071
Hogan, K. A., and Sathy, V. (2022). Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom. Morgantown: West Virginia University Press.
Hood, S., Barrickman, N., Djerdjian, N., Farr, M., Magner, S., Roychowdhury, H., et al. (2021). “I Like and Prefer to Work alone”: social anxiety, academic self-efficacy, and students’. perceptions of active learning. LSE 20:ar12. doi: 10.1187/cbe.19-12-0271
Hoose, N. A.-V. (2020). Expectancy-Value Theory. Available online at: https://edpsych.pressbooks.sunycreate.cloud/chapter/expectancy-value-theory/ (accessed February 10, 2025).
Hulleman, C. S., and Harackiewicz, J. M. (2009). Promoting interest and performance in high school science classes. Science 326, 1410–1412. doi: 10.1126/science.1177067
Kelp, N. C., McCartney, M., Sarvary, M. A., Shaffer, J. F., and Wolyniak, M. J. (2023). Developing science literacy in students and society: Theory, research, and practice. J. Microbiol. Biol. Educ. 24:e00058-23. doi: 10.1128/jmbe.00058-23
Kohn, A., and Blum, S. D. (2020). Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead). Morgantown: West Virginia University Press.
Kuh, G. D., Jankowski, N., Ikenberry, S. O., and Kinzie, J. (2014). Knowing What Students Know and Can Do The Current State of Student Learning Outcomes Assessment in U.S. Colleges and Universities. Urbana, IL: National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment.
Lai, E. R., Bay-Borelli, M., Kirkpatrick, R., Lin, A., and Wang, C. (2011). Critical Thinking: A Literature Review Research Report. London: Pearson.
Lane, A. K., Meaders, C. L., Shuman, J. K., Stetzer, M. R., Vinson, E. L., Couch, B. A., et al. (2021). Making a first impression: Exploring what instructors do and say on the first day of introductory STEM courses. LSE 20:ar7. doi: 10.1187/cbe.20-05-0098
Leach, S. M., Immekus, J. C., French, B. F., and Hand, B. (2020). The factorial validity of the cornell critical thinking tests: A multi-analytic approach. Think. Skills Creat. 37:100676. doi: 10.1016/j.tsc.2020.100676
Lennon, N. K. (2014). How Professors Infuse Critical Thinking into College Courses. New Jersey, NJ: Seton Hall University.
Levine, A., and Cureton, J. S. (1998). What we know: About today’s college students. About Campus 3, 4–9. doi: 10.1177/108648229800300103
Levy, D. A. (2009). Tools of Critical Thinking: Metathoughts for Psychology, Second Edn. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press.
Liu, Y., and Pasztor, A. (2022). Effects of problem-based learning instructional intervention on critical thinking in higher education: A meta-analysis. Think. Skills Creat. 45:101069. doi: 10.1016/j.tsc.2022.101069
Machete, P., and Turpin, M. (2020). “The use of critical thinking to identify fake news: A systematic literature review,” in Responsible Design, Implementation and Use of Information and Communication Technology, eds M. Hattingh, M. Matthee, H. Smuts, I. Pappas, Y. K. Dwivedi, and M. Mäntymäki (Cham: Springer International Publishing), 235–246. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-45002-1_20
McMurtrey, M. E., Downey, J. P., Zeltmann, S. M., and Friedman, W. H. (2008). Critical skill sets of entry-level IT professionals: An empirical examination of perceptions from field personnel. J. Inform. Technol. Educ. Res. 7, 101–120. doi: 10.28945/181
McTighe, J., and Wiggins, G. (1999). The Understanding by Design Handbook. Arlington, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Meaders, C. L., Lane, A. K., Morozov, A. I., Shuman, J. K., Toth, E. S., Stains, M., et al. (2020). Undergraduate student concerns in introductory STEM courses: What they are, how they change, and what influences them. J. STEM Educ. Res. 3, 195–216. doi: 10.1007/s41979-020-00031-1
Meaders, C. L., Smith, M. K., Boester, T., Bracy, A., Couch, B. A., Drake, A. G., et al. (2021). What questions are on the minds of STEM undergraduate students and how can they be addressed? Front. Educ. 6:639338. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2021.639338
Miller, L. M., and Favelle, S. (2024). Emphasizing transferable skills in undergraduate cognitive psychology is associated with higher grades. Teach. Psychol. 51, 291–297. doi: 10.1177/00986283221083867
Mumtaz, S., and Latif, R. (2017). Learning through debate during problem-based learning: An active learning strategy. Adv. Physiol. Educ. 41, 390–394. doi: 10.1152/advan.00157.2016
Njie-Carr, V. P. S., Ludeman, E., Lee, M. C., Dordunoo, D., Trocky, N. M., and Jenkins, L. S. (2017). An integrative review of flipped classroom teaching models in nursing education. J. Prof. Nurs. 33, 133–144. doi: 10.1016/j.profnurs.2016.07.001
Orr, R. B., Csikari, M. M., Freeman, S., and Rodriguez, M. C. (2022). Writing and using learning objectives. LSE 21, fe3. doi: 10.1187/cbe.22-04-0073
Orr, R. B., Gormally, C., and Brickman, P. (2024). A road map for planning course transformation using learning objectives. LSE 23:es4. doi: 10.1187/cbe.23-06-0114
Ouimet, J. A., Bunnage, J. C., Carini, R. M., Kuh, G. D., and Kennedy, J. (2004). Using focus groups, expert advice, and cognitive interviews to establish the validity of a college student survey. Res. High. Educ. 45, 233–250. doi: 10.1023/B:RIHE.0000019588.05470.78
Paul, R. W., Elder, L., and Bartell, T. (1997). California Teacher Preparation for Instruction in Critical Thinking: Research Findings and Policy Recommendations. Available online at: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED437379 (Accessed September 18, 2024).
Paul, R. W., and Heaslip, P. (1995). Critical thinking and intuitive nursing practice. J. Adv. Nurs. 22, 40–47. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2648.1995.22010040.x
Rapchak, M., Hands, A. S., and Hensley, M. K. (2023). Moving toward equity: Experiences with ungrading. J. Educ. Lib. Inform. Sci. 64, 89–98. doi: 10.3138/jelis-2021-0062
Rear, D. (2019). One size fits all? The limitations of standardised assessment in critical thinking. Assess. Eval. High. Educ. 44, 664–675. doi: 10.1080/02602938.2018.1526255
Romero, C. (2015). What we Know About Growth Mindset from Scientific Research. Washington, D.C: Mindset Scholars Network.
Ruesch, J. M., and Sarvary, M. A. (2024). Structure and flexibility: Systemic and explicit assignment extensions foster an inclusive learning environment. Front. Educ. 9:1324506. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2024.1324506
Ruesch, J. M., and Sarvary, M. A. (2025). Instructors as communication strategists: Using multimodal communication to implement a new course policy on assignment extension due dates. Front. Educ. 10:1558758. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2025.1558758
Sarkar, A., Xiaotong, Xu, Toronto, N., Drosos, I., and Poelitz, C. (2024). When copilot becomes autopilot: Generative AI’s critical risk to knowledge work and a critical solution. arXiv [Preprint] doi: 10.48550/arXiv.2412.15030
Sarvary, M. A., and Ruesch, J. M. (2023). A multistep science literacy training framework in an introductory biology classroom: Teaching how to find, evaluate, comprehend, and cite scientific evidence. J. Microbiol. Biol. Educ. 24:e00197-22. doi: 10.1128/jmbe.00197-22
Sarvary, M. A., Asgari, M., Castelli, F. R., and Ruesch, J. M. (2025). Applying the mentor mindset to undergraduate and graduate student teaching assistant professional development in a laboratory course. J. Microbiol. Biol. Educ. 26:e00049-25. doi: 10.1128/jmbe.00049-25
Sarvary, M. A., Castelli, F. R., and Asgari, M. (2022). Undergraduates’ experiences with online and in-person courses provide opportunities for improving student-centered biology laboratory instruction. J. Microbiol. Biol. Educ. 23:e00289-21. doi: 10.1128/jmbe.00289-21
Silva, J., Edmond, J., and Jauregui, C. (2025). Critical thinking in the classroom: Faculty perspectives and practices. J. Educ. Learn. 14:1. doi: 10.5539/jel.v14n3p1
Sjøberg, S. (2010). “Constructivism and learning,” in International Encyclopedia of Education, eds P. Peterso, E. Baker, and B. McGaw (Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier), 485–490. doi: 10.1016/B978-0-08-044894-7.00467-X
Stassen, M. L. A., Herrington, A., and Henderson, L. (2011). Defining critical thinking in higher education. Improve Acad. 30, 126–141. doi: 10.1002/j.2334-4822.2011.tb00653.x
Stedman, N. L. P., and Adams, B. L. (2012). Identifying faculty’s knowledge of critical thinking concepts and perceptions of critical thinking instruction in higher education. NACTA J. 56, 9–14.
Styers, M. L., Van Zandt, P. A., and Hayden, K. L. (2018). Active learning in flipped life science courses promotes development of critical thinking skills. CBE Life Sci. Educ. 17:ar39. doi: 10.1187/cbe.16-11-0332
Sullivan, A. M., Hayes, M. M., Beltran, C. P., Cohen, A. P., Soffler, M., Cooper, S., et al. (2024). Do we teach critical thinking? A mixed methods study of faculty and student perceptions of teaching and learning critical thinking at three professional schools. Med. Teach. 46, 1494–1501. doi: 10.1080/0142159X.2024.2316862
Svensen, E. (2025). Growth mindset and academic achievement: A multilevel analysis of upper secondary school completion. Scand. J. Educ. Res. 1–17. doi: 10.1080/00313831.2025.2459399
Tempelaar, D. T. (2006). The role of metacognition in business education. Industry High. Educ. 20, 291–297. doi: 10.5367/000000006778702292
Tsui, L. (2001). Faculty attitudes and the development of students’ critical thinking. J. General Educ. 50, 1–28. doi: 10.1353/jge.2001.0008
Tsui, L. (2002). Fostering critical thinking through effective pedagogy: Evidence from four institutional case studies. J. High. Educ. 73, 740–763. doi: 10.1080/00221546.2002.11777179
Tsui, L. (2008). Cultivating critical thinking: Insights from an elite liberal arts college. J. General Educ. 56, 200–227. doi: 10.2307/27798080
Vogt, D. S., King, D. W., and King, L. A. (2004). Focus groups in psychological assessment: Enhancing content validity by consulting members of the target population. Psychol. Assess. 16, 231–243. doi: 10.1037/1040-3590.16.3.231
Wang, Q., and Xue, M. (2022). The implications of expectancy-value theory of motivation in language education. Front. Psychol. 13:992372. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.992372
Keywords: introductory gateway courses, critical thinking, explicit teaching, implicit teaching, learning outcomes, barriers to teaching, hidden curriculum, transferable skills
Citation: Sarvary MA and Schmidt CM (2026) Perceptions, pedagogies, and challenges in critical thinking education. A faculty perspective. Front. Educ. 11:1689764. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2026.1689764
Received: 20 August 2025; Revised: 20 November 2025; Accepted: 09 January 2026;
Published: 16 February 2026.
Edited by:
Alfonso Garcia De La Vega, Autonomous University of Madrid, SpainReviewed by:
Isaiah T. Awidi, University of Southern Queensland, AustraliaM. Dolores Ramírez-Verdugo, National University of Distance Education (UNED), Spain
Copyright © 2026 Sarvary and Schmidt. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
*Correspondence: Mark A. Sarvary, bWFzMjQ1QGNvcm5lbGwuZWR1