SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Educational Psychology
This article is part of the Research TopicReviews in Educational Psychology: Volume IIView all 4 articles
Critical Thinking Disposition in Chinese Students: Meta-Analysis of Studies published from 2000 to 2025
Provisionally accepted
- 1Collge of Education, Bohai University, China, Jinzhou, China
- 2Center of Psychological Research and Education, Bohai Uniersity, China, Jinzhou, China
- 3Mississippi State University Department of Counseling Higher Education Leadership Educational Psychology and Foundations, Mississippi State University, United States
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The level of Chinese students' critical thinking disposition has been widely debated for the past three decades, yet previous studies have reported inconsistent findings and lacked quantitative synthesis. To address this gap and clarify the current state of critical thinking dispositions among Chinese students, the present study conducted a meta-analysis of 491 primary studies, encompassing 688 independent samples and 146,625 participants. The analysis found that the averaged scores of Chinese students' critical thinking disposition fluctuated between 3.684 and 3.909 on a six-point Likert scale. Moderator analyses revealed that grade level, major type, publication type, and university type significantly influenced effect sizes, whereas the methodological quality of the primary studies was not significantly associated with effect sizes. As the first global study to provide a precise estimate of Chinese students' critical thinking disposition, it highlights key areas for further research and discusses relevant theoretical and educational implications.
Keywords: Chinese students, Critical thinking disposition, effect of university type, grade effect, Inventory, major effect, Meta-analysis
Received: 25 Jul 2025; Accepted: 29 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Guo, Fan and Xu. 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) or licensor 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: Huiyong Fan
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