A thematic analysis on critical thinking in engineering undergraduates

This qualitative research paper examines the meaning and enactment of critical thinking for engineering undergraduate students. Though critical thinking is considered an important topic in the engineering community, research on the topic is limited to mostly measuring critical thinking in the classroom and definitions used are not empirically based. Thus, in this paper we seek to provide an initial exploration of what critical thinking is in engineering. We address the following research question: How do undergraduate engineering students perceive and enact critical thinking? Semi-structured interviews were conducted on the enactment of critical thinking and analyzed using a thematic analysis. Main themes that arose from the interviews included: difficulty articulating critical thinking ideas, relating critical thinking to engineering course concepts (especially problem solving), communicating with others, disposition to think critically, metacognition, challenges of critical thinking in the classroom, and critical thinking varying in other disciplines and majors. Problem solving concepts prevailed in the many of the themes. Although themes connected with many of the ideas present in current definitions of critical thinking, most students did not mention concepts of clarification, credibility, generalization, or recognizing assumptions. Participants also emphasized a broader idea of communication and stronger reliance on real world context in critical thinking than previously established by critical thinking definitions.