You will be able to synthesize, analyse and evaluate what you have learned and read to develop your own opinions, arguments, and position. You will become a critical thinker.
How will my degree develop it?
At the University of Glasgow, you won’t be told what to think; instead, you will be taught how to think. Our Institution considers critical thinking a vital graduate attribute across all subjects and disciplines, from Arts & Humanities to Science and Engineering. In all of these subjects, the arguments and data you will use to prove your argument will differ significantly; however, the techniques of approaching these issues will be similar.
Through the process of deliberating, debating, and persuasion, critical thinking will shape your attitudes and values during your academic studies and everyday life. Critical thinking will enable you to disagree with specific viewpoints and build constructive reasoning that explains why you have doubts about a particular topic.
By being a critical thinker, you will be able to assess and review evidence from numerous sources, which will enable you to create conclusions based on facts and data. Due to this, you might find that specific evidence is not convincing enough for reasons such as errors in the data acquisition process or conflict of interests. This skill is considered essential as you are exposed to a high volume of information and being selective and critical towards these data will enable you to form conclusions rooted in facts.
One of the ways you will learn critical thinking at the University will be through purposeful reading. You will be required to go through numerous scientific papers asking important questions regarding these studies, such as:
- Has the context of this paper changed since it was published?
- Is the evidence presented in the study convincing enough?
- How did the authors come to their conclusions?
- Would you form the same conclusions as the authors? If not, why?
How else can I develop it?
Being a critical thinker goes beyond what you read and learn at lectures. This skill is about having the ability to synthesize, analyse and evaluate the information you come across and, based on this, develop your own opinion, argument, and position about numerous topics. You will have the opportunity to develop this skill thanks to how your curriculum will be designed; however, there are many further opportunities on campus to enhance your ability to think critically: Learning to deal with the unknown can be a stressful experience for some, but it is possible to develop techniques for dealing with this:
- There are several student societies on campus, which provide you with a community that motivates you to think critically. One of these is the Dialectic Society, whose mission is to promote and nurture the great tradition of student-led public speaking, debating, discussion, and literary criticism.
- Another great option to develop your critical thinking skills is Glasgow University Union Debating. They meet every week to train members who go on to compete at various competitions in the UK and around the world. The Glasgow University Union is one of the most successful debating institutions globally, with 5 World University Debating Championships to its name.
- Journal clubs are another great way to enhance your critical thinking skills. In a journal club, you meet every week to critically evaluate recent articles in academic literature on various topics, including philosophy, literature and science.
Why is this attribute valuable to me?
Being an independent an critical thinker is a highly sought after skill amongst employers. Professionals who rise to the top in their career are those who can think outside the box - process information and come up with their own unique and effective spin on it, and this is what this graduate attribute is all about.