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Critical thinking in a second languageCarol Beth Floyd aa Centre for Macquarie English, Macquarie University, North Ryde,AustraliaVersion of record first published: 03 May 2011.

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Higher Education Research & DevelopmentVol. 30, No. 3, June 2011, 289–302

ISSN 0729-4360 print/ISSN 1469-8366 online© 2011 HERDSADOI: 10.1080/07294360.2010.501076http://www.informaworld.com

Critical thinking in a second language

Carol Beth Floyd*

Centre for Macquarie English, Macquarie University, North Ryde, AustraliaTaylor and FrancisCHER_A_501076.sgm(Received 30 December 2009; final version received 8 June 2010)10.1080/07294360.2010.501076Higher Education Research & Development0729-4360 (print)/1469-8366 (online)Article2011Taylor & Francis3030000002011Ms CarolFloydcarol.floyd@mq.edu.au

Critical thinking (CT) skills are generally considered to be vital to success atuniversity, but Asian students are sometimes perceived as lacking these skills. Thisresearch explores the effect that thinking in a second language has on CTperformance. To assess this, two groups of students were tested on a split-test versionof the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal ® Short Form A in both Englishand Chinese, one group taking the English half of the test first and the second grouptaking the Chinese half first. Three participants were also interviewed about the test-taking experience. The findings indicate CT performance is more difficult in an L2:participants who took the English test first performed significantly better when theytook the Chinese test second, the group who took the Chinese test first performedsignificantly better than the group who took the English test first and intervieweesreported experiencing the English test as more difficult.

Keywords: Asian students; Chinese students; critical thinking; internationalstudents; working memory

1. Introduction

Critical thinking (CT), it is argued, is vital to success in tertiary level courses (Cheung,Rudowicz, Kwan, & Yue, 2004; Moore, 2004; Phillips & Bond, 2004). All studentsface challenges in this field, but international students face a double challenge: notonly must they think critically, but they must think critically in a second language(L2). However, just how much of an additional challenge this is is not clearly under-stood. It is a significant issue, because not only is it important for educators to beaware of any CT limitations that students may have, but to understand more fully whylimitations may exist.

This paper reviews the literature on perceptions of CT skills in Asian learners,focusing on challenges to the common perception of the Asian learner as lacking CT,before detailing the present research that compares CT performance in an L1 and anL2. The discussion section consults the literature to explore the language-based issuesbehind difficulties in CT and examines the common conceptions of Asian learners inlight of the research.

1.1. Perceptions of CT abilities

It has been suggested that learners from Asian cultures are less proficient in CTbecause they are socialised to be empathetic and to conform (Atkinson, 1997). Biggs

*Email: carol.floyd@mq.edu.au

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(1996) reports that Western observers often assert that Asian students tend to use‘rote-based, low-level, cognitive strategies’ (p. 46). For example, Carson (1992)emphasises the role that rote learning and memorisation play in the Chinese student’slearning strategies, while Ballard and Clanchy (1991) describe Asian students asreproductive, as opposed to analytical, learners.

There is also a perception that CT is essentially a Western skill and not valued inConfucian cultures. In a controversial article, which provoked a number of commentsand responses, Atkinson (1997, p. 89) asserted that CT ‘is cultural thinking’ and thatWestern ideas of individualism and self-expression underlie CT. Therefore, hecautions, Western English as a Second Language educators should be careful offollowing ‘the critical thinking bandwagon’ (p. 87). In fact, argue Ramanathan andAtkinson (1999), a critical approach may contravene ‘sociocultural norms’ (p. 61).

These ideas portray Chinese learners as passive, unquestioning and lacking the abil-ity to think critically. Their learning styles, similarly, have been characterised as ‘repro-ductive rather than analytical or speculative’ (Shi, 2006, p. 123). Thus, for some, thereis a perception of Chinese students as ‘learners with “lacks” or “deficits”’ (Clark &Gieve, 2006, p. 55) and ‘less adequate in a Western setting’ (Jones, 2005, p. 340).

However, in recent years, these perceptions of Asian students have been questioned.Firstly, Asian students may have a different concept of when CT is appropriate. InChinese learning culture, practice and imitation is emphasised until mastery of thebasics is achieved, after which understanding and creativity emerge (Biggs, 1996; Jin& Cortazzi, 2006; Watkins, 1996). Secondly, cultural differences in cognitive processeshave been extensively researched, but these studies, while acknowledging differences,have not found deficits in CT amongst Chinese or Asian participants (see the wide-ranging review of such studies by Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan [2001]). In fact,it may be that the use of memorisation strategies is partly a result of language difficul-ties, rather than of culture. Kirby, Woodhouse and Ma (1996) have suggested that usingmemorisation strategies ‘arises from the relative difficulty of working in L2’ and that‘less fluent L2 students are indeed likely to adopt such strategies’ (p. 144).

Indeed, most complex cognitive functions appear to be negatively affected byoperating in a second language. Cook (1993) argues that any research finding below-par performance by L2 users must be considered in light of ‘the general phenomenonof L2 cognitive deficit’ (p. 111). Research suggests that lack of L2 proficiency reducesthe ability to use higher order strategies such as discourse processing (Koda, 2005)and to employ deep-learning processes (Kirby et al., 1996).

Since students studying in an L2 struggle to perform at the same level as they arecapable of in their first language, their difficulties in CT must be at least partly attrib-utable to language difficulties. Although much research has been devoted to readingand writing challenges in an L2, there has been little research that directly comparesCT abilities in an L1 and L2. The present research therefore attempts to discoverwhether performance on a CT test in an L2 is more difficult for students than in an L1.It is important to note that this research does not compare the CT skills of Chinesestudents with other groups of students; it simply seeks to verify the connectionbetween language proficiency and CT performance.

1.2. The research questions

In this research, Chinese students’ performance on a reputable CT test was tested:half of the test was in its original English form and the other half in a licensed

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Chinese translation. One group took the English half first, while the other group tookthe Chinese half first.

The first research question was whether students taking the first split-half of thetest in Chinese would perform better than those taking the same split-half in English.It was hypothesised that the Chinese-language test-takers would achieve better results.The second research question was whether those taking the first split-half of the testin English would perform better on the second split-half taken in Chinese. Again, itwas hypothesised that this would be the case.

The third research question was whether students taking the second half inEnglish would perform as well as they did on the first-half Chinese test. Since resultson the English test would be affected by the test-takers having understood the rubricalready in their own language, it was hypothesised that there would be no significantdifferences between these scores.

The fourth research question was whether students would subjectively experiencethe English half-test to be more difficult. In order to explore this issue, this researchincluded semi-structured interviews with students.

1.3. Testing CT: some considerations

In order to test CT it is important to have a clear idea of what CT is, as construct validityis perhaps the most significant issue in this research.

Although there are different definitions of CT, many have overall similarities.Davidson (1998) describes the definitions of key thinkers in this area as ‘simply para-phrases of the same idea’ (p. 120) and states that they all link CT to rationality or ratio-nal judgement. Halpern (1997) reviews the work of a number of theorists and sumsCT up as ‘the kind of thinking involved in solving problems, formulating inferences,calculating likelihoods [and] the development of cohesive and logical reasoningpatterns’ (p. 4). Cheung et al. (2002, p. 505) similarly review a wide range of literatureon CT and identify interpretation, analysis, evaluation of arguments, inference, expla-nation, and deduction as featuring in many CT definitions. Dale (1991), in an attemptto provide ‘an empirical taxonomy’ (p. 79) of CT, derives a list of sixteen skills fromreviewing the research. These include: justifying conclusions, identifying assump-tions, supporting causal explanations, reasoning (of various types) and deduction.Ennis (1993) supplements a general definition of CT as ‘reasonable reflective thinkingfocused on deciding what to believe or do’ with a list of ten abilities involved in CT,including the ability to ‘identify conclusions, reasons and assumptions’ and ‘judge thequality of an argument’ (p. 180). Facione, Facione and Giancarlo (2000) define CT as‘analysis, inference, evaluation, deductive reasoning, and inductive reasoning’ (p. 62).

In spite of some differences in these definitions, common to most are the skills ofreasoning, inferring, evaluating arguments and deduction. The test adopted (seeSection 1.4. below), the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (Harcourt Assess-ment Inc., 2007), tests inference, recognition of assumptions, deduction (whetherconclusions necessarily follow), interpretation (whether conclusions logically follow)and evaluation of arguments, all of which clearly fit into the definitions above.

Another issue is whether CT skills are generalisable. Traditionally, CT skills havebeen considered to be generic skills, but some researchers, notably McPeck (1981,1992), Moore (2004) and Ramanathan and Kaplan (1996), argue that they are not neces-sarily transferable from one discipline to another. McPeck (1981) argues that all think-ing is always thinking of a subject, so CT is not a general skill that can be transferred

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from one domain to another. If this is the case, then it stands to reason that it wouldbe impossible to assess generic CT skills except by using subject-specific CT tests,which do not exist (Ennis, 1993).

There are, however, problems with McPeck and Moore’s position. Davies (2006,p. 180) argues that Moore’s position is that CT is either generalist or subject-specificand that it can only be taught as generic or within a subject, but not both. This, Daviescontends, is incorrect – in fact critical thinking is both, and evidence indicates CT canbe taught in both ways (pp. 181–182). Also, Ryan (1992) investigated field-specificarguments in scientific theory and found that they featured generic CT reasoningstrategies. He concluded that they most likely exist in other domains. Anothercounter-argument is that generic CT tests have been found to be predictors of successin a number of disciplines, indicating that CT skills are generalisable. Finally, field-specific claims are evaluated by ‘criteria that extend across both fields and everydayreasoning: criteria of deductive validity, inductive strength, observational adequacy,explanatory power, and so forth’ (Siegal, 1992, pp. 106–107). These argumentspersuasively support the idea that CT skills are generic skills. If so, then a genericCT-testing instrument should be a valid means to test these skills.

1.4. The test instrument

The Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal ® (WGCTA) was first introduced in1964 and since then has been extensively tested and revised. The WGCTA ® ShortForm A is divided into five sections: ‘Inferences’, ‘Recognition of Assumptions’,‘Deduction’, ‘Interpretation’ and ‘Evaluation of Arguments’. However, the test’sauthors do not claim that each section is a reliable measure of the individual skills, butthat the test as a whole is a valid measure of CT ability (Harcourt Assessment, 2007),an assertion supported by Gadzella et al. (2006).

The WGCTA was chosen for this research for a number of reasons. Firstly, it hasconstruct validity in that its five sections correspond closely to the primary skills iden-tified by major theorists in the area. Secondly, there have been a number of reliabilityand validity studies performed on various forms of the test (Bauwens & Gerhard,1987; Gadzella et al., 2006; Wagner & Harvey, 2006; Wilson & Edwards, 1981), allof which suggest that it is a valid testing instrument.

A split-half form of the test was chosen because of the difficulty in finding twoequivalent versions of the same format test and in order to avoid test fatigue, whichcould result from taking two longer tests one after another. A final consideration wasthe possibility that any two tests chosen would not be of equal difficulty – as Ennis(1993) states, ‘comparability is always suspect’ (p. 181). However, a weakness in thedesign of this study was that the validity of the split test was not tested and thatspecific items were not analysed.

2. Methodology

This study had two parts: the administration of an established CT test in both Chineseand English and interviews with students who took the test.

2.1. Participants

To control for cultural or national differences, only Chinese students attending theCentre for Macquarie English, the English language centre at Macquarie University,

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were recruited. The participants were recruited from students enrolled in the centre’sBusiness Preparation Program (BPP) or in the Accounting Preparation Program (APP).These ten-week direct-entry courses are designed for students who have not achievedadequate IELTS scores to enter the university, and they were chosen because their busi-ness and accounting focus suggested similar types of students and similar educationalbackgrounds. Students in both programs have, or are deemed to have (by progressingthrough periods of English language study), an IELTS level of between 6 and 6.5.

In total, 55 participants took the test, 21 from BPP and 34 from APP. Moststudents (86%) had an undergraduate degree and planned to enter either a Business orAccounting postgraduate degree at Macquarie University. A small group (14.5%)were high-school graduates and were planning to enter an undergraduate degree atMacquarie. The median age was 24.

2.2. Materials

The WGCTA ® Short Form A was translated into Chinese under licence fromHarcourt Assessment Inc. It underwent a two-stage translation process; HarcourtAssessment Inc then approved the translation. The test was trialled on a Chinese-speaking PhD student.

Both the English and the Chinese tests were split, so that half the test could beadministered in Chinese and half in English. As some sections of the test have an oddnumber of questions, some questions were omitted. The rubrics for both halves of thetest were identical.

2.3. Test procedure

Participants were randomly split into two groups: Group 1 took the half-test first inChinese and then the second half in English, whereas Group 2 took the half-test firstin English and then the second half in Chinese.

Before the first test, students filled out a form asking for age, sex, years they hadstudied English, age they began studying English, highest level of education achievedand time they had lived in an English-speaking country. They were also asked to ratetheir English-language skills on a Likert scale from ‘Beginner’ to ‘Fluent’ and to indi-cate how often they had read English-language books or had seen English-languagemovies in their own country, from ‘Never’ to ‘Frequently’.

Each split-half test was untimed and students were permitted to use print or elec-tronic dictionaries and to ask questions. This procedure was to reduce the impact oftime-pressure and of unfamiliar vocabulary on participants’ ability to answer the CTquestions correctly. The Chinese-speaking translator invigilated the Chinese-languagetest to answer questions, but was not present during the English-language test.However, no questions were asked in any group. In scoring, one point was given foreach correct answer and all scores were converted to percentages.

2.4. Interview procedure

To obtain some insights into the subjective experience of CT test-taking in an L2,semi-structured, recorded interviews were conducted with three students within a fewdays of the test. Interviewees identified which test they took first and were asked toreflect on the differences between the two tests in terms of difficulty of understanding

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vocabulary, of understanding ideas and of reading comprehension. They were alsoasked on which test they thought they performed best and whether they felt moreconfident when giving answers in one of the tests.

3. Findings

3.1. Research question 1

The first research question was whether students taking the first split-half in Chinesewould perform better than those taking the same split-half in English. As detailed inTable 1, the total scores for students taking Test 1 in Chinese were significantly betterthan those for students taking the same half of the split test in English first, confirmingthe hypothesis for the first research question.

Figure 1. Chinese and English mean results of first half-test.Note: CA1 = Chinese test taken first; EA1 = English test taken first.

Table 2. Differences between Chinese-first and English-first test scores with ‘number of yearsstudying English’ controlled.

Test Mean score SD F P R squared adjusted

CA1 total 65.16 14.30 4.236 .020 .107EA1 total 58.01 11.74

Note: CA1 = Chinese test taken first; EA1 = English test taken first.

Table 1. Differences between Chinese-first and English-first test scores.

Test Mean score SD t df Two-tailed p

CA1 total 65.16 14.30 2.03 53 .047EA1 total 58.01 11.74

Note: CA1 = Chinese test taken first; EA1 = English test taken first.

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The variables of age, gender, and level of education did not influence results;neither did those variables designed to test cultural familiarity, such as years spent inan English-speaking country, frequency of readng English-language books and watch-ing English-language movies. Only one variable – the number of years studyingEnglish – was found to significantly influence the findings. When this variable wascontrolled for, the significance of the difference between test takers in Chinese andEnglish for Test 1 totals increased, as detailed in Table 2.

All tests were run on individual sections of the test. However, in most of the statis-tical analyses, except the charts, only the total test comparisons are shown since, aspreviously stated, only the total test has validity as a test of CT abilities.

Figure 1 compares the performance of students taking the Chinese test first andthose taking the English test first in all sections and in the test totals.Figure 1. Chinese and English mean results of first half-test.Note: CA1 = Chinese test taken first; EA1 = English test taken first.

3.2. Research question 2

The second research question was whether Group 1, who took the test first in Englishand then in Chinese, would perform significantly better on the Chinese half of thetest. As shown in Table 3, the comparison tests for Group 1 showed significantlyhigher results in the Chinese half of the test for the total scores, supporting thehypothesis.

Figure 2 provides a sectional comparison of Group 1’s performance on the twohalves of the test.Figure 2. Group 1 mean scores on first-half (English) and second-half (Chinese) of the test.Note: EA1 = English test mean scores; CB2 = Chinese mean scores.

Figure 2. Group 1 mean scores on first-half (English) and second-half (Chinese) of the test.Note: EA1 = English test mean scores; CB2 = Chinese mean scores.

Table 3. Differences between Group 1’s mean scores for first and second half of the test.

Test Mean score SD t df Two-tailed p

EA1 total 58.01 11.74 −3.08 28 .005CB2 total 67.55 10.85

Note: EA1 = English test taken first; CB2 = Chinese test taken second (by Group 1).

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3.3. Research question 3

No significant differences were found between Group 2’s mean scores for the Chinesetest, taken first, and the English test, taken second (Chinese mean 65.16, SD = 14.30;English mean 61. 09, SD = 14. 43, t = 1.048, df = 25, two-tailed p = .305), supportingthe third hypothesis of no effect. Figure 3 provides a graphic comparison of Group 2’sperformance on the two halves of the test.Figure 3. Group 2 mean scores on first (Chinese) and second half (English) of the test.Note: CA1 = Chinese test; EB2 = English test mean scores.In summary, the statistically significant results were in the directions hypothe-sised. Comparing students taking the Chinese test first with those taking the Englishtest first (Research question 1), the former group performed significantly better.Group 1 students, who took the English test first, performed significantly better gener-ally on the Chinese test, taken second (Research question 2). While other results werein the directions expected (with Chinese mean scores generally higher than Englishmean scores), mean score differences were not generally statistically significant(Research question 3).

3.4. Interviews

The fourth research question was whether students would subjectively experience theEnglish half-test to be more difficult. The hypothesis that it would be experienced assuch was borne out by the interview responses.

The responses of the three interviewees were remarkably similar. All indicated thatthey found the English test more difficult. Two explicitly referred to reading andvocabulary difficulties, while the other had ‘no trouble with vocabulary’ because ofdoing the Chinese test first ‘so I knew the meaning’ [of the rubric].

When questioned about understanding ideas, all interviewees strongly indicatedthat it was much harder in English to be sure of the meaning of the ideas. All had moreconfidence in their answers in the Chinese language test: one said he was ‘moreconfident and more clear’ and one said that ‘of course’ she had ‘a lot more confidence’during the Chinese-language test. Two indicated that the English test took longer to do.

Figure 3. Group 2 mean scores on first (Chinese) and second half (English) of the test.Note: CA1 = Chinese test; EB2 = English test mean scores.

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4. Discussion

Although the size of the two test groups – 29 and 26 respectively – was under thestatistically desirable minimum of 30, the results overall indicate that performing ona CT test in a second language is indeed more difficult than performing on the sametest in one’s own language. When the co-variate ‘Number of years participant hadstudied English’ was controlled for, the total first half-test showed significantly higherscores for the Chinese version of the test, reinforcing the idea that language profi-ciency (as equated to years spent studying English) was a significant influence on CTperformance. This research indicates that blanket preconceptions about Asian orChinese learners may in fact be misconceptions. It also suggests that pedagogicalpractices may need to be adapted to allow for language-based difficulties in CT.

Several factors suggest that in real-life university-level CT, the effect of thinkingin another language would be magnified. Firstly, students were allowed to finish thetests in their own time, while university exams are strictly timed, a factor likely toproduce poorer results for L2 students. Also, the WGCTA uses a 9th-grade vocabulary(Harcourt Assessment Inc., 2007). University-level vocabulary might cause anincreased difference between CT performance in L2 and L1.

4.1. Working memory and reading comprehension issues

Thinking in a second language is generally agreed to impose cognitive limitations onprocessing information (Mackee, Rispoli, McDaniel, & Garrett, 2006) and studies onworking memory, in particular, tend to support the idea that CT may be affected byL2 restrictions in working memory. Working memory is particularly important inlanguage comprehension: overloading the working memory may result in slowerhigher-order operations (Just & Carpenter, 1992, p. 122). Working memory is definedas ‘the ability to store and process information simultaneously’ (Harrington &Sawyer, 1992, p. 25) and capacities in relation to this have been related to readingcomprehension (Chun & Payne, 2004; Harrington & Sawyer, 1992). Walter’s (2004)study indicates that reading comprehension is related to ‘structure-building activity’(the way readers build up a mental picture of a text’s structure, mentally referringbackwards in the text to relate ideas) as well as to working memory. More advancedL2 readers have more L2 working memory capacity and this is associated with betterstructure-building skills, while the operation of working memory and structure build-ing is extremely quick and unconscious in L1. Schoonen et al. (2003) cite literaturethat suggests that fluency leaves ‘sufficient capacity for other attention-consuming,higher level processing’ (pp. 168–169); the corollary is that less fluent writers usemuch of their cognitive working memory capacity for lower-level skills.

The three interviews highlighted problems in reading comprehension as an issue.For example, one student said ‘when I took the English test, I thought, oh, is thisreally meaning of the introduction? But when I do the Chinese test, oh, it’s sure’. Theparticular difficulties related by the interviewees were not about CT per se, but inunderstanding the meanings of the text. As one interviewee related:

… in the Chinese I find that sometimes I think ‘Oh! The answer is so simple and so clear’.But for English, I need to find out, I need to read it clearly, I don’t think it is so simpleand so clear, and sometimes I feel that the answer is impossible!

The fact that the two split-half versions of the test included the same rubrics for eachquestion highlighted comprehension difficulties for the participants. One participant

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who had taken the English split-half first commented on the text duplicated in the teststhus: ‘When I took the Chinese test, I find that some meaning is different … so I mighthave made the mistakes in the English test’. Conversely, when a participant who hadtaken the Chinese test first was questioned about reading comprehension, he repliedthat he had had no trouble, ‘because we have done the Chinese one before, so I knewthe meaning’.

Vocabulary knowledge may also affect CT performance. In a wide-ranging studyof word-recognition research, Koda (1996) emphasises the importance of efficientword recognition, stating that without it, ‘meaning construction is seriously impaired’(p. 451). Words occur within text and so textual meanings are not understood if wordrecognition is weak. Similarly, if the text is misunderstood, individual words can bemisunderstood, thus text and word comprehension is ‘bi-directional’ (p. 451). Inter-estingly, in one interview a student identified contextual understanding as key: ‘Youknow, every word in Chinese and English … has different meanings, and in my ownlanguage, I can understand in this sentence what the word means, but in English … Idon’t know in this sentence the meaning’. Another respondent commented that themeaning of the rubric was not difficult overall, but that with ‘some words, somelogics, the critical thinking, maybe the meaning of one or two words makes the wholemeaning different’. In university contexts, the difficulty of the critical thinking taskmay or may not be exacerbated by the discipline-specific nature of vocabulary. On theone hand, in such texts there would be more unfamiliar words, on the other hand, itcould be that once learnt, the meanings within the specific discipline are relativelyfixed and defined. The relative difficulty of CT involving generic or subject-specificterminology warrants further research.

Fender (2001) suggests that speed is a factor. For language to be fluentlyprocessed, sentence-processing skills must be ‘activated rapidly enough to inform andconstrain word integration procedures’ (p. 353). Speed is a factor in another sense aswell: as McLean and Ransom (2005) point out, reading times for L2 students may be‘a third or two times longer’ (p. 55) than L1 students, so L2 students devote time tocomprehension and have less time and confidence for critical reflection. This obser-vation is supported by the testimonies of the interviewees, who felt much lessconfident and were slower in comprehending the English language test.

Exacerbating factors in reading comprehension are differences between the L1 andL2. Koda (1996, p. 460, 2005, p. 42) concludes that orthographic distance impacts onword recognition and that orthographic similarities make word recognition easier andso influence reading comprehension. Juffs (1998) found that Chinese English speakerswere less accurate in judging possible English sentences and ‘unambiguous sentenceswith bad cues’ (p. 124) than those with a Romance L1 and that for the same sentencestheir reading time was significantly longer (p. 131). Chinese ESL learners also expe-rience processing breakdowns in certain types of more difficult-to-interpret sentences(Juffs & Harrington, 1996, p. 306) and difficulties in parsing performance (Juffs,1998, p. 136; Juffs & Harrington, 1995, p. 514). Such findings suggest that furthercontrastive CT research may provide insights into comparative language-based CTdifferences.

4.2. Culture and CT

Although this research did not compare the CT performance of Chinese students withother L2 students, the language proficiency issues discussed above do challenge the

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assumption that any perceived lack of CT skills is solely attributable to the influenceof Confucian culture. In fact, much current research into the Asian learner and Asianlearning strategies challenges the idea that Confucian cultures produce learners whoare passive, unquestioning and lacking in CT skills.

Memorisation is often confused with rote learning, but much research, summarisedby Chalmers and Volet (1997), suggests that memorisation strategies are employed inorder to deeply understand a subject and are not always rote-learning techniques.Others (Jin & Cortazzi, 2006; Marton, Dall’Alba, & Kun, 1996; Ramburuth, 2001;Watkins, 1996) agree that Asian students seek to employ memorisation with under-standing. In spite of evidence of their intertwined function, many Western educatorssee understanding and memorising as ‘almost mutually exclusive’ (Watkins, 1996, p.115). Some focus on the role of memorising in Confucian ideas of learning, but thereis much about reflective learning and independent thought in Confucian philosophy(Jin & Cortazzi, 2006; Shi, 2006).

Memorisation strategies do not necessarily imply surface learning. Biggs (1989)employed a ‘Study Process Questionnaire’ that showed Asian students scoring higherthan Australian students on deep approaches. A later survey (Ramburuth & McCormick,2001), using the Biggs questionnaire as well as other measuring devices, found noevidence that Asian students have a more surface approach to learning. A deep approachto learning suggests a thinking approach and thus may suggest CT skills; further researchmight explore this link.

Passivity is another common conception that may not be accurate. Some lecturerscomment that Asian students are quiet in classes and do not ask questions; this is ofteninterpreted as being passive. Chalmers and Volet (1997, p. 91) point to the pedagogicalbackground of Asian students, which does not always encourage student participationin classes, as a cause of quiet behaviour in classrooms. However, others have foundthat the most likely cause of reticence in asking questions is anxiety about limitedlanguage skills (Fong, 2003; Jin & Cortazzi, 2006, p. 19; Robertson, Line, Jones, &Thomas, 2000). In fact, research indicates that Asian students want to be active, auton-omous learners (Littlewood, 2000). However, in their previous learning contexts oflarge, teacher-centred classrooms (Jin & Cortazzi, 2006), they may not have had thethe same opportunities to be active and, in new contexts where overtly expressed CTskills are valued, they are often faced with the task of adapting to different learningand teaching practices and paradigms.

4.3. Individual differences and CT skills in Western populations

When evaluating CT skills it is also important to be aware that cultural stereotypes mayinfluence perceptions. Difficulties in CT in a Chinese student may be seen as cultural,while similar difficulties in Australian students are regarded as individual. Clark andGieve (2006) argue against ascribing a ‘fixed, reified, homogenous’ identity to Chineselearners and urge teachers to ‘understand, interpret and represent the actual learners’(p. 63). In 1998, Spack urged that Chinese students have a wide spectrum of behaviourand linguistic characteristics. Today, changes in the Chinese educational environmentmean that there is even more diversity amongst Chinese students (Jin & Cortazzi,2006). Certainly, Chinese learners do share a cultural heritage, but individual differ-ences are just as important.

Finally, there is plenty of evidence suggesting that CT skills are not widespreadwithin the Western population (van Gelder, Bissett, & Cumming, 2004). One large

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study found that skills of argumentation in relation to causation and other issues weredeficient and that about a half of the participants could not judge what was adequateevidence (Kuhn, 1991). Such research on the deficiencies in CT in Western populationsis sometimes overlooked when making judgements about Asian groups.

In summary, this research indicates that CT performance is affected by thinking inan L2 and explores reasons for such an effect. Recognition of how thinking in an L2affects performance on CT tasks suggests that some perceptions held about Asianstudents may be flawed. Moreover, L2 fluency levels, reading and working-memoryissues and individual differences may be more important factors in CT performance.An understanding of these issues can aid lecturers in adopting pedagogical practicesto help international students in adjusting to, and ultimately succeeding in, their studies.

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