While there is no shortage of scholarship on the topic, there appears to be no widely accepted definition of critical thinking. This is coupled with the troublesome fact that those in higher education often believe their definitions are the norm. In this article, we demonstrate a lack of uniformity through a representative sample of historically influential definitions for critical thinking. These definitions are then classified into two distinct categories: context specific and cross-disciplinary definitions. From this lack of uniformity we argue that at least two problems in higher education arise: lack of proper critical thinking assessment and difficulty in interdisciplinary collaboration on the topic of critical thinking. Given the current focus on critical thinking assessment alongside a movement toward greater interdisciplinary collaboration within higher education, we conclude with a call for a uniform definition of critical thinking.

A college academic course is an argument constructed by the professor who teaches the course. Richard Paul’s elements of thinking are used to clarify this contention. It is the responsibility of the professor to choose reading materials, construct lectures, and develop other activities and assignments that can best aid her students to understand the argument. Reading texts and listening to lectures effectively to grasp the argument requires critical thinking skills that can be learned by students. Students fail when those responsible for their education either assume they already possess such skills or that they cannot learn them.

Critical thinking is often assumed to be an integral part of learning in higher education. This learning increasingly takes place in the online environment, where students and faculty are challenged to engage in a collaborative project of critical thinking. This paper seeks to explore the process of critical thinking that is currently taking place online and proposes that social interaction and the social construction of knowledge are integral parts of this process. Discussion boards from economics, history, and sociology are discussed as examples of how critical thinking is developed in the online environment.