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Table of Contents
Critical Thinking: Tools for Taking Charge of Your Professional and Personal Life
By
Richard W. Paul, Linda Elder
Publisher
: Financial Times Prentice Hall
Pub Date
: June 13, 2002
ISBN
: 0-13-064760-8
Pages
: 384
Critical Thinking is about becoming a better thinker in every aspect of your life: in your career, and as a consumer, citizen, friend, parent, and lover. Discover the core skills of effective thinking; then analyze your own thought processes, identify weaknesses, and overcome them. Learn how to translate more effective thinking into better decisions, less frustration, more wealth, and above all, greater confidence to pursue and achieve your most important goals in life.
Another Obstacle: Group Definitions of Reality
Within all organizations, there is a natural generation of "favorable self-description" or "self-serving representation." This involves an image the organization fosters of itself, both inwardly and outwardly. How explicitly and openly these representations are stated varies from organization to organization, as does the degree of contradiction between presentation and fact. By their very nature groups have a vested interest in presenting the most favorable picture of themselves to those outside. Typically, therefore, a rosier picture than is actually the case is created for external consumption. Even within an organization there are usually some truths that remain unspoken and taboo. Being an "insider" does not mean you can say anything you want to other insiders.For example, some doctors are aware of more medical malpractice than they are willing to publicly discuss. Lawyers sometimes play down the fact that some lawyers routinely bill clients for more time than they spend on their clients' cases and that judges sometimes decide a case as a result of their personal beliefs and reaction to the appearance and demeanor of the accused, rather than by the relevant facts of the case and the meaning and intent of the law. Sociologists study this phenomenon under the categories of "in-group and out-group" behavior. Social psychologists study it under the category of social self-deception.
Test the IdeaGroup Definitions of RealityWhen we experience people we do not first see the person as a set of independent characteristics and then synthesize the parts into a whole. Rather, we typically see people as "instant" wholes. We interpret the "parts" accordingly. Behind these judgments, that often occur in a fraction of a second, are often an organized set of "definitions" of how things are. Hence, a person in management will often approach a "union" man with as many preconceptions as the union man approaches him. Select some job or professional situation in which you had a role. Review it in your mind and see if you can isolate any of the implicit (biased) "definitions" that guide behavior and perceptions on the job. How were you supposed to behave? How were others supposed to behave? Can you think of any situation in which you "opposed" some definition implicit in the established view of things? Do you remember how that opposition was received? |
