critical thinking within social work

What Is Critical Thinking in Social Work?

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Effective Communication Skills for Social Workers

Top 5 values in being a social worker, legal & ethical issues facing social workers.

• Clinical Model Vs. Developmental Model in Social Work Practice
• Emotional Stresses of Being a Clinical Psychologist

Social workers offer many valuable services to people in need. They provide mental health services, such as diagnosis and counseling, advocate for clients who are unable to do so themselves, provide direct care services, such as housing assistance and help clients obtain social services benefits. The ability to remain open-minded and unbiased while gathering and interpreting data, otherwise known as critical thinking, is crucial for helping clients to the fullest extent possible. Critical thinking is one of the top skills required to be a successful social worker.

Meaning of Critical Thinking

The Foundation for Critical Thinking describes critical thinking as the ability to analyze, synthesize, evaluate and apply new information. Critical thinking in social work practice involves looking at a person or situation from an objective and neutral standpoint, without jumping to conclusions or making assumptions. Social workers spend their days observing, experiencing and reflecting on all that is happening around them.

In your role as a social worker, you obtain as much data as possible from interviews, case notes, observations, research, supervision and other means. Social workers must be self-aware of their feelings and beliefs. Stereotypical biases or prejudices must be recognized and not allowed to influence thinking when assembling a plan of action to help your clients to the highest level possible.

Importance of Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is important for the development of social work skills in direct practice. Social workers help people from all walks of life and come across people or populations with experiences, ideas and opinions that often vary from their own culture and background. Clients may be misunderstood and misjudged if thinking critically does not take place in a social context.

Applying critical thinking and analysis in social work helps social workers formulate a treatment plan or intervention for working with a client. First, you need to consider the beliefs, thoughts or experiences that underlie your client's actions without making a snap decision. What seems crazy or irrational to you at first may in fact be better understood in the context of cultural and biopsychosocial factors that play a role in your client's life. Critical thinking helps you objectively examine these factors, consider their importance and impact on your course of action, while simultaneously maintaining professional detachment and a non-biased attitude.

Interrelated Critical Thinking Skills

To develop critical thinking skills as a social worker, you need to have the ability to self-reflect and observe your own behaviors and thoughts about a particular client or situation. Self-awareness, observation and critical thinking are closely intertwined and impact your ability to be an effective social worker. For example, observing your gut reactions and initial responses to a client without immediately taking action can help you identify transference and counter-transference reactions, which can have a negative or harmful impact on your client.

Self-reflection is particularly important when working with clients who have very different or very similar backgrounds and beliefs to your own. You don't want your abilities to be clouded by your own preconceived notions or biases. Likewise, you don't want to merge with a client with whom you over-identify because you come from very similar situations or have had similar experiences.

Purpose of Clinical Supervision

Social workers engage in clinical practice under professional supervision to hone their critical thinking abilities. According to the Administration for Children and Families , clinical supervision not only encourages critical thinking but also helps social workers develop other core social work skills. Clinical experiences focus on maintaining positive social work ethics, self-reflection and the ability to intervene in crises.

Many, if not most, social work settings require or, at least offer, the opportunity to participate in peer, individual or group supervision. Discussing your cases or clients with a supervisor or with colleagues can help you sort out your own opinions and judgments and prevent these issues from impacting your work.

• The Center for Critical Thinking: Defining Critical Thinking
• Administration for Children and Families: Clinical Supervision

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Critical Thinking and Professional Judgement in Social Work, Lynne Rutter and Keith Brown

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Lee Quinney, Critical Thinking and Professional Judgement in Social Work, Lynne Rutter and Keith Brown, The British Journal of Social Work , Volume 48, Issue 4, June 2018, Pages 1128–1131, https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcx056

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As a book that will probably be attractive to both final-year and PQ students considering ways of improving and invigorating their practice, this text provides an effective introduction to critical thinking and judgement because it offers a balanced proportionate oversight of literature and key issues: it does what it says it does—I love that! It refers to a raft of well-known age-old writers on critical reflection (e.g. Brookfield, 1987; Schὂn, 1997) and more contemporary ones referring to aspects of risk assessment, judgement and decision making (e.g. Taylor, 2013), capturing the need for much more focused post-qualifying training in the wake of the Laming Report (2009) and move towards more specific education and training for newly qualified social workers and then those in their Assessed First Year in Practice (ASYE). Unfortunately, ASYE is not discussed because the book appears more focused on cognate understanding of critical thinking and judgement in an introductory manner rather than policy and practice capabilities or knowledge and skills statements. This means potentially good chapters analysing critical thinking and reflection at the ASYE stage of a career are lost in this edition. For example, the Professional Capabilities Framework for ASYE refers to showing creativity in tackling and solving problems, and using critically reflective techniques to evaluate information and test hypothesis (see BASW, 2017).

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Critical Thinking and Professional Judgement for Social Work

• Lynne Rutter - Bournemouth University, UK
• Keith Brown - Bournemouth University, UK
• Description

Critical thinking can appear formal and academic, far removed from everyday life where decisions have to be taken quickly in less than ideal conditions. It is, however, a vital part of social work, and indeed any healthcare and leadership practice.

Taking a pragmatic look at the range of ideas associated with critical thinking, this Fifth Edition continues to focus on learning and development for practice. The authors discuss the importance of sound, moral judgement based on critical thinking and practical reasoning, and its application to different workplace situations; critical reflection, and its importance to academic work and practice; and the connection between critical thinking ideas and professionalism.

See what’s new to this edition by selecting the Features tab on this page. Should you need additional information or have questions regarding the HEOA information provided for this title, including what is new to this edition, please email [email protected] . Please include your name, contact information, and the name of the title for which you would like more information. For information on the HEOA, please go to http://ed.gov/policy/highered/leg/hea08/index.html .

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Good overview on foundational issues in social work eduction. Easy to read thus appropriate for ESL students. Chapter on critical style proved valuable as a guideline to literature reviews.

This book is written in such a way that it appears the authors are actually speaking to the students and in fact uses 'we' which is as if it is a collegial journey to learning. The content is relevent and is well informed, analytical in enough detail without being too intimidating for non-academic students.

This concise and clearly-written volume is useful across a range of early-career post-qualifying modules.

Very helpful introduction to some introductory reflective learning concepts.

Helpful addition to the students reading list for their unit of study

a concise, revised and accessible text for any NQSW practitioner re their evolving professional practice and beyond in terms of their continual professional development. Revisits key essential themes within a fresh context especially liked Chapters 3 and 4. A useful reference text for any Practice Educator, SW educator and ASYE assessor.

You are here

Critical Thinking and Professional Judgement for Social Work

• Lynne Rutter - Bournemouth University, UK
• Keith Brown - Bournemouth University, UK
• Description

Critical thinking can appear formal and academic, far removed from everyday life where decisions have to be taken quickly in less than ideal conditions. It is, however, a vital part of social work, and indeed any healthcare and leadership practice.

Taking a pragmatic look at the range of ideas associated with critical thinking, this Fifth Edition continues to focus on learning and development for practice. The authors discuss the importance of sound, moral judgement based on critical thinking and practical reasoning, and its application to different workplace situations; critical reflection, and its importance to academic work and practice; and the connection between critical thinking ideas and professionalism.

Good overview on foundational issues in social work eduction. Easy to read thus appropriate for ESL students. Chapter on critical style proved valuable as a guideline to literature reviews.

This book is written in such a way that it appears the authors are actually speaking to the students and in fact uses 'we' which is as if it is a collegial journey to learning. The content is relevent and is well informed, analytical in enough detail without being too intimidating for non-academic students.

This concise and clearly-written volume is useful across a range of early-career post-qualifying modules.

Very helpful introduction to some introductory reflective learning concepts.

Helpful addition to the students reading list for their unit of study

a concise, revised and accessible text for any NQSW practitioner re their evolving professional practice and beyond in terms of their continual professional development. Revisits key essential themes within a fresh context especially liked Chapters 3 and 4. A useful reference text for any Practice Educator, SW educator and ASYE assessor.

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International Handbook of Psychology Learning and Teaching pp 1–30 Cite as

Psychology and Social Work Through Critical Lens

• Maria Cláudia Santos Lopes de Oliveira 5 &
• Tatiana Yokoy 6  
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• First Online: 26 August 2022

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Psychology around the world has undergone important changes along last decades. One of the most salient transformations has impacted both the science and psychologists’ self-images as practitioners and researchers and provoked the slow displacement of the discipline’s focus, from isolated individuals to individuals within groups and communities. Psychology today left the closed rooms of offices and clinics, and has gone outdoors, to work with community members and through the participation in communities’ daily life. As a consequence of this empirical shift, theoretical novelties were required. Psychologists represent now even more active agents within health, educational, social care system, and governmental and non-governmental programs. In this chapter we present and discuss the historical process of this sociocultural and epistemological rupture in Psychology and consider its impacts over applied social sciences today. We elaborate on contemporary challenges concerning social work and discuss the contribution critical psychological approaches can provide to enhance its impacts and outcomes in face of the very complex issues dealt by social policies in a globalized world.

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In this chapter, we use the term “social worker” in reference to the set of social care professionals, while “social assistant” is exclusively adopted to refer to those graduated in this career and registered as professionals, even though this differentiation is not universally adopted in different national contexts.

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Institute of Psychology, University of Brasília, Brasília, Brazil

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de Oliveira, M.C.S.L., Yokoy, T. (2022). Psychology and Social Work Through Critical Lens. In: Zumbach, J., Bernstein, D., Narciss, S., Marsico, G. (eds) International Handbook of Psychology Learning and Teaching. Springer International Handbooks of Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26248-8_49-1

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26248-8_49-1

Received : 04 April 2020

Accepted : 27 November 2021

Published : 26 August 2022

Publisher Name : Springer, Cham

Print ISBN : 978-3-030-26248-8

Online ISBN : 978-3-030-26248-8

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Critical thinking refers to deliberately scrutinizing and evaluating theories, concepts, or ideas using reasoned reflection and analysis. The act of thinking critically implies moving beyond simply understanding information, but questioning its source, its production, and its presentation in order to expose potential bias or researcher subjectivity. Applying critical thinking to investigating a research problem involves the act of challenging assumptions and questioning the choices and potential motives underpinning how the author designed the study and arrived at particular conclusions or recommended courses of action.

Mintz, Steven. "How the Word "Critical" Came to Signify the Leading Edge of Cultural Analysis." Higher Ed Gamma Blog , Inside Higher Ed, February 13, 2024; Van Merriënboer, Jeroen JG and Paul A. Kirschner. Ten Steps to Complex Learning: A Systematic Approach to Four-component Instructional Design . New York: Routledge, 2017.

Thinking Critically

Applying Critical Thinking to Research and Writing

Professors like to use the term critical thinking; in fact, the idea of being critical permeates much of academe writ large. In the classroom, the idea of thinking critically is often mentioned by professors when students ask how they should approach a research and writing assignment [other approaches your professor might mention include interdisciplinarity, comparative, gendered, global, etc.]. However, critical thinking is more than just an approach to research and writing. It is an acquired skill used in becoming a complex learner capable of discerning important relationships among the elements of, as well as integrating multiple ways of understanding applied to, the research problem. Critical thinking is a lens through which you holistically interrogate a topic.

Given this, thinking critically encompasses a variety of inter-related connotations applied to college-level research and writing * :

• Integrated and Multi-Dimensional . Critical thinking is not focused on any one element of the research design, but rather, is applied holistically throughout the process of identifying the research problem, reviewing of literature, applying methods of analysis, describing the results, discussing their implications, and, if appropriate, offering recommendations for further research. The act of thinking critically is non-linear [i.e., applies to going back and changing prior thoughts when new evidence emerges]; it permeates the entire research endeavor from contemplating what to write to proofreading the final product.
• Normative . This refers to the idea that critical thinking can be used to challenge prior assumptions in ways that advocate for social justice, equity, and inclusion in ways that are transformative and have lasting impact. In this respect, critical thinking can be a method for breaking out of dominant culture norms so as to produce research outcomes that illuminate previously hidden aspects of exploitation and injustice.
• Power Dynamics . Research in the social sciences often includes examining aspects of power and influence that shape social relations, organizations, institutions, and the production of knowledge. This involves how power operates, how it can be acquired, and how power and influence can be maintained. Critical thinking can reveal how societal structures perpetuate power in ways that marginalizes and oppresses group and within historical , political, economic, and cultural contexts.
• Reflection . A key aspect of critical thinking is practicing reflexivity; the act of turning ideas and concepts back onto yourself in order to reveal and clarify your own beliefs, assumptions, and perspectives. Being critically reflexive is important because it can reveal hidden biases you may have that could unintentionally influence how you interpret and validate information. The more reflexive you are, the better able and more comfortable you are about opening yourself up to new modes of understanding.
• Rigorous Questioning . Thinking critically is guided by asking questions that lead to addressing complex concepts, principles, theories, or problems more effectively and to help distinguish what is known from from what is not known [or that may be hidden]. In this way, critical thinking involves deliberately framing inquiries not just as research questions, but as a way to focus on systematic, disciplined,  in-depth questioning concerning the research problem and your positionality as a researcher.
• Social Change . An overarching goal of critical thinking applied to research and writing is to seek to identify and challenge sources of inequality, exploitation, oppression, and marinalization that contributes to maintaining the status quo. This way of thinking can help humanize the research problem, extending the scope of interpretive analysis beyond the boundaries of traditional approaches to understanding the topic.

In writing a research paper, the act of critical thinking applies most directly to the literature review and discussion sections of your paper . In reviewing the literature, it is important to reflect upon specific aspects of a study, such as, determining if the research design effectively establishes cause and effect relationships or provides insight into explaining why certain phenomena do or do not occur, assessing whether the method of gathering data or information supports the objectives of the study, and evaluating if the assumptions used t o arrive at a specific conclusion are evidence-based and relevant to addressing the research problem. An assessment of whether a source is helpful to investigating the research problem also involves critically analyzing how the research challenges conventional approaches to investigations that perpetuate inequalities or hides the voices of others.

Critical thinking also applies to the discussion section of your paper because this is where you interpret the findings of your study and explain its significance. This involves more than summarizing findings and describing outcomes. It includes reflecting on their importance and providing reasoned explanations why the research study is important in filling a gap in the literature or expanding knowledge and understanding about the topic in ways that inform practice. Critical reflection helps you think introspectively about your own beliefs concerning the significance of the findings but in ways that avoid biased judgment and decision making.

* Mintz, Steven. "How the Word "Critical" Came to Signify the Leading Edge of Cultural Analysis." Higher Ed Gamma Blog , Inside Higher Ed, February 13, 2024; Suter, W. Newton. Introduction to Educational Research: A Critical Thinking Approach. 2nd edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2012

Behar-Horenstein, Linda S., and Lian Niu. “Teaching Critical Thinking Skills in Higher Education: A Review of the Literature.” Journal of College Teaching and Learning 8 (February 2011): 25-41; Bayou, Yemeserach and Tamene Kitila. "Exploring Instructors’ Beliefs about and Practices in Promoting Students’ Critical Thinking Skills in Writing Classes." GIST–Education and Learning Research Journal 26 (2023): 123-154; Butcher, Charity. "Using In-class Writing to Promote Critical Thinking and Application of Course Concepts." Journal of Political Science Education 18 (2022): 3-21; Loseke, Donileen R. Methodological Thinking: Basic Principles of Social Research Design. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2012; Hart, Claire et al. “Exploring Higher Education Students’ Critical Thinking Skills through Content Analysis.” Thinking Skills and Creativity 41 (September 2021): 100877; Sabrina, R., Emilda Sulasmi, and Mandra Saragih. "Student Critical Thinking Skills and Student Writing Ability: The Role of Teachers' Intellectual Skills and Student Learning." Cypriot Journal of Educational Sciences 17 (2022): 2493-2510.Van Merriënboer, Jeroen JG and Paul A. Kirschner. Ten Steps to Complex Learning: A Systematic Approach to Four-component Instructional Design. New York: Routledge, 2017; Yeh, Hui-Chin, Shih-hsien Yang, Jo Shan Fu, and Yen-Chen Shih. "Developing College Students’ Critical Thinking through Reflective Writing." Higher Education Research & Development 42 (2023): 244-259.

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Thinking About Kahneman’s Contribution to Critical Thinking

A nobel laureate on contributions on the importance of 'thinking slow.'.

Updated April 10, 2024 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma

• Kahneman won a Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics for his work.
• He found that people are often irrational about economics.

During my Ph.D. studies, I recall focusing on reconceptualising what we know of as critical thinking to include reflective judgment (not jumping to conclusions and taking your time in your decision-making to consider the nature limits, and certainty of knowing) on par with the commonly accepted skills and dispositions components. The importance of reflective judgment wasn’t a particularly novel idea – a good deal of research on reflective judgment and similar processes akin to critical thinking had already been conducted (see King and Kitchener, 1994; Kuhn, 1999; 2000; Stanovich, 1999). However, reflective judgment – as opposed to intuitive judgment – didn’t seem to have ‘the presence’ in the discussion of critical thinking that it does today.

The same month I submitted my Ph.D. back in 2011, a book was released that massively helped to accomplish what I had been working to help facilitate – changing the terrain of thought surrounding critical thinking: Thinking, Fast, and Slow . Its author, Daniel Kahneman, passed away a couple of weeks ago at age 90. Psychology students will likely recognise the name associated with Amos Tversky and their classic work together in the 1970s on the availability, representativeness, and anchoring and adjustment heuristics (for example, Tversky and Kahneman, 1974). Indeed, such heuristics, alongside the affect heuristic (Kahneman and Frederick, 2002; Slovic and colleagues, 2002) play a large role in how we think about thinking and barriers to critical thought. In 2002, Kahneman won a Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics for his work on prospect theory concerning loss aversion and people’s often irrational approach to economics. Indeed, Kahneman’s resume is full of awards and achievements.

However, the accomplishment I will remember him best for is the publication of Thinking, Fast, and Slow and its contribution to the field of critical thinking. Funny enough, I don’t recall the term, critical thinking being used very often in the book, if at all – and I read it two or three times. No, critical thinking was not the focus of his book; rather system 1 (fast) and 2 (slow) thinking (see also Stanovich, 1999) – intuitive and reflective judgment. Not only did this book put into the spotlight many of the mechanics of reflective judgment for fellow academics and researchers of cognitive psychology, it also did so l for non-academic audiences – becoming a New York Times bestseller. Moreover, it won the Los Angeles Times Book Award for Current Interest, and the National Academy of Sciences Communication Award for Best Book (both in 2011). Good thinking was cool again in popular culture.

In the critical thinking literature, reflective judgment – regardless of what you want to call it (for example, system 2 thinking, epistemological understanding, ‘taking your time’) – is becoming more accepted as a core component of critical thinking. The field of critical thinking research and psychology more broadly, owes Kahneman a debt of gratitude for his contributions in helping shine a light on the importance of ‘thinking slow’. Thank you .

Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow . 2UK: Penguin.

Kahneman, D., & Frederick, S. (2002). Representativeness revisited: Attribute substitution in intuitive judgment. Heuristics and biases: The Psychology of Intuitive Judgment , 49 (49-81), 74.

King, P. M., & Kitchener, K. S. (1994). Developing Reflective Judgment: Understanding and Promoting Intellectual Growth and Critical Thinking in Adolescents and Adults. CA: Jossey-Bass.

King, P. M., & Kitchener, K. S. (2004). Reflective judgment: Theory and research on the development of epistemic assumptions through adulthood. Educational Psychologist, 39 (1), 5–15.

Kuhn, D. (1999). A developmental model of critical thinking. Educational Researcher , 28 (2), 16-46.

Kuhn, D. (2000). Metacognitive development. Current Directions in Psychological Science , 9 (5), 178-181.

Slovic, P., Finucane, M., Peters, E., & MacGregor, D. G. (2002). Rational actors or rational fools: Implications of the affect heuristic for behavioral economics. The Journal of Socio-economics , 31 (4), 329-342.

Stanovich, K.E. (1999) Who is rational? Studies of individual differences in reasoning. Mahwah, Erlbaum.

Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1974). Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases: Biases in judgments reveal some heuristics of thinking under uncertainty. Science , 185 (4157), 1124-1131.

Christopher Dwyer, Ph.D., is a lecturer at the Technological University of the Shannon in Athlone, Ireland.

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