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Critical Thinking

Enhance your higher-level thinking skills.

Critical thinking is a defining characteristic of university level study. It underpins everything from reading to analysing ideas and evidence and developing your own arguments. When we talk about the greater ‘depth’ of university learning, critical thinking is often what we mean.

Find out more about what critical thinking is and various ways to develop a critical mindset and apply it in your studies.

Critical skills 1

Understanding criticality in a university context

Critical skills 2

Unpicking what criticality means

Critical skills 3

Applying criticality to your work

Critical reading

Three domains of critical reading

An audio-visual guide to in-depth critical reading, for literature reviews.

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Critical writing

Using evidence to support your argument

How to use your reading to support your points.

Integrating scholarship

Use citation to demonstrate your critical judgement of your reading.

Recommended books and e-books

For further reading related to critical thinking and evaluation, browse our specially curated list of resources.

Critical Thinking and Evaluation - Reading List

Further help and guidance