The Relationship between Critical Thinking Standards and Critical Thinking Attitudes of Teacher Candidates

Abstract

The purpose of the research is to determine the direction and level of the relationship between the attitudes of teacher candidates towards critical thinking and their critical thinking standards and the degree to which the attitudes of teacher candidates towards critical thinking predict their critical thinking standards. The research model is a correlation survey model, one of the quantitative research models. The study group consists of teacher candidates studying at the faculty of education of a state university in Turkey in the 2023-2024 academic year. When the research findings are examined, it is seen that the attitude scores of the teacher candidates towards critical thinking and the critical thinking standards scores of the teacher candidates correspond to the “very high” level. According to another finding of the research, there is a moderately significant relationship between the level of teacher candidates’ attitudes towards critical thinking and critical thinking standards. Also, it was seen that the attitudes of teacher candidates towards critical thinking significantly predicted critical thinking standards. It can be stated that 45% of the total variance regarding the critical thinking standards of teacher candidates is explained by their attitudes towards critical thinking.