Critical thinking, culture and personality: Predicting Latinos' academic success

Observed differences in the high school graduation and college attendance rates of Latino students as compared to other ethnic groups have signaled the necessity for an understanding of the factors impacting academic achievement within this student population. The present study examines four sets of predictor variables attempting to cover four domains relevant to an individual's educational experience: critical thinking dispositions representing the metacognitive domain, cultural values representing the sociocultural context, personality traits representing the personal domain, and familial characteristics representing the home environment. The present study was not a cross-cultural comparison, rather it was an intra-cultural study of academic achievement among Latino students. The two study objectives were to (1) describe the relation between critical thinking and Latino high school students' academic achievement; and (2) investigate how gender, culture, personality, and familial characteristics influence Latinos' disposition toward CT and academic achievement. Subjects were 205 female high school sophomores and 188 male sophomores from Southern California. Subjects completed a survey booklet in either English or Spanish. Academic achievement information regarding GPA, proficiency exams, math and science achievement was gathered from the students' school transcripts. Findings suggest that the strongest predictors of academic achievement were CT dispositions, modernity, respect for elders, sex role socialization, parents' education, parents' career attainment, subjects' career aspirations, exposure to the American school system, and regional economic circumstances. Subjects' career aspirations were significant for male students but not female students. No relationship between collective orientation and academic achievement was found. Respect for elders and traditional sex role orientation were negatively correlated with academic achievement among male subjects. This study establishes the disposition toward critical thinking as a significant metacognitive personality construct within the psychological literature. This within-cultural group study demonstrates the importance of CT dispositions, biculturalism, modernity, and family educational background for predicting academic achievement among Latino students.