A Study On The Correlation Between Non-English Major Undergraduates' Critical Thinking And English Skills

With the development of time,critical thinking plays an important role in country development and society development,and it is also regarded as the core of Higher Education aim.Western researchers have drawn earlier attention on critical thinking,in contrast,domestic researchers have explored it from the late years of the19th century.Based on the previous research,it can be found that most research is related with English majors,and less research investigates non-English majors' critical thinking.Besides,most research explores correlation between critical thinking and writing,and less focuses on correlation between critical thinking and other English skills:reading,speaking,and listening.Based on this situation,this study,based on the theoretical framework of Facione(1990)on critical thinking,aims to explore these questions:1.What is the status quo of non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking and that of their English skills?2.What is the correlation between non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking and their listening,reading and writing skills respectively?Among the three skills,which skill has the strongest correlation with critical thinking?3.To what extent do the subscales of non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking disposition and skill correlate with listening,reading and writing respectively?This study is a correlation research,and 250 non-English major freshmen from Hunan University are chosen as subjects.The Chinese version of California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory(CTDI-CV)and California Critical Thinking Skill Test(CCTST)are used to test subjects' critical thinking,and the scores of College English Placement Test are analyzed to represent the status quo of non-English major undergraduates' listening,reading and writing.Then,analyze the data collected from the test with SPSS to do the descriptive and correlation analyses.Findings in this study show that:(1)In general,the non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking is in moderate level.Specifically,students in this study have both moderate critical thinking disposition and moderate critical thinking skill.In terms of sub-scales of critical thinking,students perform better in all six subscales of critical thinking disposition except for truth-seeking,together with analysis of critical thinking skills subscales.Moreover,the status quos of non-English major undergraduates' listening,reading and writing are relatively weak.(2)Positive correlations of non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking with their listening,reading and writing do exist.By contrasting the specific strengths and weaknesses of correlations,it can be found writing has the strongest correlation with both critical thinking disposition and skills,followed by reading,and listening correlates least.(3)There are positive correlations of non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking subscales with their listening,reading and writing.But correlations differ with different subscales,as for critical thinking disposition subscales,except for analyticity and inquisitiveness having moderate correlations with writing,other correlations are weak.Besides,truth-seeking,analyticity,systematicity,self-confidence,inquisitiveness correlate most with writing than the other two English skills,and maturity and open-mindedness correlate most with reading.As for English skill itself,writing could be easily affected by inquisitiveness and reading could be easily changed by maturity,and analyticity for listening.In terms of critical thinking skills subscales,all correlations of three subscales with writing are in moderate level,and correlations of three subscales with listening and reading are weak.From the perspective of English skills,writing can be easily influenced by inference,and both reading and listening are easily affected by evaluation.This study indicates that non-English major undergraduates' critical thinking needs to be further cultivated and trained,and it is necessary for English teacher to utilize the correlation of critical thinking with listening,reading as well as writing to improve students' critical thinking in the class.