9. Critical Thinking Skills

11 critical thinking skills relate to....

-Assessing and Integrating Information -Organizing Information into Premises -Developing Hypotheses -Testing Hypotheses

Assess and Integrate Information

-Envision the end state of the analysis and use that vision to guide and limit the analysis to those tasks most likely to attain the desired goal, checking on the process and products to ensure movement along the right path. -Assess and filter for relevance and validity, examining information for its potential contribution to the objectives of the analysis. -Extract the essential message by sorting through the details of information to distinguish the essential from the non-essential, and by generating clear, concise statements summarizing the main points.

Critical thinking moderating factors

-Moderating variables influence how, and how well, critical thinking skills are performed. -For example, domain expertise, recent experience, and education influence the quality of the reasoning produced by the process. -They do not, however, influence whether one executes a particular skill, as do predisposing factors.

Detail VS Confidence

-More detail provides a more useful inference but typically at the sacrifice of confidence; less detail provides a greater level of confidence but typically at the sacrifice of usefulness.

System 1: Strengths and Weaknesses

-The associational processes used that make expert performance so quick and powerful are the same processes that are responsible for systematic errors that experts sometimes make. -Additional weaknesses of System 1 are that it depends on the quality and amount of experience an individual possesses, and it can't be used effectively in novel situations.

Limitation - Complexity

-The complexity of information to be analyzed can increase rapidly and easily. -The potential extent of complexity becomes apparent when one realizes that it is not uncommon for an analyst to address hundreds or thousands of entities. -there are various other contributors to complexity—types of relationships, variability of conditions, and so on. -simplifying strategies may lead to biased results, such as focusing on vivid, immediate cases rather than on more abstract, pallid statistical data that are often of much greater value.

Limitation - Domain Expertise

-analysts cannot be experts in all of domains required for a typical analysis. -Critical thinking skills are required to compensate for lack of domain expertise and to facilitate the development of expertise in new domains. -Closely related to this challenge is the availability of information, which might range from large volumes in some domains to very little in others. -In the first case, critical thinking is required to sort out the relevant from the non-relevant from the volumes available and, in the second, to develop assumptions to be used in place of non-available facts. -Another problem is language, where analysts may have to depend on translations away from original sources or where cultural information is vital to the analysis but they don't have much prior knowledge of the culture.

System 1 vs System 2

-experts believe System 1 & 2 work together, checking each other. -one function of the controlled deliberate process (System 2) is to monitor the products of the automatic process (System 1). -if no intuitive response is accessible, System 2 may be the primary processing system. -but System 2 may override, or confirm, the judgment of System 1. -Although System 1 might derive just one solution, System 2 can provide multiple potential solutions. -Even if the final result is based on System 1 processing, System 2 determines when the requirements of the purpose have been met.

System 2: Strengths and Weaknesses

-highly useful in novel situations and problems but it is also slow and effortful. -It usually cannot be utilized concurrently with other tasks -it can also produce wrong judgments.

Limitation - Uncertainty

-intelligence analysis is conducted within the realm of uncertainty and with the aim of reducing the veil of uncertainty through which judgments, decisions and actions must be taken. -Since few inferences in the dynamic, complex world of decision-making lend themselves to the rigor of statistical analysis, most of the objective, mathematical approaches to the assessment of uncertainty are not applicable. -Thus, in assessing and communicating the level of confidence that should be associated with a specific inference, the analyst must employ subjective conditional probabilities. -That is, not only must critical thinking skills be employed to assemble evidence, generate premises and develop an inference, they must also be employed to arrive at the level of confidence one should have in the inference

Predispositions

-measurable ways in which people differ, whether fixed or modifiable, that influence the use or persistence of use of critical thinking. -Predisposing factors influence the likelihood of a person using, or persisting in using, a critical thinking skill. -serve as input conditions, and as a filter through which the situation and purpose are evaluated.

Meta-tasks

-objectives specified by purpose (metatasks). -The purpose also dictates the specific response that will be required to successfully end the process. For example, the situation may include a meta-task to understand, make an evaluation, make a decision, or solve a complex problem.

Negative affective consequences

-the primary inhibitory sources preventing the application of critical thinking. -individuals who engage in critical thinking for any substantive length of time are likely to experience negative affective reactions. -For example, the process can produce mental fatigue, increased effort, increased anxiety, cognitive dissonance, and decreased self-esteem. -Negative affect experienced during an episode might be countered by positive affect such as solving a difficult problem that, in turn, is a direct result of critical thinking. -critical thinking requires more effort than System 1 processing, and is therefore a less desirable means to achieve judgment in that limited sense.

Human limitations affecting critical thinking

1) ability to address complexity, 2) biases they bring to the process, 3) difficulties in handling uncertainty 4) lack of relevant domain expertise

Challenges ahead for intelligence analysis

1) the extension of current trends (increased globalization, communications flow, opportunities for terrorism) will continue to blur the line between personal security and national security, and then will blur the line between LE and military operations, and between activities involving people and those involving territory. 2) most information (perhaps 90%) now is available online, that understanding and influencing foreign populations was very important, and that future enemies are unlikely to confront the world's overwhelming military power with conventional warfare, but with a technology-assisted insurgency. 3) information is vast but physical collection has become easier because of online availability.

two characteristics of the situation must be present to elicit critical thinking:

1) the stimulus material must contain substantive information, and 2) there must be sufficient time available to engage System 2. -Other characteristics that make it more likely that System 2 will be engaged include the presence of conflicting information, disordered or unorganized material, uncertain information, and complex material.

Research VS Intelligence

OSINT can be distinguished from research since the former's intent is to create tailored or customized knowledge to support a particular decision or satisfy a specified information need by an individual or group.

Similarities between critical thinking & System 2

The words "effortful, controlled, deliberate, purposeful, and conscious" are frequently used to describe both.

Application of available technology

To be meaningful and realistic, training content and exercises must be developed and implemented within the context of available technology.

effective intelligence analysis consists of...

integrating collected information and then developing and testing hypotheses based on that information through successive iterations of additional data collection, evaluation, collation, integration, and inductive reasoning.

heuristic theory

proposes that two cognitive systems are used to make judgments. -System 1: intuition, is a quick, automatic, implicit process that been proposed to explain judgment. -System 2: reasoning, is effortful, conscious, and deliberately controlled.

The desired end products are inferences that...

specify the who, what, when, where, why, and how of the activity of interest and lead to appropriate actions.

cognitive ergonomics, aka cognitive engineering

the aspect of ergonomics research that seeks to understand how people engage in cognitive work and how to develop systems and training that best support that work

Limitation - Confirmation Bias

the selective use of information to support what we already believe, ignoring information that would disconfirm the belief.

The ultimate objective of intelligence analysis is...

to develop timely inferences that can be acted upon with confidence.

Test Hypotheses

• Consider value-cost-risk tradeoffs in seeking additional information to employ available resources in a manner that will produce the greatest value for the resources expended and the time available. • Seek disconfirming evidence during the testing of hypotheses when the more natural inclination is to seek confirming evidence. • Assess the strength of logical relationships in a manner that provides a numerical probability estimate of the confidence one can have in the validity of hypotheses and inferences.

Develop Hypotheses

• Establish logical relationships by applying inductive logic to derive one or more hypotheses from the set of premises summarizing facts derived from available information. • Consider alternative perspectives by setting aside personal inclinations, values, and expectations so as to develop explanations (hypotheses) that cover the full range of possibilities. • Counter biases, expectations, mindsets, and oversimplification by developing the ability to recognize the possible effects of these influences and developing techniques to keep them from distorting the products of analysis.

Organize Information into Premises

• Recognize patterns and relationships, establishing causes and effects vital to understanding situations, threats, processes and events during the development of premises in an argument. • Challenge assumptions so as to avoid ideas that might be treated as facts but that are not supported by available evidence or might be related to biases that have been introduced by mind sets or expectations.

Human tendencies creating confirmation bias

• humans tend to perceive what they expect to perceive and, as a consequence, valuable experience and expertise can sometimes work against an analyst when facing new or unexpected information or situations; • mind-sets are quick to form but resistant to change, leading analysts to persist with a hypothesis in the face of growing disconfirming evidence; and • well-established thinking patterns are difficult to change, leading to difficulties in viewing problems from different perspectives or understanding other points of view.