Critical Thinking For Social Work Education: Or Popper Logic

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Critical Thinking For Social Work Education Or
Popper Logic

• Dr. Tomi Gomory
• Florida State University
• Including material adapted from Magee, B. (1998)
  The Story of Philosophy Swann, J. and Pratt, J.
  (1999), Improving Education Realist Approaches
  to Method and Research Perkinson, H. J. (1984),
  Learning from Our Mistakes and Perkinson, H. J.
  (1993), Teachers Without Goals/Students Without
  Purposes

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Purpose

• What is the purpose of thinking about policy or
  practice-related questions?
• If our purpose is to gain knowledge or help
  others by reducing or eliminating problems, then
  we must carefully consider our beliefs and
  actions.
• Critical thinking requires testing evidence.
• Critical thinkers make a genuine effort to fairly
  critique all views, preferred and not preferred.
  They value accuracy and rigor (truth) over
  "winning" or social approval.

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Importance

• Does critical thinking matter? Are clients likely
  to receive better services if social workers or
  other helping professionals use critical-thinking
  skills for example? These are some of the errors
  that may occur if incomplete or inaccurate
  perspectives are accepted
• Misclassifying clients
• Selecting weak intervention methods (e.g.,
  offering psychological counseling when clients
  need material resources)
• Increasing client dependency
• Overlooking client assets
• Causing harm where none may have been intended

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Danger

• Examples of harm based on thoughtless
  intervention and iatrogenic effects
  (helper-induced harm) include
• 20-40 of psychiatric clients (tens of millions)
  taking antipsychotics have various movement
  disorders i.e. Tardive Dyskinesia (permanent
  organic brain damage) as a result (Breggin,
  1997).
• Neither hypericum St. Johns Wort nor
  setraline Zoloft could be differentiated from
  placebo on the primary efficacy measures. ( a
  Double-blind, randomized, placebo controlled
  trial conducted at 12 psychiatric research
  clinics with an n340. Hypericum Depression Trial
  Study Group, (2002), JAMA) with suicidality one
  of the many adverse effects of the antidepressant
  but no hypericum.

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CognitionThe Act or
Process of Knowing

• Truth Is it Absolute (Objective) or Relative
  (Subjective)?
• Can we have Objective Observations? The human
  organism and its limits or can we read the book
  of nature due to its commonsense obviousness?
• Are we Tabula Rasa (empty buckets ready for the
  filling) or do we have A Priori knowledge at
  birth?

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• The Transmission Metaphor
• Education is a process of transmission by
  authority.
• The teacher prepares the student, prepares the
  subject matter, and transmits (instructs,
  matches) the subject to the student in the form
  of lessons to be learnt.
• The subject matter is what is transmitted that
  which is learnt.
• The student is a learner, a more or less passive
  container who needs to be controlled and
  motivated externally.

• The Growth Metaphor
• Education an autonomous procedure of (Darwinian)
  growth trial-and-error elimination the
  continuous modification of existing knowledge.
• The teacher creates an educative environment--an
  environment that is free, responsive, and
  supportive--wherein the student can improve
  (modify) his present knowledge through
  trial-and-error elimination.
• The subject matter is an agenda specifying what
  aspects of students current knowledge are to be
  improved. The subject matter evokes present
  knowledge and tests it (revealing inadequacies).
• The student is a fallible, active creator of
  knowledge who seeks order. When he discerns
  contradictions (errors) in his present knowledge,
  he will modify it.

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The Two Frameworks of Knowledge Development

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Formula for Critical Rational Thinking(CRT)-Karl
Popper 1902-1994

• All learning begins with a problem.
• P1-TT(TS)-EE-P2
• P1A problem occurs when an individual
  experiences a mismatch between what she expects
  to occur and the actual experience which
  stimulates the person to attempt to resolve the
  discrepancy.
• TT(TS)A tentative theory or trial solution with
  its own set of expectations is applied to the
  problem. Like the disappointed expectation (a
  tentative falsification) leading to the initial
  problem(P1) it provides further scope for the
  discovery and elimination of error(EE) or
  inadequacy.
• EEError Elimination A rigorous test or argument
  is used to evaluate by attempted falsification
  the impact of the TT(TS). Feedback in the form of
  experience(actual and anticipated) reveals errors
  and inadequacies in an individuals implicit
  assumptions and explicit theories.
• P2The inevitable result of EE in trying to solve
  a problem (P1) is a new problem (P2) requiring
  attention.
• This process is infinitely reiterative.

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Critical Rational Thinking About Mental Illness

• P - Mental disorderliness-what is that?
• TT- 1. Volitional troubling behavior to
  self/others
• a. Problems in living (groupings of socially
  undesirable habitual behaviors)
• b. Disvalued/deviant behaviors (labels)
• 2. Medical disease/disorder(DSM mental
  disorders)
• a. DSM definition
• b. Harmful dysfunction
• c. Diseases just like other diseases
• (i.e. Cancer)
• EE- Rigorous evaluation of the results of the
  various conceptualizations through scientific
  research about the empirical realities of
  postulated entities and explanations, and broad
  critical debate of the positions held. The fact
  that according to the research literature and the
  DSM itself not a single DSM Mental Disorder
  entity has a physical marker should present
  serious concerns for those who claim that mental
  illnesses are medical disorders for example.

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Next Steps

• Primum Non NocereFirst and foremost do no harm
• Always ask Cui Bono? For whose benefit For what
  purpose?
• De Omnibus Dubitandum Doubt Everything and
• Carpe Diem Seize the Day by enjoying and
  engaging in problem solving in the present world
  and not in planning for future Utopias