For Courses on Critical Thinking, Argumentative Writing, Informal Logic courses, as well as Student Success courses. Asking the Right Questions is a concise, well-priced book with great examples, and it thoroughly covers critical thinking. This highly popular text helps students bridge the gap between simply memorizing or blindly accepting information, and the greater challenge of critical analysis and synthesis. It teaches them to respond to alternative points of view and develop a solid foundation for making personal choices about what to accept and what to reject.  Perfect for freshman courses, this brief book does an amazingly thorough job covering critical thinking.

Table of Contents:
Preface   1      The Benefit of Asking the Right Questions   Introduction   Critical Thinking to the Rescue   The Sponge and Panning for Gold: Alternative Thinking Styles   An Example of the Panning-for-Gold Approach   Panning for Gold: Asking Critical Questions   The Myth of the “Right Answer”   Thinking and Feeling   The Purpose of Asking the Question, “Who Cares?”   Weak-Sense and Strong-Sense Critical Thinking   The Satisfaction of Using the Panning-for-Gold Approach   Trying Out New Answers   Effective Communication and Critical Thinking   The Importance of Practice   The Right Questions    2      What Are the Issue and the Conclusion?   Kinds of Issues   Searching for the Issue   Searching for the Author’s or Speaker’s Conclusion   Clues to Discovery: How to Find the Conclusion   Critical Thinking and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Practice Exercises     3      What Are the Reasons?   Reasons + Conclusion = Argument   Initiating the Questioning Process   Words That Identify Reasons   Kinds of Reasons   Keeping the Reasons and Conclusions Straight   Reasons First, Then Conclusions   “Fresh” Reasons and Your Growth   Critical Thinking and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Practice Exercises     4      What Words or Phrases Are Ambiguous?   The Confusing Flexibility of Words   Locating Key Terms and Phrases   Checking for Ambiguity   Determining Ambiguity   Context and Ambiguity   Ambiguity, Definitions, and the Dictionary   Ambiguity and Loaded Language   Limits of Your Responsibility to Clarify Ambiguity   Ambiguity and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Summary   Practice Exercises     5      What Are the Value Conflicts and Assumptions?   General Guide for Identifying Assumptions   Value Conflicts and Assumptions   Discovering Values   From Values to Value Assumptions   Typical Value Conflicts   The Communicator’s Background as a Clue to Value Assumptions   Consequences as Clues to Value Assumptions   More Hints for Finding Value Assumptions   Avoiding a Typical Difficulty When Identifying Value Assumptions   Finding Value Assumptions on Your Own   Values and Relativism   Summary   Practice Exercises     6      What Are the Descriptive Assumptions?   Illustrating Descriptive Assumptions   Clues for Locating Assumptions   Applying the Clues   Avoiding Analysis of Trivial Assumptions   Assumptions and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Summary   Practice Exercises     7      Are There Any Fallacies in the Reasoning?   A Questioning Approach to Finding Reasoning Fallacies   Evaluating Assumptions as a Starting Point   Discovering Other Common Reasoning Fallacies   Looking for Diversions   Sleight of Hand: Begging the Question   Summary of Reasoning Errors   Expanding Your Knowledge of Fallacies   Fallacies and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Practice Exercises             8        How Good Is the Evidence: Intuition, Personal Experience, Testimonials, and Appeals to Authority?   The Need for Evidence   Locating Factual Claims   Sources of Evidence   Intuition as Evidence   Dangers of Appealing to Personal Experience as Evidence   Personal Testimonials as Evidence   Appeals to Authority as Evidence   Summary   Practice Exercises     9      How Good Is the Evidence: Personal Observation, Research Studies, Case Examples, and Analogies?   Personal Observation   Research Studies as Evidence   Generalizing from the Research Sample   Biased Surveys and Questionnaires   Critical Evaluation of a Research-Based Argument   Case Examples as Evidence   Analogies as Evidence   Summary   Practice Exercises     10    Are There Rival Causes?   When to Look for Rival Causes   The Pervasiveness of Rival Causes   Detecting Rival Causes   The Cause or A Cause   Rival Causes and Scientific Research   Rival Causes for Differences Between Groups   Confusing Causation with Association   Confusing “After this” with “Because of this”   Explaining Individual Events or Acts   Evaluating Rival Causes   Evidence and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Summary   Practice Exercises     11    Are the Statistics Deceptive?   Unknowable and Biased Statistics   Confusing Averages   Concluding One Thing, Proving Another   Deceiving by Omitting Information   Risk Statistics and Omitted Information   Summary   Practice Exercises     12    What Significant Information Is Omitted?   The Benefits of Detecting Omitted Information   The Certainty of Incomplete Reasoning   Questions That Identify Omitted Information   The Importance of the Negative View   Omitted Information That Remains Missing   Missing Information and Your Own Writing and Speaking   Practice Exercises     13    What Reasonable Conclusions Are Possible?   Assumptions and Multiple Conclusions   Dichotomous Thinking: Impediment to Considering Multiple Conclusions   Two Sides or Many?   Searching for Multiple Conclusions   Productivity of If-Clauses   Alternative Solutions as Conclusions   The Liberating Effect of Recognizing Alternative Conclusions   All Conclusions Are Not Created Equal Summary   Practice Exercises     14    Practice and Review   Question Checklist for Critical Thinking   Asking the Right Questions: A Comprehensive Example   What Are the Issue and Conclusion?   What Are the Reasons?   What Words or Phrases Are Ambiguous?   What Are the Value Conflicts and Assumptions?   What Are the Descriptive Assumptions?   Are There Any Fallacies in the Reasoning?   How Good Is the Evidence?   Are There Rival Causes?   Are the Statistics Deceptive?   What Significant Information Is Omitted?   What Reasonable Conclusions Are Possible?     Final Word   The Tone of Your Critical Thinking   Strategies for Effective Critical Thinking     Index