Critical Thinking in Psychology and Everyday Life shows how a scientific, critical thinking approach can be effective in addressing psychological questions, and discusses other questions that straddle the boundary between science and non-science. While scientific, critical thinking can be effective in addressing psychological questions, this textbook is a guide for how to separate fact from speculation and true claims from misconceptions and misinformation. Covering a wide range of topics, this book seeks to engage students in a serious search for answers, using what psychologists and other scientists know about how to think effectively. What does science have to say about whether some people have special psychic abilities, such as being able to “see” the future? Can people use their minds to move objects without any physical aid? Does the mind actually leave the body during an out-of-body experience? You may be surprised to learn that we are tantalizingly close to a scientific answer to this last question (see Chapter 7).

1. Introduction to Critical Thinking in Psychology and Everyday Life
2. Deductive Reasoning, Prediction, and Making Assumptions
3. Inductive Reasoning in Psychology and Everyday Life
4. Critical Thinking and Scientific Reasoning
5. Pseudoscience, Science, and Evidence-Based Practice
6. Errors in Attention, Perception, and Memory That Affect Thinking
7. Can the Mind Leave the Body? The Mind–Brain Problem
8. Critical Thinking and the Internet
9. Emotion, Motivated Reasoning, and Critical Thinking
10. Critically Analyzing a Psychological Question: Are People Basically Selfish?
11. Judgment, Decision Making, and Types of Thinking
12. Superstition, Magic, Science, and Critical Thinking
13. Critical Thinking in Clinical Reasoning and Diagnosis 
14. Language, Writing, and Critical Thinking