Deficit model
Μοντέλο του ελλείμματος
The assumption that people disagree because they lack information, and that handing them the information settles it. It is often wrong, because decisions rest on costs, on promises already given, and on risks nobody has said out loud, and none of those is reached by another number. It is a description of your own model of the disagreement, not a verdict on the people in it.
How to spot it
Ask what would have to be true for the other option to be the right call. If the answer is a cost or a promise rather than a fact, more evidence will not reach it.
The research behind the term
The term is not our invention. It comes from published research, and what follows is what that research found — our own synthesis of the published abstract, not a translation of the original.
Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Waddington, D. I., Wade, C. A., & Persson, T. (2015). Strategies for Teaching Students to Think Critically: A Meta-Analysis — doi:10.3102/0034654314551063
What it found
- Across 341 effect sizes from experimental and quasi-experimental studies, teaching critical thinking has a mean weighted effect of g+ = 0.30.
- The effect appears at every educational level and across all subject areas — it is not a skill confined to a single domain.
- Three conditions stand out as particularly productive: the opportunity for dialogue, exposure to authentic or contextualised problems, and mentoring.
How it found it
A meta-analysis of 341 effect sizes from studies that used standardised instruments measuring critical thinking as the dependent variable; the collection was statistically heterogeneous, so the individual results differ substantially from one another.
What it means for critical thinking
Critical thinking can be taught — but not by lecture: what makes the difference is dialogue about a real problem with someone who guides you.
Practised in
The term does not stay a definition. It appears inside missions where the pattern happens in real time and you have to recognise it as it happens to you.
The Number Nobody Wants
Sources
Every claim on this page maps to published research. The citations link to the original source.
- Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Waddington, D. I., Wade, C. A., & Persson, T. (2015). Strategies for Teaching Students to Think Critically: A Meta-Analysis — doi:10.3102/0034654314551063