批判性思维在西方国家教育界已经引起了广泛的重视，近年来我国也越来越重视批判性思维在教育等其他领域的应用。批判性思维的研究起源于20世纪初，最早是出现在杜威《我们怎样思维》一书中，但其在早期哲学思想中很早就有体现。本文首先对现有文献进行了分析和整理。文献综述部分首先总结了西方古典哲学中体现的批判性思维的思想，包括苏格拉底的问答法，笛卡尔的普遍怀疑论，以及康德的批判哲学等；其次梳理了近代西方对批判性思维的主要研究工作和理论，包括以恩尼斯为主的技能理论，从皮亚杰开始的认知理论，以及近代主要是用的莫尔的教材等。其次，根据扎根理论本次选择了深度访谈的方法。本次研究访谈了14名主要来自清华大学的专家和学者，其专业背景主要包括哲学、历史、医学、法学、文学、教育学等。在此基础上对访，本文对谈结果进行分析，并与文献中的理论作比较，认为批判性思维是一种过程、态度、能力的综合，它是一种质疑和自我反思的态度，他是在拥有相关的专业知识的基础上，对外界的信息加以分析、判断，并构建自身的知识体系的过程。

Critical thinking has caused widespread attention in Western education. Recent years China has also emphasized more and more on critical thinking as well as its application in education and other areas. Research of critical thinking began in the early 20th century, first appeared in Dewey’s "How We Think", but it is reflected in very early western philosophy thought.This paper first analyzes the existing literature, organize and summarize the idea of critical thinking embodied in Western philosophy including Socratic Method, Descartes' general skepticism and critical philosophy of Kant, etc. as well as the Modern research work on critical thinking including Ennis’ Skill Theory, Piaget’s Cognitive Theory and Moore & Parker’s textbook of Critical Thinking.According Grounded Theory, this paper interviewed 14 experts and scholars, mainly from Tsinghua University focusing on the fields of Philosophy, History, Medicine, Law, Literature, Education, etc., and conducts an analysis of the comments on critical thinking. This paper makes the definition that critical thinking is a combination of process, attitude, ability, it is a querical and self-reflection attitude which analyzes, judges, and the process information and builds their own knowledge, with an understanding of the relevant professional knowledge.