This study compares 31 Chinese university students' critical thinking (CT) performance based on their articles written in English and Chinese respectively to examine the similarities and differences in students' CT performance when writing in two different languages and to explore the roles of the two languages in their CT development.
As little research has been devoted to comparing one's critical thinking (CT) performance in their first and second languages (Floyd, 2011), it is not clear how writing in different languages affects one's CT performance. The present study, therefore, seeks to discover whether one would perform different CT abilities through their L1 and L2 writing and to explore the roles of language and other influential factors in one's CT development and performance. This research examined 31 Chinese university students' CT performance by comparing their writing in their L1 (Chinese) and L2 (English). The participants were first required to write in English and six months later in Chinese on the same topic and then compare their two articles. Each student's two articles were evaluated based on Dong's (2018) criteria for evaluating critical thinking in writing. The result of the paired-samples T test shows a significant difference between the CT scores for the participants' L1 writing (M=3.56, SD=0.52) and L2 writing (M=2.79, SD=0.35) (t=8.105, p< .01). It suggests that the students demonstrated significantly better CT ability when they wrote in their L1. Although strong correlations have been identified between one's CT and writing scores in previous studies (e.g., Dong, 2015), surprisingly, no significant correlation (r=.295, p>.05) was found between the CT scores for their L1 and L2 writing in the present study. It seems that the degree to which their CT performance differed via L1 and L2 writing varied from individual to individual. The analyses of students' two articles and students' self-comparisons reveal an array of factors besides language proficiency that have influenced students' writing and thinking in these two different languages. The research findings contribute to the understanding of the complexity in the connection between CT and writing and have practical implications for CT and writing instruction and curriculum development.
