Colleen Bowden
Barriers To Critical Thinking
HUM/114
August 25, 2014
Pamela Strunk

There are many barriers to critical thinking. The ones that I feel are barriers for myself are anger, stress and depression. These three barriers can cause a person to not be able to correctly critically think about a specific situation they are in. Anger. The first barrier that I feel hinders my critical thinking. I’m going to use an example with my husband to best describe this barrier. Let’s say I am having a bad week all around, work, home, kids, school, everything is just not going right for me. Then we add on the sink full of dishes, the dirty floor that has not been swept or vacuumed all week and the mound of laundry in each room of the house. Meanwhile, my husband is watching his favorite shows or movies or playing on his phone. I work full time, going to school full time and have two little ones, I could use help around the house. Not realizing that I am overwhelmed at the current moment, my husband doesn’t think anything of it. I let the sink full of dishes sit there because I want to “show him” I am not going to do it, but I am upset with him about it already. The next day the dishes are still there, then the same for the following day. I just blow up. My anger gets so heated that I cannot think rationally and think things through. What I should do to overcome this barrier is from the get go, have good communication with my husband. Let him know off the bat that my week is not going so well and that I am feeling overwhelmed and that I would love to have extra help this week. That right there can stop anything else from happening during the week to have me go postal on him for something so small and minor. Let’s say I do get to that point that I am that mad, I need to take a breather. Step back, leave the room or the house for a minute and cool down. Collect my thoughts and find out what it is that is making me so angry, is it that there is a sink full of dishes? Or maybe that I am feeling so overwhelmed and need help. Then go talk to my husband about it instead of blowing up at him over something that was not his fault. Stress can cause a person to not be able to critically think. I know when I am feeling overwhelmed and have a lot going on and I am stressed out I cannot think straight. I think irrationally and think of a “quick” fix to things that are overwhelming me or stressing me out. Right now, to overcome