Construction and Psychometric Evaluation of the Critical Thinking Disposition Assessment Questionnaire Among Medical Undergraduate Students in West Bengal, India

Introduction Assessing the critical thinking disposition of students with a valid tool in an Indian setting was a prerequisite to introducing critical thinking under the undergraduate medical curriculum, as it was shaped by society, culture, and language. The study planned to design and assess the psychometrics of the Critical Thinking Disposition Assessment Questionnaire (CTDAQ) in the Indian setting. Methods The study was conducted among undergraduate students at a medical college in West Bengal, India. A 30-item scale was initially designed through the review of relevant literature and discussion with experts. Through two rounds of the Delphi technique, a 20-item CTDAQ was formulated, and the content validity index (CVI) was calculated. The test-retest agreement was calculated after administering the tool twice among 25 students with a gap of three weeks using the weighted kappa coefficient. Then, principal component analysis was conducted to extract component structure with rotation. The internal consistency was measured using Cronbach's alpha. Results Item-wise and scale CVIs were more than 0.80 and 0.90, respectively. All items had a weighted kappa coefficient of ≥0.75. A three-component model was extracted from 20 items, with a minimum factor loading of 0.30. It explained 50.3% of the total variance. Cronbach's alpha of the scale, the <i>conversance and systematicity</i> component with seven items, the <i>analyticity and flexibility</i> component with nine items, and the <i>maturity</i> component with four items were 0.783, 0.789, 0.825, and 0.797, respectively. Conclusions The 20-item CTDAQ is psychometrically a valid, stable, and internally consistent scale to assess critical thinking disposition in the Indian context.