Promoting Critical Thinking Research Skills and Digital Citizenship among Students of Nigeria’s Tertiary Institutions

Abstract

The study is anchored on the importance of promoting critical thinking research skills and digital citizenship among students of Nigeria’s tertiary institutions with special emphasis on universities in Delta State, Nigeria. Three research questions and three hypotheses guided the study. Descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. The population for the study was 131,150 (one hundred and thirty one thousand, one hundred and fifty) tertiary institutions’ students in Delta state. A self-structured questionnaire developed by the researcher and titled “Promoting Critical Thinking Research Skills and Digital Citizenship Questionnaire” (PCTRSDCQ) was used for data collection. This instrument was validated by three experts, two from the Department of Social Science Education and one from Measurement and Evaluation all from Delta State University, Abraka. Reliability coefficient of .74 was established using Cronbach Alpha reliability estimate. Mean with standard deviation were used to answer the research questions. T-test statistics was used in analyzing the hypotheses at .05 level of significance. The findings of the study among others revealed that universities’ students in Delta State are not exposed to critical thinking research skills, and the concept of digital citizenship. The researcher therefore recommended among others that management of universities, and lecturers should encourage students to explore critical thinking research skills, and digital citizenship in their research writing. This will enhance quality research output among universities’ students in Delta State.

Keywords: Critical Thinking, Research Skills, Digital Citizenship, Students, Nigeria’ Tertiary Institutions, and Universities