Abstract:
In this paper I argue that education for a just democracy depends upon the development of evaluativist thinking. The term comes from epistemological levels theory; a branch of cognitive psychology. Epistemological levels theorists suggest that people in general, not just philosophers, hold a variety of views about how beliefs are to be justified. Researchers plot a common developmental sequence of beliefs about justification, ranging from absolutism (i.e. appeal to authority) through relativism to evaluativism (the understanding that conflicting view points can be compared and evaluated on the basis of reason and evidence). I argue further that in order to develop evaluativist students it is necessary for teachers themselves to think as evaluativists. While a number of preliminary small-scale studies have pointed to the crucial role community of inquiry style dialogue plays in fostering evaluativism, larger scale empirical studies are awaiting the development of an efficient instrument exhibiting both validity and reliability. As part of doctoral research this challenge has been taken up with the development of a questionnaire designed to test the epistemological levels of teacher-education students. Preliminary findings suggest the need for significant changes within teacher education in order to move pre-service teachers' absolutist and relativist thinking to evaluativism.