Counterargumentation and reasoning in academic writing

One of the cornerstones of critical thinking is to have an open mind for alternative viewpoints. Students are often given an opportunity to display this quality when responding to writing prompts in school. However, research studies have shown that at both the secondary and tertiary levels, students usually display a "myside bias." Specifically, they fail to seriously consider alternative viewpoints via counterargumentation and rebuttals. Furthermore, despite attempts to measure the quality of arguments in terms of persuasiveness and absence of inaccuracies and fallacies, no standardized method has appeared. In this roundtable discussion, issues such as how to encourage counterargumentation and enhanced quality of reasoning will be approached.