Educational intervention to improve critical thinking for undergraduate nursing students: A randomized clinical trial

The objective of this study was to compare the effectiveness of Problem Based Learning (PBL) versus PBL associated with the Active Learning Model for Critical Thinking (ALMCT) to improve critical thinking (CT) in nursing students in an educational intervention on Basic Life Support (BLS). A two-arm randomized, single-blinded, parallel clinical trial was carried out with 108 Brazilian undergraduate nursing students who participated in a BLS course. PBL + ALMCT was used in the control group (CG), and PBL was used in the experimental group (EG). Pre- and post-tests were used to evaluate CT dispositions using the California Critical Thinking Dispositions Inventory (CCTDI), and CT skills were evaluated using the California Critical Thinking Skills Test (CCTST). The results did not indicate significant differences between the CG and EG groups for total CCTDI and total CCTST scales and for most of their subscales. However, there was a significant difference in the EG when the mean scores on the pre- and post-test were compared on the CCTDI analyticity subscale (t = 2073; p = 0.043) and on the CCTST analysis subscale (t = 2302; p = 0.025). We strongly recommend further studies using PBL associated with ALMCT and randomized clinical trials that last more than one month.