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Critical Thinking for Strategic Intelligence
Fourth Edition
December 2025 | 560 pages | CQ Press
With Critical Thinking for Strategic Intelligence, Katherine Hibbs Pherson and Randolph H. Pherson have updated their highly regarded, easy-to-use handbook for developing core critical thinking skills and analytic techniques. This indispensable text is framed around 20 key questions that all analysts must ask themselves as they prepare to conduct research, generate hypotheses, evaluate sources of information, draft papers, and ultimately present analysis, including: How do I get started? Where is the information I need? What is my argument? How do I convey my message effectively?
The Fourth Edition includes an exploration of use and implications of artificial intelligence, increased coverage of cyber issues such as digital disinformation and deepfakes, and new case studies. Drawing upon their years of teaching and analytic experience, Pherson and Pherson provide a useful introduction to skills that are essential within the intelligence community.
The Fourth Edition includes an exploration of use and implications of artificial intelligence, increased coverage of cyber issues such as digital disinformation and deepfakes, and new case studies. Drawing upon their years of teaching and analytic experience, Pherson and Pherson provide a useful introduction to skills that are essential within the intelligence community.
List of Figures
Foreword
Preface
About the Authors
Introduction to the Fourth Edition
Introduction
Part I: How Do I Get Started?
Chapter 1: Who Are Your Clients?
Chapter 2: What Are the Key Questions?
Chapter 3: What Is the Broader Context for the Analysis?
Chapter 4: How Should I Conceptualize My Product?
Chapter 5: What Is My Analytic Approach?
Chapter 6: Can Collaboration Contribute to a Better Answer?
Part II: Where Is The Information I Need?
Chapter 7: How Do Models and Artificial Intelligence Help My Analysis?
Chapter 8: What Types of Information Are Available?
Chapter 9: Can I Trust the Sources?
Chapter 10: How Should I Assess the Reliability of Internet Information?
Part III: What Is My Argument?
Chapter 11: Are My Key Assumptions Well-Founded?
Chapter 12: Can I Make My Case?
Chapter 13: Did I Consider Alternative Hypotheses?
Chapter 14: How Do I Present to Policymakers?
Chapter 15: How Might I Be Spectacularly Wrong—Or on the Doorstep of an Unmitigated Success?
Part IV: How Do I Convey My Message Effectively?
Chapter 16: Is My Argument Persuasive?
Chapter 17: How Should I Portray Probability, Levels of Confidence, and Quantitative Data?
Chapter 18: How Can Graphics Support My Analysis?
Chapter 19: Am I Presenting My Message in the Most Compelling Way?
Chapter 20: How Do I Know When I Am Finished?
Appendix A: Definitions of Biases and Traps
Appendix B: Definitions of Intuitive Traps
Part V: Case Studies
Case Study I: Uncharted Territory in the Arctic
Case Study II: Blackout on the Eastern Seaboard!
Case Study III: The End of the Era of Aircraft Carriers?
Case Study IV: The Case of Iraq’s Aluminum Tubes
Glossary of Terms
List of Names
Recommended Readings
US Government Publications
Index
