Once you have considered different points of view, it’s up to you to reach your own conclusions, craft a new idea based on what you’ve learned, or make a decision about what you’ll do with the information you have.

This process isn’t necessarily a matter of figuring out the best idea. Depending on the goals of the activity, it might be simply the one that you think is the most fun or the most practical, or it might be a new idea of your own creation. For a business decision it might involve additional cost-benefit analysis to decide which computer equipment to purchase for your office. In a chemistry lab it might be a matter of interpreting the results of an experiment. In a creative writing workshop students might collaborate to select the most workable plot for a classmate’s short story. Or a social worker might conduct multiple interviews before recommending a counseling plan for a struggling family.

Drawing conclusions involves looking at the outcome of your inquiry in a demanding, critical way. If you are trying to solve a problem, which possible solutions seem most promising after you have conducted an exhaustive search for information? Do some answers conflict with others? Which solutions can be achieved? If you have found new evidence, what does that new evidence show? Do your original beliefs hold up? Do they need to be modified? Which notions should be abandoned? Most important, consider what you would need to do or say to persuade someone else that your ideas are valid. Thoughtful conclusions aren’t very useful if you can’t share them with others.