This paper examines the value of using cross-cultural studies for teaching critical thinking skills to college students. Critical thinking has been narrowly defined as an ability to think logically, abstractly, and objectively. Recently, however, a new model of critical thinking suggests the importance of adding multiple perspectives as a crucial component of critical thinking (K. Walter, 1994). Based on this new model, this essay discusses the use of cross-cultural studies as a pedagogical alternative for teaching critical thinking skills to college students. For the sake of argument, the paper uses an example of cross-cultural differences in medical decision making styles for cancer diagnosis in the United States and Japan. This example illustrates how medical decisions for cancer treatment are made differently in the two countries. To explain how the cross-cultural comparison of medical decision making styles can help students develop critical thinking skills, the seven dispositions of critical thinking proposed by P. Facione and N. Facione (1992) are used. (Contains 1 figure and 38 references.) (Author/SLD)