Dr. Linda Elder is an educational psychologist and a prominent authority on critical thinking. She is President of the Foundation for Critical Thinking and Executive Director of the Center for Critical Thinking. Dr. Elder has taught psychology and critical thinking at the college level and has given presentations to more than 50,000 educators at all levels. She is author of Critical Thinking Therapy: For Happiness and Self-Actualization (2025), Critical Thinking Therapy: Self-Actualization and Happiness Toolbox for Everyone (2025), and Liberating the Mind: Overcoming Sociocentric Thought and Egocentric Tendencies (2019), and she has coauthored four books (including 30 Days to Better Thinking and Better Living Through Critical Thinking, Fact Over Fake: A Critical Thinker’s Guide to Media Bias and Political Propaganda, and Critical Thinking: Tools for Taking Charge of Your Professional and Personal Life) as well as 24 Thinker's Guides.

Dr. Elder has developed an original stage theory of critical thinking development. Concerned with understanding and illuminating the relationship between thinking and affect, as well as the barriers to critical thinking, Dr. Elder has placed these issues at the center of her thinking and her work.

With experience in both administration and the classroom, Dr. Elder understands firsthand the problems facing educators, administrators, and business leaders. She is a dynamic presenter who reaches her audience on a person-to-person level.