13-Intelligence

Question 1

Eric Hoffer said “man is most uniquely human when” what?

Answer 1

“When he turns obstacles into opportunities”

Question 2

Animals solve problems to find the right food, shelter or partner. How do they differ from humans?

Answer 2

Sometimes they have superior mechanisms (e.g. electromagnetic field perception); their mechanisms are often incapable of overcoming obstacles (e.g. the digger wasp); limited evidence for flexible intelligence (e.g. insight & reason in apes & corvids)

Question 3

What was the 1921 consensus defining intelligence?;

What did Sternberg & Detterman add to this definition in 1986?

Answer 3

The capacity to learn from experience; the ability to adapt to the surrounding environment;
Metacognition – the ability to reflect on our abilities; take advantage of our strengths

Question 4

Although it’s been largely ignored, what was Pinker’s (1997) definition of intelligence?

Answer 4

The ability to attain goals in the face of obstacles by means of decisions based on rational rules (we need to take into account what the individual is trying to achieve, even if we don’t know why)

Question 5

What was Boring’s (1923) definition of intelligence?;

Although this is a circular definition, what else did he note?

Answer 5

Intelligence is what intelligence tests measure;
That the differences on these tests were stable over time; that children improved with age; that their relative ranks tended to be maintained; & that people that are good at one part of these tests also tend to be good at other parts

Question 6

Francis Galton, the inventor of scatterplots came up with a way of testing/objectifying intelligence. What was it?

Answer 6

Measuring human abilities; tests of intelligence by measuring energy (how much effort is put into a task) & sensitivity to physical stimuli (being able to distinguish between stimuli)

Question 7

When Wissler systematically tested intelligence according to Galton’s approach, to see what it predicted, what did he find?

Answer 7

No correlation with student grades; lack of predictive validity; doubting the existence of general ability

Question 8

What was Alfred Binet’s approach to objectively test intelligence?

Answer 8

He used a pragmatic approach, coming up with tests to identify defective/special needs children (selecting tasks that are typically taught at school & looking at the average performance for each age group); looked at how kids performed relative to their “mental age” (if perform like a 10 y/o their mental age is 10)

Question 9

What’s Stern’s (1912) formula for the Intelligence Quotient?;
What’s a problem with this?;

Answer 9

IQ = mental age divided by chronological age, times one hundred;
Restriction of range: not valid across the lifespan (harder to distinguish for adults & they don’t increase in the same way as children)

Question 10

List 3 modern tests used for IQ testing

Answer 10

Norms (normal distribution; looking at percentiles of individuals of the normal curve, & standard deviations from the average; e.g. 1 SD = 15 either side of 100); Stanford-Binet (modern version of Alfred Binet’s); The Wechsler scales

Question 11

What content areas are covered in a Wechsler verbal scale test?;
What’s a problem with this test?

Answer 11

Comprehension, vocabulary, information, similarities, arithmetic, & digit span;
There are cultural & temporal dimensions that may not be generalizable

Question 12

What kinds of tests are measured (& timed) on a Wechsler performance scale test?

Answer 12

Object assembly (combining pieces of a puzzle); block design (matching patterned blocks); picture completion; picture arrangement (putting in chronological order); digit symbol (transcribing code of symbols & numerals)

Question 13

What is performance on other intelligence & aptitude tests, such as Raven’s progressive matrices, highly correlated with?

Answer 13

Performance on general IQ tests (have to figure out the rule)

Question 14

What psychometric properties of intelligence tests are required to ensure quality control?

Answer 14

Validity – does it measure what it purports to measure; reliability – does it consistently measure what it measures; standardization – conditions are the same for all test takers; norms – translation of raw scores into scaled equivalents of relative levels of performance

Question 15

How has IQ influenced societal & occupational outcomes?

Answer 15

The bell curve has influenced people getting accepted into school, jobs, etc; in America people get restratified on the basis of IQ (chance in society goes down if they don’t perform well); Gottfredson found correlations between low IQ predicting high school drop outs, welfare, poverty, incarceration, compared to those in the top 5% predicting high end careers

Question 16

Describe the cognitive correlates that predict IQ;

So basic processing seems to predict what?

Answer 16

Working memory capacity; simple information processing speed - those with high IQ are better at lexical access speed (distinguishing lower & upper case letters); choice reaction time (pressing button when light comes on); inspection time paradigm (which of 2 lines is shorter; the minimum exposure duration to make 9 out of 10 correct decisions);
What we perceive to be complex (intelligence)

Question 17

Describe the biological correlates of IQ, a source of individual differences

Answer 17

PET scans show that overall glucose is lower in higher IQ people (neuronal efficiency); heritability; nutrition (if hungry, test performance will be low); lead (said to lower IQ); prenatal exposure (to alcohol, aspirin, antibiotics)

Question 18

Social variables are another source for individual differences, influencing IQ. What do these include?

Answer 18

Culture (can either foster or discourage); occupation (need stimulation); schooling; intervention (only partially successful – no long term effects); family environment; life experiences

Question 19

Describe the Flynn effect

Answer 19

Inter-generationally, performance is improving & we appear to be getting smarter (could be access to internet; or we’re being primed to do the tests better; the norm needs to be adjusted)

Question 20

Apart from the Flynn effect, what other group differences have been found to influence IQ?

Answer 20

Males are generally better than females on visual-spatial tasks & females are better than males on verbal subtasks (could be hormonal); & race differences – Asians said to perform the best, & caucasians better than African Americans (but the research is misleading & there’s no biological basis for this)

Question 21

One psychometric model is based on correlations between tasks of the IQ tests. What 7 primary mental abilities is intelligence composed of according to Thurstone (1938)?

Answer 21

Verbal comprehension, verbal fluency, inductive reasoning, spatial visualization, number, memory & perceptual speed (can be intelligent at one of these but not another)

Question 22

How is Thurstone’s model assessed?

Answer 22

Combinations are created & divided; different combinations reflect different types of intelligence

Question 23

Another psychometrics model was proposed by Spearman (1927). What is it?

Answer 23

The g factor – includes a general factor (g) & some set of specific factors (s); can create a matrix of correlations that explains variations (e.g. speed vs. strength)

Question 24

What is Raymond Cattell’s hierarchical model (1965) composed of?

Answer 24

G is divided into fluid abilities (understanding abstract relationships, as in inductive reasoning, analogies, etc) & crystallised intelligence (accumulation of facts, such as vocabulary, general knowledge, etc)

Question 25

What is Caroll’s (1993) hierarchical model?

Answer 25

A three-stratum structure of cognitive abilities; General intelligence is composed of 8 different components (e.g. fluid, crystallised, perceptions, processing speed, etc), which is further divided into various level or speed factors

Question 26

Describe some problems for psychometric approaches to intelligence

Answer 26

The theories (contradicting conclusions; difficulty of testing the models against each other); the method (factor-analysis is exploratory: results may have little to do with mental processes; individual differences overlooks what intelligent people have in common); the data (restriction of range of participants, tasks & situational contexts)

Question 27

How is intelligence assessed using an anthropological approach?

Answer 27

As a cultural invention – acknowledges different ideas about smartness (different cultures value different types of cognition); culture fair tests (e.g. raven tests); culture-relevant tests (contexts relevant to a culture is taken into account)

Question 28

Howard Gardner proposed intelligence should look at different abilities & came up with a system’s model of multiple intelligences. What do these include?;
How may this model be problematic?

Answer 28

Linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist & existential;
Limited empirical research; different components can overlap; are some areas really intelligence or talent?

Question 29

Another system’s model was proposed by Sternberg, with his triachic theory (a theory of “successful intelligence”). What is it composed of?

Answer 29

Analytic (componential) – characteristics: analyzing, evaluating, contrasting, based on efficient information processing (measured by conventional IQ tests); Creative (experiential) – flexibility, exploring, inventing discovering, imagining (measured by creativity tasks); Practical (contextual) – applying, using, implementing, putting into practice (measured by practical reasoning tasks)

Question 30

What’s a problem with creativity testing?

Answer 30

It’s difficult to evaluate; not as much reliability or resolution

Question 31

Which view does Sternberg’s triachic theory support?

Answer 31

Pinker’s view about taking others’ goals into account