ch10: intelligence Flashcards
intelligence
the capacity to be a general problem solver and to solve a wide variety of problems in a wide variety of domains through pattern recognition, analogous transfer, and reasoning
IQ
- “intelligence quotient”, a standardized measure of one’s intelligence developed by Terman
- it is one’s mental age divided by one’s chronological age multiplied by 100, it is standardized so that comparisons between individuals is clearer
- used in the Stanford-Binet test
- challenged by the issues that as one ages, one’s IQ score will go down even though it is implausible that one is becoming less intelligent with age
- measure the ability to complete a pattern, short-term memory, the ability to grasp analogies
self-enhancement bias
the tendency to judge one’s performance as better than the average without any evidence of special expertise or training
low intelligence is often associated with what characteristics?
it is generally correlated with lower socioeconomic status and health
what is the origin of the word “intelligence”?
- it came from two Latin words “inter” meaning between and “legere” meaning to choose, pick out, read
- original use of the word referred to the ability to discern true or important information from false ones
- root meaning refers to being able to read between the lines
- intelligence is thought to generate more behavioural flexibility
what two dimensions of behavioural flexibility did Aristotle distinguish?
- practical wisdom: the application of knowledge, the use of action
- theoretical wisdom: the pontification of ideas across contexts, the conceptualization of underlying explanations of thoughts and actions across situations
origin of the word “intellect”
- Aristotle stated the ability to engage in reasoning that is both cross-contextual and contextually sensitive as nous, which is translated as intellect
- meant the ability to discern or notice underlying patterns
Flynn effect
the finding by James Flynn that on average IQ scores were rising, which are supposed to be immune to cultural influences. the result is controversial since it implies that most people several generations back were unintelligence
what are the three main explanations that try to identify the precise causes of the change in IQ scores (Flynn effect)
- 1st explanation: overall improvement in nutrition and medical care results in significant positive effects on the healthy development of the brain and cognitive abilities
- 2nd explanation: focuses on improvements in education, post-industrial society emphasizes the importance of abstract thinking, scientific reasoning, classification, and focus on logical and mathematical analysis
- 3rd explanation: increase in environmental complexity resulted from rapidly changing technology, which is believed to have necessitated adaptations in the use of one’s working memory and attention
what does it mean to use “scientific spectacles” according to James Flynn?
to group concepts using classification schemes
concrete vs abstract thinking
concrete thinking considers the basic, physical properties, while abstract thinking considers meaningful relationships and other higher-order features like category membership (modern world uses more abstract thinking, whereas people in the early 1900s used concrete thinking)
according to James Flynn, why do modern people tend to see the orange circle surrounded by little circles as smaller than the one surrounded by big circles? (the Ebbinghaus illusion)
pre-modern villagers are not as influenced by holistic context because they are not used to transferring knowledge form one context to another, whereas modern people tend to look at things with a holistic approach and how each items are in relation to one another
when was the written form of intelligence measurement first introduced
in the early 1900s. Prior to written measures, earlier physiological measures were used to assess intelligence but the perceived relationship was not psychometrically sound (lacked reliability and validity)
who is Francis Galton?
- a psychologist and statistician who focused on measuring varied abilities of people using empirical methods to ensure precise assessment
- he hypothesized that one’s general cognitive ability (g) was the product of heredity and that intelligence was related to how well one used one’s senses
weight discrimination
the ability to notice small differences in weight
pitch sensitivity
the ability to notice differences in pitch
variability
represents how far scores differ from the mean
standard deviation (SD)
- commonly used measure of variability
- magnitude of SD indicates the degree to which scores cluster around the mean
- large SDs indicate higher levels of discrepancy between the scores and the mean, low SDs mean scores are tightly clustered around the mean = less variability
describe the outcome of Galton’s tests
across his 17 measures, the tests were not predictive of each other (low concurrent validity) and were not predictive of academic success (low predictive validity), the scores were unrelated
Binet and Simon’s intelligence test
- focused on behavioural measure of intelligence
- defined intelligence as the ability to judge well, comprehend well, and reason well
- they developed tests that reflected three basic abilities: direction, adaptation, and criticism
direction
the ability to know what to do and how to do it
adaptation
the ability to create strategies for implementing this knowledge and monitoring its progress
criticism
the ability to step back and find errors in one’s thinking
how was performance measure on Binet and Simon’s tests
performance was measured by how many of the tests a child could successfully complete. Since Binet noticed that intelligence developed with age, tests corresponding to a child’s age were given to each and the tests gets progressively more difficult.
mental age
according to Binet and Simon, one’s mental age indicates the average age of children who can solve the set of problems that a particular child is capable of solving (4 yo solving a problem that an average 4 yo could answer)
what was significant about Binet and Simon’s intelligence test
it helped standardize the measure of intelligence, it allows many other researchers to use the same test and the same calculation to meaningfully compare results (further scientific investigation)
the Stanford-Binet test
the first written (paper and pencil) measure of intelligence and was referred to as the Binet-Simon test
what did Terman do that was significant in calculating one’s IQ
- he built on Binet’s work and followed the suggestion of William Stern to divide the person’s mental age by their chronological age to get their IQ. this would indicate if the child was above or below the average performance of their age group
- IQ = (mental age/chronological age)*100
- the scores matched the assessment by teachers of the student’s intelligence, proving validity to the test. Terman’s test was superior to Galton’s, and the Stanford-Binet test became the standard for intelligence testing
who created the first assessment of intelligence with physiological measure
Francis Galton
what is the problem with the way scores are derived using the Stanford-Binet test?
intelligence would appear to level off at 16, meaning that while one’s mental age stays constant, their chronological age still advances, so their IQ score will go down over time. (40yo would be scored less intelligence than a 20yo)
