Chapter 9: Theories of Intelligence/Binet Scales

Question 1

48. What were the three independent research traditions identified by Taylor to study human intelligence?

Answer 1

• Psychometric
• Information processing (how you learn and solve problems)
• Cognitive (how you react to life)

Question 2

49. Through what 3 facilities did Binet believe intelligence expressed itself? What two major concepts guided him?

Answer 2

• Judgment, Attention, Reasoning
• Age differentiation and general mental ability

Question 3

50. Know age differentiation, mental age, general mental ability, and positive manifold.

Answer 3

• age differentiation: Children at different ages have different abilities. Older children have more abilities
• mental age: equivalent age capabilities of child regardless of chronological age, obtained through age differentiation
• general mental ability: a general level of intelligence that drives all other cognitive abilities
• positive manifold: When diverse tests are given to large, unbiased samples, they correlate together positively. Supports the idea of general mental ability

Question 4

51. Binet searched for tasks that could be completed by what percentage of children in a particular age group?

Answer 4

66-75%

Question 5

52. What concept did Spearman introduce? What does this concept mean?

Answer 5

G; General Intelligence Factor
- Based on positive manifold I
- Intelligence consists of one general factor (g) plus a large number of specific factors
- All tests measure g

Question 6

53. What statistical method did Spearman develop to support his notion of g?

Answer 6

Factor analysis

Question 7

54. According to the gf-gc theory, what are the two basic types of intelligence? How do they differ?

Answer 7

• Fluid intelligence (gf): the abilities allowing us to reason, think and acquire new knowledge
• Crystalized intelligence (gc): the knowledge and understanding that we have acquired
• gf -> abstract concepts while gc -> concrete knowledge

Question 8

55. Know and be able to calculate IQ using mental age and chronological age

Answer 8

IQ = (Mental age/Chronological age) x100

Question 9

56. What is a deviation IQ and how was it used in the Stanford-Binet scale?

Answer 9

IQ obtained statistically from a person’s relative standing in his or her age group based on the mean score

• Rejects the IQ based on mental age/chronological age

Question 10

57. Define and differentiate basal and ceiling. Be able to give an example of each.

Answer 10

Basal
- the minimum amount you can get right before you move up

Ceiling
- specified number of incorrect responses/the maximum you can get wrong before you drop a level