Historical Roots of Intelligence

Question 1

Frances Galton

Answer 1

Believed people were born with different levels of intelligence. Tried to raise the “intellectual pool” by proposing a eugenics program to curtail the breeding of the “feebleminded”

Question 2

Charles Spearman

Answer 2

Developed factor analysis and correlation. Accepted an equality of intellectual ability. Believed everyone has a level of general intelligence (g) and then they have specific intelligences that make them unique (s). Correlations between tests suggest that g exists.

Question 3

Louis Thurstone

Answer 3

Seven primary mental abilities (verbal fluency, verbal comprehension, numerical reasoning, spatial reasoning, memory, perceptual speed and inductive reasoning).

Question 4

Phillip Vernon

Answer 4

Multi-level hierarchy of intelligences. g is at the top, with major factors beneath (verbal-educational and spatial-mechanical-practical). At the bottom are minor group factors such as verbal reasoning, numeracy, logic and attention (v:ed) and spatial/mechanical reasoning, social skills and psychomotor coordination (s:m:p).

Question 5

Raymond Cattell

Answer 5

Fluid and crystallised intelligence. Below these are three group factors (general speediness, general visualisation and general fluency).