History of Intelligence Tests- Binet

Question 1

Binet

Answer 1

· Commissioned to develop a test to identify children with special academic needs
o Wanted to identify children in need of special training without relying on teachers
- 1905: Binet and Simon published first useful test of mental ability
- Focused on abstract reasoning
- Success!: easy to administer, objective, inexpensive and had good criterion-related validity
- Assumed all children follow same course of mental development, but may differ in speed of development
- Made no assumption as to why this occurs, but leaned toward environmental explanation
- Scores expressed in terms of “mental age”
- Mental abilities are comparable of a child with that chronological age
- Proposed that “dull” children were simply “retarded” in their development while “bright” children were “advanced”
- Revised by Binet, carried on by other psychologists
- Binet viewed tests in terms of its practical purpose (identify at risk kids
- Others viewed as measure of intelligence
History of Intelligence Tests: Terman
- IQ: Child’s mental age divided by chronological age and multiplied by 100
- IQ made it possible to the children of different ages by placing them all on the same scale
- IQ works well for children, not for adults
- Became the standard for all intelligence tests
- Complained that certain ethnic groups were dull
- Wanted IQ test to lead to policies that would curtail reproduction of feeble-mindedness
- Helped US govt develop tests to evaluate immigrants
- Jewish, Hungarian, Italian and Russians- feeble-minded
Stanford-Binet was used in Canada (Alberta and BC) as basis for Sexual Sterilization Act