Intelligence Flashcards
What is “g”?
General intelligence, also known as g factor, refers to the existence of a broad mental capacity that influences performance on cognitive ability measures. Charles Spearman.
this g factor was responsible for overall performance on mental ability tests.
Charles Spearman was one of the researchers who helped develop a statistical technique known as factor analysis. Factor analysis allows researchers to a number of different test items that can measure common abilities.
History of IQ testing
History of IQ testing: mental age/chronological age * 100
Example: Head size as proxy for intelligence. Cause bigger brain cause brain stuff mean make smart smart
• Correlation between body size and cranium size
Example: Stanford-Binet Sample Questions: questions are pretty subjective
Example: Yerkes and Army Examination (Alpha): information based.
• The most prominent industry in Detroit is
(A) automobiles (B) brewing (C) flour (D) packing
The gist is that its absolutely fraught with discrimination and measurement failures.
Crystallized Intelligence vs. Fluid Intelligence
Fluid intelligence is defined as the ability to solve new problems, use logic in new situations, and identify patterns. In contrast, crystallized intelligence is defined as the ability to use learned knowledge and experience.
Fluid intelligence declines as you get older. crystallized intelligence does not.
What is the “Flynn Effect”?
Flynn discovered that IQ scores increased from one generation to the next for all of the countries for which data existed. The Flynn Effect deals with the issue of how the general IQ scores of a population change over time.
our IQ levels are higher than our grandparents
What were the results of IQ testing?
Results:
• African-Americans scored extremely low compared to whites
• Average mental age of white American adults stood at 13!
• European immigrants: Russian - 11.34, Italian -11.01, Pole - 10.74
Breastfeeding? Does it make children smarter?
Really… no. If you control for mother’s SES, breastfeeding has no effect.
It takes time to breastfeed (it’s a privilege), you need maternity leave or the funds to imitate it.
However–it is good for the immune system
Is there a unitary reasoning neural substrate?
No
Heterogeneity:
No consistent piece of evidence yet for IQ in the brain
Hereditary Structure:
Twin studies on gray and white matter
What’s the goal of this research field? Have they found any genetic or environmental factors?
Heterogeneity and Hereditary studies:
Trying to look for neural correlates for intelligence, want to control for biological factors, environmental factors. Part of the goal is establishing predictive measures.
“Without additional evidence, correlations between biologically related parents and children cannot be unambiguously interpreted as either genetic or environmental”
However, what about similarity of intelligence scores in twin studies?
The most genetically similar people have the most similar scores
Identical twins reared together -> identical twins reared apart -> fraternal twins reared together -> siblings reared together -> strangers
However, not all twin studies are the same.
