Lecture 1 Theories of Intelligence Flashcards
What areas has intelligence research impacted on society?
Policy: health, law, education, Organisational: schools and workplaces, Individual: lifestyle decisions
How does Plato define intelligence? 350 BC
Gain information through the senses (passive intellect), make sense of it and use it (active intellect)
First intelligence test? 1905
Alfred Binet Binet-Simon test, 1905, 30 tasks, child vs mental age/reading age
William Stern 1912
Intelligence Quotient (IQ): IQ= mental age/chronological age X 100
Lewis Terman 1916
Stanford-Binet - 40 new items, arrange weights from highest to lowest
Advances: 1) Standardised testing Terman
Terman tested the Stanford-Binet test on a big sample of 1000 children
Why is this important?
More representative
Beginning of standardised testing
Advances: 2) Use of IQ scale Terman
Stern’s procedure of calculating IQ applied to the Stanford-Binet scale
Robert Yerkes 1917 Adult tests
Yerkes (1917) During WW1, the American army wanted a test to classify soldiers
Army Alpha: for those with literacy skills
Army Beta: for those without literacy skills
Tested 1.75 million people
Key advances
Time-limited testing, in groups
Raised the profile of IQ testing with the public and businesses (National Intelligence Test, 1919)
Summary (history) of intelligence research
Early intelligence research was mainly motivated by practical needs, not theory-driven
It developed key elements of intelligence testing, in terms of:
What should be measured (vision -> multiple tasks)
Who could be tested (children -> adults)
Practicalities of testing (timed, group tests)
Comparisons across individuals (standardised IQ scores)
Implicit theories of intelligence: Sternberg et al (1981)
Sternberg et al. (1981) lay persons thoughts on intelligence:
Practical problem solving
Verbal ability
Social competence
What is intelligence?
Different studies produce different dimensions (Sternberg, 1985)
Practical problem-solving ability
Verbal ability
Intellectual balance and integration - seeing similarities, making connections
Goal orientation and attainment
Contextual intelligence – learns from experience, understands environment
Fluid thought – thinks quickly
Intelligence across culture
Conceptions of intelligence change depending on what part of the world you live in
Western culture: speed of
mental processing associated
with high intelligence
Eastern cultures: awareness of
self in society, history and
spirituality associated with high intelligence
Intelligence across culture: Yang and Sternberg (1997)
Yang and Sternberg (1997) Asked Taiwanese Chinese people to define intelligence
General cognitive factor of intelligence - practical problem solving, fast learning, etc.
Interpersonal intelligence – relating well to others, showing understanding and empathy
Intrapersonal intelligence – good knowledge of self
Intellectual self assertion – confidence in intellect
Intellectual self effacement – modesty about intellect
Intelligence across the lifespan
Age group differences in 11 to 16 year olds (Yussen & Kane, 1985)
Knowledge is central to intelligence - all
Intelligence is inborn - child
Intelligence is a one-dimensional construct - child
Understand the influences of both nature and nurture on intelligence - older
Understand differences between academic, social, and physical intelligence - older
Intelligence to the expert
In 1921 Journal of Educational Psychology asked 14 prominent psychologists to describe what comprises intelligence
Sternberg and Detterman (1986) replication with 24 experts
Jensen (1998): 38 experts, 38 definitions!
But Sternberg (2000) found some common themes:
adaptation to the environment
basic mental processes
higher order thinking (reasoning, problem solving, decision making)
Different definitions of the ideal intelligent person: Business, Physics, Philosophy, and Arts (Sternberg, 1985) Intelligence to the expert
Arts: Knowledge
Ability to use knowledge
To weight up possible alternatives
To see analogies
Business: Ability to think logically
To focus on essential aspects of a problem
To follow others’ arguments
Philosophy: Critical and logical abilities
Ability to follow complex arguments
To find errors in arguments and generate new arguments
Physics: Precise mathematical thinking
Ability to relate physical phenomena to the concepts of physics
To grasp the laws of nature quickly
Summary (non-expert theories)
We have a strong intuitive sense
of what ‘intelligence’ is…
But:
The definition of ‘intelligence’ is different for different cultures, age groups, and subject areas
Lots of different traits, skills, abilities and achievements are associated with intelligence
What are the current theories of intelligence?
General intelligence – Spearman’s g
Multifactor and hierarchical theories
Thurstone – primary mental abilities
Cattell – crystallised (gc) and fluid (gf)
Cattell-Horn-Carroll theory
Other intelligences
Multiple intelligences; emotional intelligence
General intelligence (g)
1904: Charles Spearman tested children
‘intelligence’ tests
memory, light, weight, sound discrimination
‘intellectual’ tests
vocabulary, maths, spatial abilities
Positive Manifold: Positive correlation between scores on different tests, e.g. Children who did well on one test tended to do well on others
Spearman championed the use of factor analysis, to group correlated tests together, adapted from Jensen (1998)
Spearman’s theory of intelligence (1904):
‘Specific abilities’ or ‘s’ (e.g. vocabulary intelligence, mathematical intelligence, etc.)
‘General intelligence’ or ‘g’ (i.e. underlying “mental energy”)
Thurstone: multiple factors
Thurstone (1938) argued that ‘g’ was the result of, rather than the underlying mechanism behind, 7 primary mental abilities:
Associative memory – rote learning
Number – carry out mathematical operations
Perceptual speed – perceive details of visual stimuli
Reasoning – inductive and deductive reasoning
Space – transform spatial figures mentally
Verbal comprehension – reading, comprehension, verbal analogies
Word fluency – generate and use words and letters
Cattell: Crystallised & fluid intelligence
Cattell (~1966): ‘g’ comprises two related but distinct components
Crystallised intelligence (Gc)
acquired knowledge and skills, vocabulary, comprehension, factual knowledge, etc.
Fluid intelligence (Gf)
reasoning ability, problem solving, patterns, analogies, understanding new information
Dynamic (changing) relationship between the two components
Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) theory
Influential theory of intelligence, especially for the development of IQ tests
A combination of:
Cattell’s concept of crystallised and fluid intelligence
Horn’s additional ‘g’ abilities
Carroll’s three-stratum hierarchical model
Combined to develop the Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) theory of cognitive abilities (1999)
Influential in the development of IQ tests
Dynamic theory
Horn: additional ‘g’ abilities
Horn worked with Cattell
Concluded that there were 9 broad ‘g’ abilities (no single ‘g’)
Cattell-Horn Gf-Gc (~1985)
Carroll: Three-stratum model (1993)
Hierarchical model based on factor analysis of 461 datasets obtained between 1927 and 1987
3-level hierarchy:
-Stratum I: 69 different cognitive abilities
-Stratum II: 8 broad factors arising from these abilities
Stratum III: general intelligence (g)
What is Stratum II
fluid intelligence (Gf), crystallised intelligence (Gc), general memory and learning (Gy), visual perception (Gv), auditory perception (Gu), retrieval ability (Gr), cognitive speediness (Gs), processing speed (Gt)
CHC theory summary
Three-stratum theory
16 broad-stratum intelligences (sometimes 10)
Fluid (Gf) & crystallised (Gc) intelligence
General knowledge (Gkn), quantitative knowledge (Gq), reading/writing (Grw)
Visual-spatial (Gv), auditory (Ga), olfactory (Go), tactile (Gh), psychomotor (Gp) & kinaesthetic (Gk) abilities
Cognitive processing speed (Gs), decision/reaction time (Gt), psychomotor speed (Gps)
Short-term memory (Gsm) & long-term storage & retrieval (Glr)
Lots of narrow-stratum intelligences
Gardner: Multiple intelligences
Howard Gardner: Educational psychologist, interested in educational theory and practice
Traditional intelligence testing does not translate easily into the classroom
Western education systems: focus on logical-mathematical and linguistic intelligences
Less focus on interpersonal intelligence
What 7 intelligences did Gardner identify?
Gardner (1983) Identified 7 intelligences ‘Conventional’ intelligences:
linguistic
logical-mathematical
spatial
Other types of intelligence:
musical
bodily kinaesthetic (using the body)
interpersonal (relating to others)
intrapersonal (understanding oneself)
Extra two intelligences identified by Gardner?
… plus an extra two (Gardner, 1998; Gardner et al., 1996)
Naturalist (ability to interact with nature,
maybe good at biology or meteorology)
Existentialist (ability to understand one’s
surroundings and place in the grand
scheme of things)
Emotional Intelligence?
Ability to understand our own emotions and the emotions of others
Ability to use emotional information to guide thinking and behaviour
Theory
Four-branch model of emotional intelligence - Salovey & Mayer (1990)
Theory of emotional intelligence - Goleman (1995)
Emotional-social intelligence model - Bar-On (1997, 2005)
Four-branch model of emotional intelligence (Salovey & Mayer, 1990)
Low sophistication:
Perceiving - recognising emotions
Facilitating – using emotions to make judgements & prioritise
Understanding –emotions and how they are linked
Managing – detached evaluation, emotional regulation
High sophistication
Goleman’s theory of emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence is about learning to control our basic emotional responses
e.g. fight or flight
‘Mixed’ model of emotional intelligence
emotional intelligence (emotional awareness)
personality and behaviour traits (conscientiousness, adaptability, trustworthiness)
Goleman (2001); Goleman et al. (2002): Four emotional competencies
Self-awareness (identify own emotional states) - service orientation, empathy
Self-management (manage own emotions)
Social awareness (assess and influence
others’ emotions)
Social skills / management (sustain good
interpersonal relationships) - leadership, teamwork abilities
Based on 25 abilities
Bar-On: Emotional-social intelligence model
Bar-On (1997, 2005): Emotionally and socially intelligent behaviour is adaptive
Emotional expression important for adaptation and survival
Emotional-social intelligence model
Interrelated emotional and social competencies:
understand and express themselves effectively
understand and relate to others
cope with environmental demands and pressures
Mixed model (emotional intelligence & behavioural traits like optimism)
Five major domains; 15 aspects
5 Main domains of emotional-social intelligence model
Intrapersonal skills, interpersonal skills, adaptability scales, stress-management scales, general mood
Intrapersonal skills
Recognise own emotions, emotional self-awareness, assertiveness, self-regard, self-actualisation, independence
Interpersonal skills
understand others’ emotions, Interpersonal relationships, social responsibility, empathy
Adaptability scales
manage emotions, Problem solving, reality testing and flexibility
Stress-management scales
manage change, Stress tolerance, impulse control
General mood
generate positive affect, happiness and optimism
Comparing ability and mixed models
Salovey & Mayer: emotional intelligence only
‘emotional intelligence’ clearly defined
can look at relationship between emotional intelligence and other variables (mental health, school)
Goleman and Bar-On: mixed models
abilities that emotionally intelligent people have, including abilities and behaviours
useful in the workplace for identifying EI role in success
Critique of EI theory and research
No benchmark to establish meaningfulness of emotional intelligence
Mixed models – mixing intelligence and personality factors is ‘unscientific’ (Eysenck, 2000)
