CHAPTER NINE: INTELLIGENCE AND IQ TESTING
● Intelligence: defined by psychologist Edward Boring (1923) as whatever intelligence tests
measure. Related to the efficiency or speed of information processing.
○ Intelligence as Sensory Capacity: Out of Sight, Out of Mind
■ Scientist and inventor Sir Francis Galton (1822-1911) and James McKeen
Cattell determined that intelligence is the byproduct of sensory capacity;
most knowledge comes first through the senses (vision and hearing) and
therefore, people with higher sensory capacities should acquire more
knowledge than other people. However, sensory capacity and intelligence
are weakly correlated (ex. Helen Keller was brilliant).
○ Intelligence as Abstract Thinking
■ Alfred Binet and Theodore Simon (1904) developed the first intelligence
test– a diagnostic tool designed to measure overall thinking ability– as
the French government wished for them to develop an objective
psychological test that would identify students’ learning abilities. This test
measured the speed of learning and the ability to name objects, generate
meanings of words, draw from memory, complete incomplete sentences,
determine the similarities between two objects, and construct a sentence
with three words. Binet and Simon (1905) recognized higher mental
processes: reasoning, understanding, and judgement.
● Abstract Thinking: the capacity to understand hypothetical
concepts, rather than concepts in the here and now.
■ Intelligence consists of the following abilities:
● Reason abstractly
● Learn to adapt to novel environmental circumstances
● Acquire knowledge
● Benefit from experience
○ Intelligence as General vs. Specific Abilities
■ Charles Spearman (1927) hypothesized the existence of a single shared
factor across all of these aspects—g, or general intelligence, that
accounted for the overall differences in intellect among people and
corresponds to the strength of mental engines.
■ Spearman also proposed the existence of factor s, or specific abilities,
that refer to particular skills in narrow domains (ex. spatial tests).
, ● Intelligence (CONT’D)
○ Fluid and Crystallized Intelligence
■ Raymond Cattell and John Horn distinguished “intelligence” as a mixture
of two capacities: fluid and crystallized intelligence.
■ Fluid Intelligence: the capacity to learn new ways of solving problems;
more likely to decline with age and related to g as it is may better capture
the power of Spearman’s “mental engine”.
■ Crystallized Intelligence: accumulated knowledge of the world acquired
over time; able to increase with age and could give rise to greater
openness to experience personality trait as intellectually curious people
may expose themselves to more knowledge.
○ Multiple Intelligences & Frames of Mind
■ Multiple Intelligences: theorized by Howard Gardner (1983, 1999) as
entirely different domains of intellectual skill as there are numerous
“frames of mind” or ways of thinking about the world. Each frame of
mind is a different and fully independent intelligence.
● Linguistic Intelligence: speak and write well.
● Logico-Mathematical: use logic and math skills to solve problems,
such as scientific questions.
● Spatial: think and reason about objects in three-dimensional
space.
● Musical: perform, understand, and enjoy music.
● Bodily-Kinesthetic: manipulate the body in sports, dance, or other
physical endeavours.
● Interpersonal: understand and interact effectively with others.
● Intrapersonal: understand and possess insight into self.
● Naturalistic: recognize, identify, and understand animals, plants,
and other living things.
● Humour and Memory Intelligences; Emphasis on Evolutionary
Adaptiveness
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