Why is screening for intelligence still so contentious?


0

Introduction

These items come from various online IQ exams. There are two main types of alleged IQ tests: verbal and non-verbal. Though they were developed over a century ago, these tests are still often used to evaluate students’ cognitive skills today.

IQ tests are used in schools to determine which students might benefit most from gifted and talented programs and to identify those who need special education services. Social scientists, psychologists, and scientists in other fields investigate IQ test results, probing their significance in light of a wide range of factors like family history, economic standing, educational attainment, and even skin color.

Going all the way, In his 1922 book, A Study of American Intelligence, Carl Brigham, a psychologist at Princeton University and a pioneer in the field of psychometrics, analyzed the well-publicized findings of the United States Army’s Alpha and Beta intelligence tests. Brigham used careful statistical analysis to prove that American IQ was falling and blamed rising immigration and racial integration for the decline. 

Concerning this problem, he advocated social reforms that would limit immigration and forbid racial mixing. Online IQ “quizzes” are a common scam. They claim to determine whether or not “you have what it takes to be a member of the world’s most prestigious high IQ society.”

You should have been able to figure out the solutions to the questions on your own if you want to brag about your intelligence. John will be twice as old as his brother when he turns 16. The bowling bill for the two families is £26.61. To complete the series, add 49.

Educators, social scientists, and hard scientists continue to argue over the IQ test’s utility, validity, and relevance, despite the publicity it has received. The history of the IQ test and how it came to be used in modern society, including how it was used to further stigmatize racial and economic minorities, is crucial to grasp why this is the case.

This is a testing moment.

Numerous intelligence tests, created in the early 1900s in Europe and the United States, claimed to be objective methods of assessing a person’s IQ. The French government commissioned a French psychologist named Alfred Binet to create the first of these exams so that they could better predict which kids would have the most trouble in class. The ensuing Binet-Simon Scale in 1905 formed the cornerstone of contemporary intelligence testing. 

Binet believed, ironically, that IQ tests were insufficient measures of intelligence due to their inability to capture nonverbal abilities like creativity and emotional intelligence. Intelligent people have always been highly esteemed in society, and the IQ test was created to help classify people according to this trait. In the United States and elsewhere, IQ tests are used by the police and military as a means of vetting new recruits. In addition, they used the findings to change the admissions criteria.

During World War I, the United States Army administered the Alpha and Beta Tests to around 1.75 million draftees to assess their IQ and mental fortitude. Soldiers’ test scores were used to evaluate their readiness for military service and to assign them to the appropriate occupational specialty or leadership position. Starting in the early 1900s, IQ tests were used in the American school system to identify “gifted and talented” pupils and students with special needs who required specialized programs and classroom accommodations.

Take this real iq test to see how well you measure up.

Some American jurisdictions have, ironically, begun requiring applicants to meet a minimum IQ before being considered for police employment. After extensive time and money had been invested in their training, it was feared that individuals who scored too highly might eventually find the work monotonous and depart.

In the 20th century, iq test were increasingly popular alongside the theory that a person’s innate intellect level was determined by their genetic make-up. IQ tests were popular among ethnocentrists and eugenicists because they were believed to be able to reveal the biological and racial roots of intelligence and other social behaviors. They maintained the discrepancies between minority and white students or between students from low- and high-income backgrounds that these exams revealed.

There were many who said the findings proved already existing suspicions about the genetic differences between different ethnic and socioeconomic groups and the evolutionary roots of societal inequality.

Both natural and social scientists have done extensive work to disprove claims, popularised by thinkers like Brigham and Terman, that biological factors account for racial disparities in IQ.

Lack of data and flawed statistical analyses are often cited in criticisms of such “hereditarian” notions, which propose that genetics provides a powerful explanation for human character traits and even human social and political problems. Many scientists remain unconvinced and worried by ongoing studies of racial differences in intelligence and continue to voice their concerns about this area of study.

In its darkest hours, however, IQ testing proved to be an effective tool for excluding and controlling social outcasts by equating scientific terminology with empirical evidence. In the early 20th century, IQ tests were employed by proponents of eugenic ideologies to sort out the “idiots,” “imbeciles,” and “feebleminded.” The eugenics movement said these individuals posed a threat to the purity of the American population’s white Anglo-Saxon DNA.

Many American citizens were sterilized in the years following the popularity of such eugenic arguments. The Supreme Court of the United States issued a notorious rule in 1927 that made it permissible to sterilize people with developmental disabilities and the “feebleminded,” who were often defined by their low IQs, without their will. The Buck v. Bell decision led to nearly 65,000 forced sterilizations of people with low IQs. Those who were subjected to forced sterilization in the United States in the wake of Buck v Bell were disproportionately from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds.

It wasn’t until the mid-1970s that groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center began initiating cases on behalf of people who had been sterilized in the United States on the basis of IQ, crime, or sexual deviance. The United States Senate approved compensation for survivors of state-sponsored sterilizing programs in 2015.

Today’s IQ testing

Even now, the concept of intelligence and the reliability of the IQ test as a measurement instrument continue to provoke passionate and diametrically opposed responses. Some academics have argued that the whole idea of intelligence is culturally bound. They argue that, like many other cultural practices, their appearance varies depending on the specifics of the situation being examined. For instance, burping, for instance, is considered disrespectful in certain cultures but a token of appreciation for the host in others.

Therefore, what is regarded as intellectual in one setting may not be in another. In some African societies, for instance, knowledge of medicinal herbs is considered a sort of intelligence, despite its lack of correlation with high scores on standard Western academic intelligence tests.

Some academics argue that IQ tests are skewed toward the white, Western societies from whence they originated due to the “cultural uniqueness” of intelligence. Because of this, they may cause issues in groups with varying cultural backgrounds. Applying the same standard across societies would ignore the cultural norms that determine what counts as “smart” in any one society.

Furthermore, some academics argue that IQ tests cannot accurately and evenly measure an individual’s ability since they have a history of being used to support problematic and often racially motivated notions about what different groups of individuals are capable of.


Like it? Share with your friends!

0
Kamal Pandey