INTELLIGENCE
SESSION 17&18
What is Intelligence?
CONTESTED DEFINITIONS
• Intelligence refers to individuals’ abilities
• to understand complex ideas
• to adapt effectively to the environment
• to learn from experience
• to engage in various forms of reasoning
• to overcome obstacles by careful thought (Neisser et al. 1966)
• “Intelligence is the aggregate or global capacity of the individual
• to act purposefully
• to think rationally and
• to deal effectively with his environment” (Wechsler, 1944)
ABILITY
TO
LEAR
ADAPT OR N
ADJUST
RATIONAL
THINKING
ABSTRACT
THINKING
DEBATES
•What is intelligence? (content)
•Many or one?
•How can intelligence be measured?
(psychometric)
•To what extent does intelligence
contribute to success/happiness?
•Nature (biological) versus nurture?
•How is intelligence used?
(process; cognitive)
EVOLUTION OF
INTELLIGENCE TESTING
Sir Francis Galton Alfred Binet Charles Spearman Lewis Terman L. L. Thurstone David Wechsler
1869 Theodore Simon 1904, 1927 1916 1931, 1938 1939
1905
Edward Thorndike J. P. Guilford Robert Sternberg Howard Gardner
Raymond Cattell (1941) Arthur Jensen
1946 1961 (1981) (1983)
John Horn (1965) 1969
John Carroll (1993)
NATURE
NATURE
INDIVIDUAL TEST GROUP TEST INDIVIDUAL TEST
GENERAL MULTIPLE
Eugenics
Eugenics INTELLIGENCE ABILITIES (7)
Racism
Racism
Nazism
Nazism
Sir Francis Galton Alfred Binet Charles Spearman Lewis Terman L. L. Thurstone David Wechsler
1869 Theodore Simon 1904, 1927 1916 1931, 1938 1939
1905
Raymond Cattell (1941) Robert Sternberg Howard Gardner
Edward Thorndike J. P. Guilford Arthur Jensen
John Horn (1965) (1981) (1983)
1946 1961 1969
John Carroll (1993)
Eugenics Eugenics
Racism Racism Process theories Process theories
Nazism Nazism
MULTIPLE NATURE MULTIPLE NATURE MULTIPLE MULTIPLE
ABILITIES (4) GENERAL ABILITIES ABILITIES (3) ABILITIES (8)
GENERAL
INTELLIGENCE (120-
INTELLIGENCE
180)
FRANCIS GALTON
• Hereditary Genius (1869)
• Intelligence runs in families and is passed on
from generation to generation through
genetic inheritance
• Coined the phrase “nature versus
nurture” to refer to the heredity-
environment issue
• Tried to assess innate mental ability in
terms of sensory skills with assumption
BINET-SIMON TEST OR SCALE
• In 1904, Ministry of France wanted to identify mentally “subnormal” children who
could benefit from special education programs
• Alfred Binet and student Theodore Simon created test in 1905
• Focused on measuring abstract reasoning skills → SUCCESS
• Measures mental age which indicates that he or she displayed the
mental performance typical of a child of that chronological (actual)
age.
• Aims to measure native ability, not knowledge or scholastic attainment
• Revised scale in 1908, 1911
• Henry Goddard translated it into English and brought into lexicon the word
‘moron’- an adult with mental age between 7 to 10
STANFORD-BINET SCALE
• Lewis Terman at Stanford University revised Binet’s test in 1916
• New scoring scheme measuring INTELLIGENCE QUOTIENT
• Intelligence quotient (IQ) is a child’s mental age divided by
chronological age, multiplied by 100.
• IQ = (Mental age × 100)/Chronological age (German- William Stern in 1910)
• In Binet’s system, comparisons across ages were difficult. IQ made
comparisons possible.
• Widespread adoption for educational testing
• Revised for group testing among army and immigrants with Robert Yerkes and
Henry Goddard (1917)
• The test consists of a series of items that
vary according to the age of the person
being tested
• copy figures or answer questions about
everyday activities.
• solve analogies, explain proverbs, and
describe similarities that underlie sets of
words.
• Starts with the level of MA (mental age)
questions and then moves on to successively
Terman’s study of the gifted
• Challenged the stereotype that geniuses are not
socially well-adjusted
• Longest longitudinal study in the world (1928 to
ongoing)
• Although children did well in life, few made genius
contributions
• While Terman was in favour of biological determinism,
Criticisms (class activity)
• https://youtu.be/m5aOnGdWr78
• Watch the above video and answer following questions
• Name the psychologists mentioned in the video
• What are the groups that have been influenced negatively by
intelligence testing?
• Share an example of how the concept of intelligence and/or intelligence
testing has affected your self-concept in your own life and/or how you have
viewed others
THEORIES OF INTELLIGENCE
Classification of theories of intelligence
• Psychometric
• Spearman’s two factor theory
• Thurstone’s Primary mental abilities
• Cattel’s fluid and crystallized ability
• Guilford’s Structure of Intellect theory
• Cognitive theories
• Sternberg’s Triarchic theory of intelligence
• Gardner’s Multiple Intelligence
• Biological theories
• Brain size and intelligence
Another way to classify theories of
intelligence
•Content theories- What is content
of intelligence?
•Process theories – How is
intelligence used? What are
cognitive processes?
CHARLES SPEARMAN’S TWO FACTOR
THEORY
• Invented factor analysis method where
correlations among many variables are
analyzed to identify closely related clusters of
variables.
• If number of variables correlate highly with one
another, the assumption is a single factor is
influencing all of them
• All cognitive performance can be explained by two
variables: g and s
• G (general ability, assumed to be innate); S (many
specific abilities, likely to be learned)
• G and S highly correlated
OPPOSITION Raymond Cattell (1941) J. P. Guilford
L. L. Thurstone Edward Thorndike John Horn (1965) 1961
1931, 1938 1946 John Carroll (1993)
Fluid intelligence
7 independeAnt Multifactor theory Fluid Intelligence Structure of intellect
primary mental Concrete (motor or Crystallized intelligence theory
abilities mechanical) intelligence
word fluency, verbal Abstract intelligence 120-180 factors
comprehension, spatial Social intelligence
ability, perceptual speed,
numerical ability, 4 attributes of
inductive reasoning, and intelligence: level, range,
memory. area, speed
OPPOSITION
MULTIPLE
INTELLIGENCES
TRIARCHIC THEORY Robert Sternberg Howard Gardner
(1981) (1983) Naturalistic
Interpersonal
Analytical
Intrapersonal
Bodily kinesthetic
Practical
Visual-spatial
Musical
Creative
Existential
Logical-mathematic
al
Verbal or linguistic
MEASURING
INTELLIGENCE
INTELLIGENCE TESTS
Tests devised to quantify a person’s
level of intelligence Why?
• Benefit in identifying students in need
of special attention in school
• Diagnosing cognitive difficulties
• Helping people make optimal
educational and vocational choices
BRIEF HISTORY
• The size and shape of a person’s head could
be used as an objective measure of
intelligence.
• The idea was put forward by Sir Francis Galton
• Personal prejudices
• First person to suggest that intelligence could be
quantified and measured in an objective manner
• The first real intelligence tests were developed by the French psychologist
Alfred Binet (1857–1911).
• His tests followed from a simple premise:
• If performance on certain tasks or test items improved with
chronological, or physical, age, performance could be used
to distinguish more intelligent people from less intelligent ones
within a particular age group
• On the basis of the Binet test, children were assigned a score relating to
their mental age, the average age of individuals who achieve a specific
level of performance on a test.
• Mental age: The average age of individuals who achieve a particular level
of performance on a test.
• For example, if the average 8-year-old answered, say, 45 items correctly on a
test, anyone who answered 45 items correctly would be assigned a mental age of
8 years
• He propagated Intelligence quotient, or IQ, a score that takes into account
an individual’s mental and chronological ages.
• Historically, the first IQ scores employed the following formula, in which MA
stands for mental age and CA for chronological age:
• IQ score=MA/CA X 100
• 20 year old performing at a mental age of 18. Calculate the IQ score?
WHAT IS IQ SCORE MEAN?
• The normal distribution is a symmetrical, bell-shaped curve
that represents the pattern in which many characteristics are
dispersed in the population.
• When a trait is normally distributed, most cases fall near the
center of the distribution.
• Psychologists eventually recognized that intelligence scores
fall into a normal distribution.
• In this system, raw scores are translated into deviation IQ
scores that locate respondents precisely within the
normal distribution.
THE NORMAL
DISTRIBUTIO
N
ACTIVITY - REALITY
CHECK Reali
ty
IQ tests are characterized as measures of
general mental ability, and the public
Misconception has come to believe that IQ tests
measure
IQ tests measure mental ability in mental ability in a truly broad sense. In reality, IQ
a truly general sense. tests have always focused only on
the abstract reasoning and verbal
fluency essential to academic success.
The tests do not tap social competence,
practical problem solving, creativity,
mechanical ingenuity, or artistic talent.
DO INTELLIGENCE TESTS HAVE
RELIABILITY & VALIDITY?
• Reliability refers to the measurement consistency of a test. A
reliable test is one that yields similar scores upon repetition.
• Validity refers to the ability of a test to measure what it was
designed to measure.
• IQ tests are valid measures of the kind of intelligence necessary to
do well in academic work. But if the purpose is to assess
intelligence in a broader sense, the validity of IQ tests is
questionable.
David wechsler –
•Wechsler adult intelligence scale–iv (WAIS-IV)
•Wechsler intelligence scale for children–iv, or WISC-
IV.
•Both the wais-iv and the wisc-iv have two major parts:
a verbal scale and a performance (or nonverbal) scale.
•Verbal tasks -vocabulary definition and
comprehension of various concepts.
•Performance (nonverbal)- timed assembly of small
objects and the arrangement of pictures in a logical
order
APA Classification of MR
68 - 83 -- borderline MR
52 – 67 -- mild MR
36 – 51 --moderate MR
20 – 25 -- severe MR
Below 20 -- profound MR
Limitation
• the stanford-binet, wais-iii, and wisc-iv
all require individualized, one-on-one
administration, it is relatively difficult
and time-consuming to administer and
score them on a large-scale basis
• validity: the property by which tests actually
measure what they are supposed to measure.
• sir francis galton assumed that skull size is
related to intelligence, and he was able to
measure skull size with great reliability.
however, the measure of skull size was not valid
—it had nothing to do with intelligence.
• in this case, its reliability without validity
• if we assume that a test is both valid and reliable, one
further step is necessary in order to interpret the
meaning of a specific test-taker’s score: the
establishment of norms.
• norms are standards of test performance that permit
the comparison of one person’s score on a test to the
scores of others who have taken the same test.
• tests for which norms have been developed are known
as standardized tests
TYPES OF INTELLIGENCE TESTS
• Verbal Intelligence- ability to analyze information and solve
problems using
language-based reasoning.
• Non-verbal Intelligence- ability to analyze information and
solve problems using visual, or hands-on reasoning. In
other words, it is the ability to make sense of and act on
the world without necessarily using words.
• Performance based intelligence- a score resulting from a test
that assesses your child's mental capacity in dealing with
nonverbal skills. Requires actual physical handling of
Stanford-Binet Scale
• The Stanford-Binet test is a examination meant to gauge intelligence through five factors of
cognitive ability.
• Fluid reasoning, knowledge, quantitative reasoning, visual-spatial processing and working memory.
Wechsler Scales
• Introduced in 1955
• Developed to address weaknesses in Stanford-Binet
• There have been four different versions of the WAIS over the years. These include:
• WAIS (1955); WAIS-R (1981); WAIS-III (1997) and WAIS-IV (2008)
• Scores provided on Perceptual Reasoning, Processing Speed, Verbal Comprehension, and
Working Memory
Types of
tests
Individual and group tests
- Individual- administered 1 individual at a time;
can be oral, written or performance-based;
involves rapport-building e.g. Stanford Binet,
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale
- Group test- administered in groups, no rapport
building involved, economical, less time
consuming, usually multiple choice questions
e.g. Army alpha, Army beta, Raven
Progressive Matrices
Types of tests
Verbal, Nonverbal, Performance
Verbal- requires verbal responses either orally or in written form; can be
administered to literates only, may have cultural bias. E.g. Stanford Binet
Intelligence Scale, Verbal group test
Nonverbal- Has pictures or illustrations as test items; reduces cultural bias to
some extent as compared to verbal tests e.g. Ravens progressive matrices-
series of pictures and participant is asked to choose from images to complete the
pattern.
Performance test- requires students to manipulate objects to perform the test;
written language not necessary; reduces cultural biases; administered to
people from diverse cultural groups; e.g Bhatia’s battery performance test of
intelligence
PATTERN
BLOCK DESIGN
DRAWING
TEST
https://youtu.be/
EeNswK1yyxI
RAVEN’S SPM
https://youtu.be/xze_9ION-
4I
PASS-ALONG
TEST
https://youtu.be/
kmOJCkfML7U
IQ RANGE
120and
140 above –--superior
- 139 very superior
110 – 119 -- above average/bright
average
90 – 109
-- average
80 – 89
--below average/ low average
70 – 79
-- borderline defective
69 and below --mentally defective/
retarded
IQ TESTS
ADVANTAGES DISADVANTAGES
• It is a way to identify • Challenging to design an
individuals who are “gifted.” independent test.
• Offers valuable diagnostic • It can lead to the use of labels.
insights.
• Does not measure all forms of
• Identify Individuals who are at- intelligence.
risk
• Provide a ‘snapshot’ of a child’s
• Can provide unique and important responses at the time of taking
information about a young child’s the test
intellectual development
DO INTELLIGENCE TESTS PREDICT
VOCATIONAL SUCCESS?
• People who score high on IQ tests are more likely than those who score low
to end up in high-status jobs (Gottfredson, 2003b; Schmidt & Hunter, 2004).
• Because IQ tests measure school ability fairly well and school performance is
important in attaining certain occupations, this link between IQ scores and
job status makes sense.
• A meta-analysis of many studies found a correlation of .37 between IQ and
occupational status. correlation of .21 between IQ and income (Strenze,
2007).
• Intelligence fosters vocational success. However, the strength of the
relationship is modest.
ACTIVITY - INTELLIGENCE TEST
• A test of “g” is one is most likely to think of when they hear Intelligence Test.
• The images available in the below link is an example of what one would see on a
test of g.
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_Fair_Intelligence_Test#mediaviewer/
Datei:R aven_Matrix.svg
• (1). What are they measuring? and (2). What that tells us about intelligence?
Please find more details culture fair test in this link
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_Fair_Intelligence_Test#mediaviewer/Datei:Raven-
Matrices_a11
.jpg
ARE IQ TESTS WIDELY USED
IN OTHER
• Western cultures CULTURES?
with European roots the answer is
yes.
• Non -Western cultures, the answer is only very little.
• One reason is that some cultures have different
conceptions of what intelligence is, and value
different mental skills (Niu & Brass, 2011; Sternberg,
2007).
• Western IQ tests do not translate well into the
language and cognitive frameworks of many non-
Thank you
