Marieke van Leeuwen
Background: What psychologists mean by intelligence and biological factors that could affect it
Key Study: Van Leeuwen et al. (2008)
Strategy: Assessing intelligence
Key Study: Van Leeuwen et al. (2008)
Strategy: Assessing intelligence
Background: Definitions of Intelligence: Intelligence as a cognitive skill
Spearman categorised these skills into two types:
Background: Definitions of Intelligence: Whole of human cognition
It is now widely recognised that intelligence is more than simply someone’s ability to memorise tests or solve maths problems. Sternberg (1985) in his theory of successful intelligence identified three types of intelligence:
Background: Definitions of Intelligence: Multiple intelligences
Gardner (1983) referred to a range of literature and drew up seven intelligences.
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Gender
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Genetics
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Environment
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Stress
- Spearman (1904) stated that if a person could demonstrate different cognitive skills (e.g. maths ability, reading, writing) then they could be considered intelligent.
- Raymond and Cattell (1942) actually identified over 100 different abilities that could be considered as cognitive skills.
Spearman categorised these skills into two types:
- Fluid intelligence – your innate, biological level of intelligence that you were born with. You use this intelligence when you come across new situations (e.g. learning how to drive).
- Crystallised intelligence – which is intelligence we use when we can draw upon past experiences to solve problems (e.g. use your general knowledge in a pub quiz).
- Horn (1967) found that young adults had higher fluid intelligence and lower crystallised intelligence, while older adults had lower fluid intelligence and higher crystallised intelligence.
Background: Definitions of Intelligence: Whole of human cognition
It is now widely recognised that intelligence is more than simply someone’s ability to memorise tests or solve maths problems. Sternberg (1985) in his theory of successful intelligence identified three types of intelligence:
- Analytical intelligence – skills of analysing and judging (e.g. planning to design a lamp).
- Practical intelligence – applying these skills to a real-life context (e.g. making the lamp).
- Creative intelligence – using cognitive skills to solve new problems that you are unprepared for (e.g. using a new design for the lamp because there were not enough materials).
- In addition to this, Gardner also identified personal or emotional intelligence.
- This is your ability to understand the feelings and emotions of both yourself (INTRA-personal intelligence) and of other people (INTER-personal intelligence).
Background: Definitions of Intelligence: Multiple intelligences
Gardner (1983) referred to a range of literature and drew up seven intelligences.
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Gender
- Research has shown that there are differences in males and females.
- Males tend to have thicker white matter fibres in the brain which allows for better spatial intelligence.
- Females tend to have thinner white matter fibres but more of them, which allows for better verbal skills.
- Overall, males and females have the same level of intellectual performance but this is achieved through the use of different parts of the brain.
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Genetics
- Can intelligence be passed down from your parents through genetic inheritance?
- It is controversial to claim that some people are born more intelligent than others. However, researchers such as Leeuwen et al. (2007) have found that between 25 and 50% of genes can contribute to intelligence.
- Deary (2011) states although no one gene can cause intelligence, small variations in many genes can add up to a larger difference overall.
- Some cognitive skills tend to be affected by genetic inheritance more easily (e.g. verbal and organisational skills) while others are largely not affected by genes (e.g. memory).
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Environment
- Nutrition can have a significant effect on intelligence.
- Lucas et al. (1998) found that premature babies developed higher cognitive skills at 7 or 8 after being breastfed compared to babies who were not breastfed.
- Schoenthaler et al. (1991) found that children who lacked a healthy diet but took vitamin pills scored on average 15 IQ points higher than those who didn’t take the pills (although this was only on non-verbal tests).
- On the other hand, toxic substances like cannabis can reduce the intelligence of children aged 6 if their mothers smoked one or more cigarette of cannabis during the first three months of pregnancy (Goldschmidt et al. 2008).
- Other factors associated with cannabis can also have affected the intelligence – social factors such as low income or poor nutrition could also have affected the intelligence in Goldschmidt's study.
Background: Biological factors that can affect intelligence: Stress
- Stress can have an impact on intelligence.
- Glover (2009) found that mothers who had suffered from a high degree of stress had more cortisol in their body.
- This cortisol, which is normally broken down, can enter the amniotic fluid when the mother is pregnant. The cortisol could have an effect on the development of the baby’s IQ (in particular verbal and linguistic development).
- King et al. (2008) found that mothers who reported a high degree of stress when they were pregnant (caused by a natural disaster) gave birth to children who were on average 15 IQ points lower on a test when compared to non-stressed mothers.
Aim = to investigate identical twins (who share 100% of genetic material) and non-identical twins and other siblings (who share 50% of genetic material) as well as parents (who share 50% of genetic material with their children).
Sample
112 families who were screened for mental illness and materials like pacemakers (which affect scans) volunteered. This was made up of:
Procedure
Results
Conclusions
Sample
112 families who were screened for mental illness and materials like pacemakers (which affect scans) volunteered. This was made up of:
- families with identical male twins (23)
- identical female twins (25)
- non-identical male twins (23)
- non-identical female twins (21)
- non-identical wins of different genders (20)
Procedure
- Children and adults both completed cognitive tests to assess their intelligence.
- Families arrived at a research lab and were tested over five hours.
- Adults (parents) completed Raven’s advanced progressive matrices.
Children completed Raven’s standard progressive matrices. - The difficulty of each question was controlled for by a model that predicted how likely it is that the participant would get the question correct based on their ability.
Results
- There was a higher correlation of results between the identical twins than any of the other participants (non-identical twins, siblings and parents).
- There was also a high correlation between parents, which suggests that the effect of genes on intelligence (the heritability) is 67% while the remaining 33% comes from environmental factors.
- However, low IQ scores were explained by the interaction of the environment on the genetic make-up.
Conclusions
- Individual genetic differences account for differences between the intelligence of people. However, other factors like the environment can have more of an impact on low IQ scores.
- Participants with high IQ are more genetically predisposed to seek out intellectually stimulating environments, while those with low IQ are more likely to seek out non-intellectual environments.
Application: Methods of assessing intelligence
An IQ test is the most common way of measuring intelligence.
Application: Examples of intelligence assessment
Application: Evaluating IQ tests
IQ tests can be evaluated in several ways:
An IQ test is the most common way of measuring intelligence.
- One of the first intelligence tests (the Stanford-Binet) assessed fluid (problem solving) and crystallised (knowledge and language) intelligence.
- A good IQ test should be standardised and should only be used on a target group of people, i.e. a child’s IQ test will not measure an adult’s IQ.
Application: Examples of intelligence assessment
- The most common IQ test used in psychology is the Wechsler intelligence scale which can either be used for adults or children.
- Sternberg, who earlier identified three types of intelligence (analytic, practical, creative), assesses these using the Sternberg Triarchic Abilities Test (STAT).
- Human drawing of figures can be used with young children, as intelligence can be measured based on how accurate the human looks (e.g. are the legs in proportion to the body?).
- Emotional intelligence can be assessed by questioning an individual about social problems and then seeing if that person gives an answer that correlates with the majority of other people.
Application: Evaluating IQ tests
IQ tests can be evaluated in several ways:
- The validity of an IQ test can be seen as low if there is a ‘ceiling’ or ‘floor’ effect. The ceiling effect is when too many of the participants score full points on an intelligence test and the floor effect is when too many participants score few or no points. Both effects make it hard to differentiate the intelligence of individuals.
- IQ tests should avoid cultural bias as tests created in one culture might not work in other cultures. Yerkes (1919) claimed that black Americans were less intelligent than white Americans. However, when looking at his test, it was clear that it only assessed white American culture.
- IQ tests can lack ethics, for example when trying to use an IQ test to move primary school students into selective schools (see the 11+).
- However, IQ tests are useful, e.g. they can help students identify what types of learning works best for them.
- Several different IQ tests can also help both reliability and concurrent validity
Discuss the extent to which research into intelligence can be considered reliable (15).
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Martha is concerned that her daughter is being treated unfairly at school, as she has been placed in bottom sets for all her subjects based on initial testing. She wants to further investigate whether this is the case, or whether her daughters initial test scores may be indicative of a different issue.
What advice might an educational psychologist give Martha about how she could go about further investigating this problem? (10)
What advice might an educational psychologist give Martha about how she could go about further investigating this problem? (10)
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