Psychology of intelligence - Essay Example

Psychology Psychometric testing input into the development of social issues has produced a number of controversial findings that significantly differentiate people in their psychology. In the following paper I would like to emphasize on several points that relate to intelligence. The approaches to discussion will base on origins of the term as well as its meaningfulness among races and on a workplace. We define intelligence as refined information desired or used by the state to further its national goals or policies. Intelligence concerns the means by which such information is collected, the translation of that raw information through interpretation or analysis based in both technical exploitation and a more subjective "expertise," and the possible utilization of that refined information-- intelligence --by the policymaker. Intelligence may be collected overtly from a myriad of open sources. Success in this area is dependent on the "openness" of the society; yet it must also be noted that all societies will strive to protect essential elements of information deemed vital to their security. It is necessary, therefore, to collect information within closed societies or in contexts of denial and, as a consequence, to engage in clandestine activities to obtain the needed information. Although even aboveboard information must be interpreted and analyzed, we will focus more of our attention here on the less easily acquired "vital" information. If to speak about the differences in intelligences among races then it is needed to say that this suggestion has been made in frames of scientifical and psychological research in the area. In 1994 Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray The Bell Curve reignited debate over the role of genetic and environmental factors in explaining the black - white test score gap. Many Americans suspect that blacks perform poorly on standardized tests because of their social and economic disadvantages. But Beckwith (1999) argued that contemporary racial differences in socioeconomic status are not large enough to explain the gap. They also argued that social and economic inequalities are weak predictors of children's test scores and that apparent environmental effects may merely be proxies for genetic effects. Differences in intelligence between black and white people exist due to many historical and genetic factors. First it is needed to mention the contribution of parental education and income that a family has to contribute in child's education and development. It is not only prejudice to think that black people are poorer and smaller percentage of them is educated and well-promoted for mental abilities enrichment and advancement. Test score gab between white and black appears to be the result of family customs and traditions that were historically formed in white families where children were and are taught to earn with the help of their head rather then physical capacity. Although parents' education is fairly strongly related to children's test scores, it is found that eliminating the black-white gap in parents' years of schooling would not shrink the gap in children's test scores much because black and white parents now have very similar amounts of schooling. Compared with the education gap, the average black-white income gap is large. But eliminating the income gap might not do much to reduce the test score gap, either, because at least in one of our data sets, family income does not seem to be strongly related to children's test scores. If to look deeper into the factors that affect the test score gap between black and white then it is worth to mention much larger set of family environment indicators, including grandparents' educational attainment, mothers' household size, mothers' high school quality, mothers' perceived self-efficacy, children's birth weight (a proxy for prenatal environment), children's household size, and mothers' parenting practices. Blacks are much more disadvantaged than whites when ranked on this set of measures than when ranked on the measures of socioeconomic status considered by Herrnstein and Murray. It is found that racial inequalities on these measures account for more than half the test score gap between black and white five- and six-year-olds. If to add measures of mothers' cognitive skills, it can be accounted for about two-thirds of the gap. To the extent that current family environment measures are really proxies for children's genes, these reductions are too large. But if our statistical models omit other aspects of the environment that affect children's test scores and on which blacks are disadvantaged, and especially if they omit aspects of the environment that vary between but not within races, the environmental differences between blacks and whites may explain the entire test score gap. Genetic inheritance of intelligence is another area research in the current direction. It can only estimate to what extent the variance of one measurement, such as intelligence test scores, is correlated with the variance of another measurement, such as genetic differences, in a population of individuals. The heritability of a trait, for example, intelligence (as reflected by IQ), refers to the proportion of that variation that is associated with genetic differences among the individuals. Although behavior genetic researchers make strong claims for the validity of the (separated twin and adoption) research that they have used to estimate the heritability of intelligence, some of the core assumptions underlying such research have been seriously called into question. For example, according to some authors (e.g., Beckwith, 1999; Joseph, 1998), the equal environment assumption--namely that the environments of identical and fraternal twins are equal or even similar--is demonstrably false, whereas other critics (e.g., Layzer, 1999) seriously question the assumption that the variation of genetic and non-genetic factors contribute additively and independently to intelligence and, even if they do, that the heritability of IQ can be estimated from the extant data. As long as intelligence is a controversial issue there exists many opinions as for the certain separation of types of intelligence. For example, Sternberg's (1984) triarchic theory includes three types of intelligence --analytical, creative, and practical--all of which combine to make up what we call "intelligence." Gardner (1983) has postulated no fewer than six intelligences, including linguistic and musical intelligence, both of which are aural-auditory; logical-mathematical and spatial intelligence, which are visual; and bodily kinesthetic and personal intelligence. Although Gardner explicitly warns against the trap of reification when discussing intelligence, he offers the following general rule: "Intelligences should be thought of as entities at a certain level of generality, broader than highly specific computational mechanisms (like line detection) while narrower than the most general capacities like analysis, synthesis, or a sense of self (if any of these can be shown to exist apart from combinations of specific intelligences)" (p. 68, emphasis added). After numerous researches in the area of intelligence the simple conclusion would be to say that intelligence in its essence is a myth which can not be accurately defined by the science. It is a bunch of individual traits and qualities that differentiate people not dependently from their race, gender or genetic code. Bibliography: 1. BECKWITH, J. (1999). Simplicity and complexity: Is IQ ready for genetics Cahiers de Psychologie Cognitive, 18 (2), 161-169. 2. GARDNER, H. (1983). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books. 3. LAYZER, D. (1999). Comment on "Misconceptions of Biometrical IQists" by C. Capron et al. Cahiers de Psychologie Cognitive, 18 (2), 214-216. 4. STERNBERG, R. J. (1984). Toward a triarchic theory of human intelligence. Behavior and Brain Sciences, 2, 269-315. Read More