Gateway THEME Measuring intelligence
Gateway THEME Measuring intelligence
9781285519517, Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to Mind and Behavior with Concept Maps and Reviews, Thirteenth Edition, Coon/Mitterer – © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization.
Unlike other species, humans owe their success more to thinking abilities and intelligence than to physical strength or speed. That’s why our species is called Homo sapiens (from the Latin for man and wise). Our intelligence makes us highly adaptable creatures. We live in deserts, jungles, mountains, frenzied cities, placid retreats, and space stations.
Consider Stephen Hawking. He can’t walk or talk. When he was 13, Lou Gehrig’s disease began to slowly destroy nerve cells in his spinal cord, short-circuiting messages between his brain and muscles. Today, he is confined to a wheelchair and “speaks” by manually controlling a speech syn- thesizer. Yet, despite his severe disabilities, his brain is unaffected by the disease and remains fiercely active. He can still think. Stephen is a theoretical physicist and one of the best-known sci- entific minds of modern times. With courage and determination, he has used his intellect to advance our understanding of the universe.
What do we mean when we say that a person like Stephen Hawking is “smart” or “intelligent”? Can intelligence be measured? Can intelligence tests predict life success? What are the conse- quences of having extremely high or low intelligence? These questions and others concerning intelligence have fascinated psychologists for more than 100 years. Let’s see what has been learned and what issues are still debated.
Gateway QUESTIONS 9.1 How do psychologists define intelligence? 9.2 What are typical IQ tests like? 9.3 How do IQ scores relate to sex, age, and
occupation? 9.4 What does IQ tell us about genius?
9.5 What causes intellectual disability? 9.6 How do heredity and environment affect
intelligence? 9.7 Are there alternate views of intelligence? 9.8 Is there a downside to intelligence testing?
303
Intelligence
9781285519517, Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to Mind and Behavior with Concept Maps and Reviews, Thirteenth Edition, Coon/Mitterer – © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization.
Chapter 9304
Defining Intelligence— Intelligence Is … You Know, It’s …
Gateway Question 9.1: How do psychologists define intelligence? Like many important concepts in psychology, intelligence cannot be observed directly. Nevertheless, we feel certain it exists. Let’s compare two children:
When she was 14 months old, Anne wrote her own name. She taught her- self to read at age 2. At age 5, she astounded her kindergarten teacher by bringing an iPad to class—on which she was reading an encyclopedia. At 10, she breezed through an entire high school algebra course in 12 hours.
