Intelligence Psyc 1104 Notes PDF

Psyc 1104 Intelligence notes: Learning objective 1: What Do We Mean By Intelligence- Intelligence: The ability to learn, to meet the demands of the environment effectively (And to understand and control one’s mental activities. AKA metacognition) ​ Metacognition: The ability to understand and co...

Psyc 1104 Intelligence notes: Learning objective 1: What Do We Mean By Intelligence- Intelligence: The ability to learn, to meet the demands of the environment effectively (And to understand and control one’s mental activities. AKA metacognition) ​ Metacognition: The ability to understand and control one’s mental activity ○​ Ability to think about one's own thinking. ○​ Know Thyself - Socrates ○​ Ie studying is a way of meeting the demands of the academic environment, while knowing when you have studied enough and are ready for a test. ​ This definition does not include the wide variety of notions about what intelligence is. Is intelligence general or specific? Spearman and the g Factor: ​ Factor analysis: a statistical method for determining whether certain items on a test correlate highly, thus forming a unified set, or cluster, of items. ○​ Ie, people who do well on vocabulary tests also tend to do well on other verbal items such as reading comprehension. (verbal reasoning cluster) ○​ Other clusters include logical, spatial, mechanical reasoning abilities ○​ He said that a bright child tends to score higher in all aspects of intelligence than a dull one. ​ G factor: a theoretical general factor of intelligence underlying all distinct clusters of mental ability; part of Spearman’s two-factor theory of intelligence ​ S factor:. A theoretical specific factor uniquely tied to a distinct mental ability or area of functioning; part of Spearman’s two-factor theory of intelligence ​ Example of two-factor view of intelligence: Sheldon Cooper. ○​ He’s super smart and knowledgeable but cannot drive a car or understand how to make a friend. ○​ He speaks many languages, plays many instruments and knows flags and other topics very well. ○​ G-factor is not merely book learning, a narrow academic skill, or test taking smarts. It is the capability of understanding our surroundings. Other birds and primates may also have a g factor. Thurstone and Primary Mental Abilities: ​ Primary mental abilities: seven distinct mental abilities identified by Thurstone as the basic components of intelligence. (See table below) ​ Idea of the g factor was controversial so he developed primary mental abilities instead. ​ Because of variation from person to person, he said the abilities were distinct and not a result of general underlying intelligence. Abilities are also not related.  ​ A reevaluation of Thurstone's ideas proved that people who scored high in one mental ability also had tendencies to score high in others so he did not entirely dispel the g factor Current Multifactor Theories of Intelligence: ​ Most psychologists today put more emphasis on s factors ​ Three big theorists: Howard Gardner, Robert Sternberg, and Stephen Cei Howard Gardner: Theory of Multiple Intelligences ​ Theory of multiple intelligences: Theory that there is no single, unified intelligence, but instead, several independent intelligences arising from different portions of the brain. ○​ Supported this by saying that damage to specific areas of the brain does not always lead to universal collapse of mental functioning. ​ Savant syndrome - people with various developmental disorders but have incredible talent and abilities. (ie, autism) ○​ Score low on traditional tests but have startling ability in other areas. ○​ Ie, Stephen Witshire paints detailed cities after viewing them from a helicopter for the first time for only 45 minutes. ○​ Roots from Thurstone’s ideas but also different because: 1.​ Thurstone held that mental functions he identified collectively constitute intelligence, not that each factor is an intelligence in and of itself. 2.​ Gardner believes that various intelligences are best measured in the contexts in which they occur. (it is easier to tap into intelligence in real world settings where it is more useful than writing a test. 3.​ Gardner’s definition of multiple intelligence includes a cultural component: each intelligence reflects the ability to solve problems or create products that are valuable in one or more cultural settings.  ​ Gardner’s model is called the modular model because the various intelligences are thought to emanate from different areas or modules of the brain. Type of Intelligence Characteristics Possible Vocations Linguistic Sensitivity to the sounds and Author, journalist, teacher, meaning of words blogger Logical/mathematical Capacity for scientific Scientist, engineer, analysis and logical and mathematician, video game mathematical problem developer solving Musical Sensitivity to sounds and Musician, composer, singer rhythm; capacity for musical expression Spatial Ability to accurately perceive Architect, navigator, sculptor, spatial relationships athlete Bodily/kinesthetic Ability to control body Athlete, dancer, surgeon movements and manipulate objects Interpersonal Sensitivity to the emotions Manager, therapist, teacher, and motivations of others; Twitter influencer skillful at managing others Intrapersonal Ability to understand one’s Leader, or freelancer, in many self and one’s strengths and fields weaknesses Naturalistic Ability to understand patterns Biologist, naturalist, and processes in nature ecologist, farmer Existentialist Ability to understand Philosopher, religious religious and spiritual ideals scholars ​ Limited research supporting the existence of the specific types of intelligence ​ Studies demonstrating the different intelligences being consistently and distinctly measured have yet to arise. ​ Not all human abilities have to be called intelligence. Robert Sternberg: Triarchic Theory of Intelligence ​ Triarchic theory of intelligence: Sternberg’s theory that intelligence is made up of three interacting components: internal, external and experiential components Internal (analytic) - internal processing of information. Planning, monitoring, problem solving, instruction following. Most measured by modern intelligence tests. External (creative) - more creative thinking. Knowing your way around a foreign country without speaking the language. Must involve interaction with the internal component to bring successful results. Experiential (practical) - adapt to improve the environment or select new environments. ​ If you have new neighbors who make a lot of noise at night you might start by trying to move to a different room (adapting to environment) or move to another house eventually because (selecting new environment) ​ Practical intelligence relies on tacit knowledge. (AKA action oriented knowledge and is acquired from others which allows individuals to achieve goals they personally value) ○​ Related to job success. ​ Interactions between the three are key to achieving successful intelligence. (advantageous balance between adapting to, shaping and selecting problems encountered in the environment.) Stephen Ceci: Bioecological Theory of Intelligence: ​ Bioecological model of intelligence: Ceci’s theory that intelligence is a function of the interactions among innate potential abilities, environmental context, and internal motivation. ○​ Resource pools (biological factors) fuel people’s innate abilities. Each pool is independent and responsible for different aspects of information processing abilities. ○​ Abilities depend more or less on how people interact with the environment. ​ If a girl is good at math and her parents are supportive, they may take actions to get her into a field that furthers her abilities, but if her parent’s claim that “girls can’t do math” then she may gradually lose interest and the potential is lost. ​ Individuals must be internally motivated to fulfill their potential and take advantage of their environments (Ayaan being an idiot) Most people today believe intelligence includes the g factor. (an overriding intellectual ability) Learning objective 2: How do We Measure Intelligence: ​ Psychometric approach: an approach to defining intelligence that attempts to measure intelligence with carefully constructed psychological tests. Intelligence Test Construction and Interpretation: ​ Usually compare one person's scores with another but we never know for certain what a person’s intelligence is. ​ Tests must function the same in different groups of people so scores don’t vary just because of ethnicity, etc. ​ To ensure tests are grounded in scientific principles, tests adhere to three basic principles: reliability, validity and standardization. Reliability: ​ Reliability: The degree to which a test produces the same scores over time. ○​ Test-retest reliability: administer a test and then a second test and if the scores agree for each individual, they are said to correlate highly and the test is reliable. ○​ Split-half reliability: divide items on the tests and see whether each individual's scores on the two halves correlate. ​ The higher the correlation the more reliable the test is. The tests must produce similar results when administered to the same people within a short period of time. ○​ Correlation vary between +1.00 to -1.00 Validity: ​ Validity: the extent to which a test accurately measures or predicts what it is supposed to measure or predict ​ Test is not automatically valid because it is reliable. ○​ If we use a broken scale and it gives us the same answer, the answer is reliable but not valid. ​ Content validity: the degree to which the content of a test accurately represents what the test is intended to measure. ○​ You cannot use a Chinese test to assess a student’s mastery of French. ​ Validity coefficient: a correlation that measures validity by correlating a test score with some external criterion. ○​ If we think intelligent people will do better at school then we expect that their intelligence test scores correlates with their school grades. If this is true, the coefficient is higher and the test is considered more valid. ​ Predictive validity: the extent to which scores on a particular test successfully predict future performance on a measure related to the test. ○​ Test scores from middle school predict grades for high school. Standardization: ​ If only one person took an intelligence test the result would mean very little. ​ The group of people tested on is called a sample. ​ Standardization: the use of uniform procedures in administering and scoring a test.  ​ Normal distribution: a symmetrical, bell shaped distribution in which most scores are in the middle, with smaller groups of equal size at either end. (normal curve) ○​ The middle is called standard deviation of the mean ​ Represents 68% of the population ○​ The sides have a small number of people with higher scores and the opposite side has an equally small number of people with lower scores. (They fall either below or above 2 standard deviations from the mean of 100 and represent only 5% of the population. It is often called a bell curve. ○​ Median: the score exactly in the middle of a distribution ○​ Mean: the average score in a distribution ○​ Mode: the score that occurs most frequently in a distribution History Of Intelligence testing: ​ Francis Galron and Alfred Binet ​ Lewis Terman and David Weschsler Alfred Binet and Binet-Simon Test: ​ Minister of Public Instruction in Paris wanted to devise a way to distinguish students who did more poorly in school due to behavioral problems from those with intellectual disabilities ​ Put intellectually disabled children in special classes. ​ He viewed intelligence to be the “ability to demonstrate memory, judgement, reasoning and social comprehension.” ​ Focussed largely on language abilities ​ Mental age: the intellectual age at which a person is functioning as opposed to chronological age. ​ Does not measure inborn intelligence but the likelihood of doing well in school ​ Did not use this to rank children because he believed intelligence was too complex to draw conclusions to the relative intelligence among most children. Galton and “psychophysical performance:” ​ Believed that by understanding intelligence he could learn more about evolution of human species and the inheritance of intelligence in particular. ​ Theory of psychophysical performance: ○​ People with more energy can perform more work and are therefore develop greater intelligence ○​ Individuals who have more highly developed senses can take in more information ​ Cattel: 50 psychophysical tests to see if they would support these ideas and tested skills like how fast someone could move their arm over a specified distance or how many letters in a series they can remember. ○​ Eventually came to the conclusion to discredit Galton’s notions by supporting the idea that there is more than one general form of intelligence.  ○​ His student (Clark Wissler) also hypothesized that people would perform consistently well or consistently poorly across the various psychophysical tests and the ones who did consistently well would display higher levels of intelligence. ​ The tests didn’t correlate with each other or the academic performance. He used the correlation coefficients, so Galton’s own statistical tool was used to challenge and refute his theory. (You dare use my own spells against me Potter?) Lewis Terman and the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Test: ​ Realized that some test items developed for French children needed to change to better assess the intelligence of children in the US. (ie age norms not reflect ○​ Important recognition of the influence of culture in intelligence testing. ​ Stanford-Binet Test: ○​ Tests result not in mental age but in terms of chronological age. ○​ Intelligence Quotient (IQ): Terman’s measure of intelligence; the ratio of a child’s mental age to her chronological age multiplied by 100 ​ Eugenics movement: Humans can improve through selective breeding. ​ Tested immigrants to see if they should be allowed into the country and army recruits. A perfect example of how no scientific thinking like prejudice and racism influences scientific thinking and political decision making. David Wechsler and the WAIS: ​ Sent to administer and score the Stanford-Binet and other tests and recognized to key problems: 1)​ The distinction between mental and chronological age becomes less informative when testing adults. a)​ There is a considerable difference in 8yo and 13yo but there is less difference between a 30yo and 35yo. 2)​ J ​ Wechsler Adult Intelligence scale (WAIS) and Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC) WAIS: Verbal comprehension: ​ Vocabulary: test ability to define increasingly difficult words ○​ What does repudiate mean? ​ Similarities: Asks in what way certain objects or concepts are similar; measures abstract thinking ○​ How are calculators and a typewriters alike? ​ Information: tags a general range of information ○​ On which continent is France?  ​ Comprehension: Tests understanding of social conventions and ability to evaluate past experience. ○​ Why do people need birth certificates Working memory: ​ Arithmetic: tests arithmetic reasoning through word problems. ○​ How many hours will it take to drive 150 km at 50 km an hour? ​ Digit span: Test attention and rote memory by orally presenting series of digits to be repeated forward or backward ○​ Repeat the following numbers backward: 2 4 3 5 1 8 6 7 ​ Letter-number sequence: tests attention, concentration, mental control. ○​ For each item repeat the numbers first in ascending order and then alphabetical order. Perceptual reasoning: ​ Block design: tests ability to perceive and analyze patterns by presenting designs that must be copied with blocks ○​ Assemble the blocks to match this design: *insert image* ​ Matrix reasoning: tests non-verbal abstract problem solving, inductive reasoning, and spatial reasoning. ○​ Which image goes in the empty box (see first image) ​ Visual puzzles: tests spatial reasoning ○​ Which three pieces go together to make this puzzle (see second image) ​ Picture completion: tests ability to quickly perceive visual details ○​ What’s missing in this picture? ​ Figure weights: tests quantitative and analogical reasoning. ○​ Which one of these goes to balance the scale? Processing Speed: ​ Coding: tests visual-motor coordination, motor and mental speed, and visual working memory ○​ Fill in the empty boxes with the shapes you see here. ​ Symbol search: tests visual perception/analysis, scanning speed ○​ For each set below, indicate whether the symbol in the black box is contained in the set of symbols to the right: (see third image) ​ Cancelation: Tests visual-perceptual speed ○​ When I say go, draw a red line through the red square and yellow triangle.  ​ Weschers tests differ from Binet because it was less dominated by verbal ability ○​ Take the test, and receive a score on each scale. Overall score associated with g factor. ○​ IQ - derived score from normal distribution (standardized) scores rather than a ratio. (He would compare individual scores to scores obtained over a large sample, then using normal distribution, would see how they differed (deviated) from the general estimated average. How well do intelligence tests predict performance? ​ Stanford-Binet and WAIS = high level of reliability and repeated tests correlate highly ​ Most scores today correlate with academic performance ​ IQ scores higher with the number of years of school people complete. ○​ It is used to do more though. It is of general mental ability. ○​ It is unclear how these tests relate to the other types of intelligence ​ Outside of the classroom, IQ is related to areas of functioning in life (such as occupational and social achievements, income, and health-related factors.) ○​ Tested children 11yo and followed their development, which showed that performance in an IQ test at a young age was related to better health factors, greater independence in old age and longer lifespans. ○​ IQ tests have some relevance beyond school ages, but these relationships are correlational. We do not know that higher intelligence actually caused any of these outcomes. Cultural bias and stereotypes in intelligence testing: ​ Different cultures have different ideas of what intelligence is. ○​ Western intelligence is logic, math skill, and verbal fluency. Not social behaviors or environmental awareness which are both important in Chinese culture. ​ Fluid vs crystalized intelligence: ○​ Fluid: dynamic problem solving independent of acquired knowledge. Ie, lateral thinking puzzle. Outside the box thinking, an example is winning video games. ○​ Crystalized: understanding of cultural values and pre-existing knowledge of a subject. Use acquired knowledge to solve a problem, and an example is remembering a formula for a math problem. ○​ Interaction of both: Minecraft. Combinations of basic controls is crystallized intelligence, and building of worlds and cities are an example of fluid intelligence. ○​ Independent: a bunch of people tried to improve below average IQ by playing video games and it suggested that simple games can improve both kinds of intelligence. ​ Sub-cultural difference: ○​ Intelligence tests are both international and existing in subcultures of society ○​ WAIS aimed to be unbiased and standardized but earlier versions had oversights.  ​ Middle Class Bias in early WAIS ○​ Problem solving questions were based on experiences of the middle class ○​ Middle class children had better learning opportunities and richer vocabularies which aligned to the test makers assumptions. ○​ All pictures o test participants were Caucasian until recently ​ Cultural bias in intelligence tests: ○​ Testers assumed all participants had experiences and knowledge required to ace the test ○​ White people had an advantage over black because of white privilege. ​ Teaching tool highlight bias: ○​ “You think you know the ghetto?” illustrates cultural bias in testing ○​ Cultural and historical aspects reflected in tests leading to questions about what is fair. ​ Most people have given up on the idea of completely unbiased tests. ​ Stereotype vulnerability or threat: a phenomenon in which people in a particular group perform poorly because they fear that their performance will conform to a negative stereotype associated with that group. ○​ Telling students they won’t do well on a test for race/gender can lower results. ○​ Asian women (women bad at math, Asian good at math) those who were told to focus on the Asian part performed better on the test. ○​ People are trying to make tests better (Ie WAIS trying to make it less culture-specific) and assessed fr item bias: two or more variables that give racial, gender, or cultural bias that may affect results. Is Human Intelligence increasing: ​ People taking WAIS today are taking a reconstructed version and have noticed the test scores rising. ○​ Flynn effect: the observation of IQ average rising over time. ○​ We don’t know why but we think: 1.​ There is something wrong with the basic procedures, content, or nature of standardization of intelligence tests. 2.​ Intelligence is changeable and people have a higher intelligence than they did in the past. (related to better education, nutrition, environments, reductions in childhood disease, or evolutionary shifts in genetic inheritance) 3.​ Some think that it is because we have better test-writing sophistication and test-taking motivation of today’s students. Learning Objective 3: Additional types of Intelligence: Emotional Intelligence: ​ Emotional Intelligence: an individual’s ability to perceive, express, assimilate, and regulate emotion in self and others. ○​ Self aware and sensitive to how they feel and how their feelings change in different situations. They are able to manage their emotions so they are nor overwhelmed by them. ○​ Very empathetic, know how to comfort and influence others through their emotional states. They often succeed in careers, as parents, marriages, and leaders ○​ Emotional intelligence positively affects their academic performance and they will stay in university after their second and third years. Social Intelligence: ​ They know how to charm their way out of situations, have lots of friends and can make friends easily. They know how to gain affection from others. ​ This notion is older than Emotional Intelligence. ​ Thorndike - the ability to understand and manage men and women, boys and girls- to act wisely in human relationships. Wisdom: ​ Often older people who have experience and insightful appreciation for the world ​ Experienced in the ways of the world ​ (Sterngerg’s model including abstract, critical and practical - the ability to apply one’s experience and learning to every day decisions - so it is mostly practical that fuels wisdom) ​ “Know-how” application of tactile knowledge ​ Requires the delicate art of balancing multiple perspectives ​ Age does not cause wisdom, time just tends to increase it (most of the time) Creativity: ​ Creativity: the ability to produce ideas that are both original and valuable ​ Reflects collective and personal values ​ It plays a role in technological, scientific and artistic advances (different cultures define and appreciate creativity differently) ○​ Requires verbal and mathematical skills in Western culture, and relies on ability to appreciate and interact with nature in other cultures ​ High intellectual aptitude is necessary but not sufficient for creativity. Those who score high on intelligence tests score high on creativity, but beyond a certain point the correlation diminishes ○​ Creative architects, musicians, scientists and engineers do not score higher on tests than their less creative colleagues. ○​ Thus there is more creativity than what intelligence tests can measure ​ Intrinsic motivation - an internal drive to create  ​ Imagination - an ability and willingness to reexamine problems in new ways ​ Game personality - tolerates ambiguity, risk, and initial failure ​ Other useful qualities: complex thinking, broad attention, expertise in relevant fields, broad interests, high energy, independence, and self-confidence ​ Divergent thinking ○​ Seeing how many different ways people can think about simple objects or events. (ie how many uses can you think of for a brick? The more uses you can come up with in under 2 minutes the higher the creativity score.) ​ Nurtured, inspired, and refined by environments ○​ Encourage people to be innovative, and are relatively free of criticism. They provide freedom, models, resources, and communities. Personality Characteristics: ​ Early observations: intelligence and personality are interconnected and intelligence test attempt to separate intellectual functioning from personality, but some theorists argued this division is artificial. Traits may be integral to intellectual functioning ​ Wechsler’s View: intelligence is a reflection of personality. Emotional, motivational, and personal traits are key to intelligence ​ Modern perspectives - intelligence = Cognitive aspect of personality, others say it’s a reciprocal relationship where intelligence, emotions, and motivation influence each other in daily life. ​ Effects of emotions and motivation on intelligence ○​ Negative emotion - can impair intellectual performance, especially in tasks that require attention and quick recall ○​ Positive traits - like self-efficacy (belief in one’s ability to master tasks) and high achievement motivation enhance performance (Freud and Holling, and Honicke and Broadbent) Learning Objective 4: How is Intelligence Influenced by Biological and Environmental Factors? The Bell Curve Controversy: ​ People argued that the author’s conclusions do not follow from data but rather from their personal beliefs. The conclusions include: ○​ IQ tests accurately measure intelligence ○​ IG is an important indicator of successes in life (ie school, work, parenting, income) and higher IQ predicts avoidance of welfare dependence and criminality ○​ Given the short correlations (that do not equal causation) people with higher IQs are said to be elites ○​ IQ is heritable and there are racial and ethnic differences in intelligence. It is likely but not certain that these differences are due to genetics Genetic Influences on Intelligence: ​ Genetic factors do still play a role in intelligence though  ​ Family studies: Identical twins have similar IQs than fraternal twins. Correlation of +.86 between intelligence tests of identical twins compared to the +0.6 of fraternal twins. ○​ Not PURELY genes. Parents treat identical twins more the same than fraternal ones. Identical twins who were raised apart from one another still have similar scores but it is less than genetics. ○​ Adopted children compared with their biological and adoptive parents: showed that biology and environment play an equal role in development of intelligence. (Adoptive parent child scored slightly higher) ​ Heritability: the amount of a given trait that can be attributed to inherited genetic factors. ○​ Used to explain differences in groups of people, not provide info about an individual. ​ Heritability coefficient: a correlation coefficient used to indicate the contribution of heredity to some characteristic, such a s intelligence ○​ 0.00 means there is no impact on variations observed among people and a +1.00 means heredity is the sole influence on the characteristic under investigation. ​ Ie, Huntington's disease has a heritability coefficient of +1.00 and genetics are 100% responsible for the inheritance of this disease. Environmental Influences on Intelligence: ​ If heritability of intelligence is 50% then aspects of the environment that an individual grows up in must influence development of their intelligence. Genes do not “decide” to act in isolation, or at all. ​ Family and home environment: parent’s childbearing methods and interactions with siblings and family members are part of the environment. ​ Cultural influences: people believe intelligence varies from culture to culture. (does not mean that people from a different part of the world are less intelligent) ○​ Values of society have powerful effects on intellectual skills. ​ Ie, inuit people’s knowledge about the environment of the Canadian North is becoming more and more valuable as we worry about climate change. ​ Parenting approaches can raise IQ ​