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After reading this article you will learn about Intelligence:- 1. Subject-Matter of Intelligence 2. Nature of Intelligence 3. Binet-Simon Intelligence Tests 4. Theories.
Subject-Matter of Intelligence:
Intelligence is akin to intellect, but is not identical with it. Intellect is the faculty of observing, remembering and thinking, as distinguished from feeling and willing. Intelligence is a way of acting, and helps the individual in reaching a goal. It is not an acquired ability but a native ability.
It is a shorthand symbol for the fact of behaving intelligently. Benet defines intelligence as the power of attention, of adaptation, and of self-criticism. Ebinghaus defines it as synthetic or combining ability. Thorndike defines it as the sum or average of all specific abilities.
Spearman defines it as a general central factor. Bridges defines it as the capacity to learn or acquire ideas, sentiments, and skills. Munn defines it’ as flexibility of versatility or adjustment. Terman emphasized capacity for abstract thinking, Colvin adjustment to environment, Dearborn capacity to learn, and so on, in intelligence.
There is much over-lapping among the characteristics stressed by different psychologists. Stern defines intelligence as a general mental adaptability to novel situations. Wells defines it as the power of recombining our behaviour patterns so as to act better in novel situations. Woodworth defines it as intellect put to use in solving a problem and reaching a goal. He regards it as a way of doing.
He mentions the following mark of intelligence:
Man is more intelligent than the dog. It means that man makes more use of his past experience. An intelligent man makes more use of his past experience to seek a goal. Utilizing past experience is a mark of intelligence.
Man can adapt himself to a novel situation more easily than the dog. An intelligent person can master a complex situation easily. But a less intelligent person breaks down in a new situation. Capacity to master a novel situation is a mark of intelligence. Intelligence consists in ‘seeing the point’ or finding out the essentials of a problem, or insight into the key of a situation is a mark of intelligence.
Man takes account of a broader situation in his action than the dog can fathom. A stupid person cannot take a broad view of a situation. His perspective is narrow. He follows a fixed routine in his actions. But an intelligent person takes a broad view of a situation and adapts his actions to it. Foresight is a sign of breadth of view which consists in seeing the whole situation as a pattern of interrelated parts.
Intelligence consists in acting in a given situation with use of past experience, with due regard to what is novel in a situation and to the whole situation rather than to some striking part of it. It contains insight into the key to the whole situation.
Intelligence depends upon the cerebral cortex. The increase in intelligence does not depend upon the large number of brain-cells in the cortex, but upon their larger size and greater complexity. Intelligence is congenital, and finds its expression in a congenial environment. But it cannot be acquired.
Intelligence is not intellect. Intelligence is the general power of adaptation or the capacity to learn or acquire complex ideas, emotions and sentiments, and motor skills. Intellect is the organisation of ideas or the sum-total of ideas. It is acquired while intelligence is innate. The Development of intellect depends upon innate intelligence and the influence of the environment.
Nature of Intelligence:
(i) Feeble-Mindedness:
Among normal persons some are deficient in intelligence. They cannot manage their own lives. Idiots are the most deficient in intelligence. Imbeciles are less deficient, and morons are least deficient in intelligence. The morons are more numerous than the idiots and imbeciles. These are mental defectives.
Idiots are the most defective in intelligence. The most deficient idiots cannot attend to their bodily needs. They cannot learn to eat or to drink. They cannot learn to wash or dress themselves. They cannot talk beyond a few monosyllables.
Idiots cannot avoid the common dangers of life. They cannot avoid a running motor car. They cannot avoid a fire or deep water. They are too stupid to avoid these common dangers. Their IQ is from 1 to 19.
Imbeciles are less defective than idiots. They are distinguished from idiots by the fact that they learn to avoid the common dangers of life. But they cannot learn to do much useful work. Some of them in the upper limit can learn to dress, wash and feed themselves. They can learn only the briefest and the simplest tasks under constant supervision. They cannot learn complex actions. Their IQ is from 20 to 39.
Morons are less defective in intelligence than imbeciles. They also differ from one another in intelligence. The least intelligent morons can hardly be distinguished from the highest imbeciles.
But morons can learn simple routine tasks without constant supervision. They can make beds, run errands, etc. Some high-grade morons can take care of animals, tend babies, operate a sewing machine, etc. Some of them have been trained to do some remunerative work. The morons cannot successfully cope with a novel situation or solve a complicated problem. Their IQ varies from 40 to 69.
Normal or average persons’ IQ varies from 90 to 109. Bright normal persons’ IQ varies from 110—119. Superior persons’ IQ varies from 120 to 129. Very superior persons’ IQ varies from 130 to 140. Geniuses’ IQ is above 140.
Dull normal persons’ IQ varies from 80 to 89. Dull person’s IQ varies from 70 to 79. Morons’ IQ varies from 40 to 69. Imbeciles’ IQ varies from 20 to 39. Idiots’ IQ varies from 0 to 19.
Idiots and Imbeciles are not abnormal. They would have been normal except for some early damage to the brain, as by birth injury. Morons are usually not pathological cases. They are the least intelligent among normal individuals.
Very superior persons are 2 ½ % of the population, superior persons, 6 ½ %, bright normal persons, 16%, normal persons, 50%, dull normal persons, 16%, morons, imbeciles and idiots, 2%.
(ii) Mental Age:
As the child grows older, his intelligence gradually increases. The rate of such growth is fairly constant in childhood under normal conditions. It goes on increasing with the increase, of age up-to the fourteenth or fifteenth year. It does not increase beyond that age.
Intelligence tests have been devised to measure the intelligence of children of different ages. There is a separate test suited to each age level. When a child of 10 years passes a test not higher than that suited to a child of 8 years, his mental age is said to be 8, though his actual or chronological age is 10.
Similarly, a child of 8 years may pass a test suited to a child of 10 years. In this case, his mental age is said to be 10, though his real age is 8. The first child is comparatively dull. The second is comparatively bright. The mental age of a normal child is the same as his actual or chronological age. For example, the normal eight year old child has the mental age of eight years.
(iii) Intelligence Quotient:
The intelligence of a child is described in terms of his intelligence quotient. It is determined by dividing his mental age by his chronological age. When the child has a mental age that corresponds with his actual age, his Intelligence Quotient, or in brief, I. Q. or IQ. is 1.00. If his mental age is 8, and actual age, is 10, his IQ is 8/10 = .80.
If his mental age is 10, and actual age is 8, his IQ, is 10/8 125. Generally, the decimal point is ommitted in expressing IQ’s and 1.00 is expressed as 100 and .80 expressed and 80, as 1∙25 expressed 125. Thus, the IQ is determined by dividing the mental age by the chronological age and multiplying it by 100. Thus—
IQ = M.A. /C. A. X 100
M. A. = Mental age. C. A. = Chronological age.
Intelligence cannot be determined by mental age alone. The mental age has to be related to the actual age. Intelligence is measured by IQ which is the ratio between the mental age and the actual age. The ratio remains fairly constant throughout life.
The IQ of the average individual is 100. It may be asserted definitely that intelligence does not develop beyond twenty. The level of intelligence remains the same from twenty to sixty.
Constancy of the IQ:
The mental age gradually increases with the chronological age up to 16 to 20. It does not increase beyond that age. The IQ of an individual remains constant throughout his life and declines in old age.
But this does n6t mean that his knowledge and skill will remain the same, because they depend upon innate intelligence, experience and learning. Two individuals of the same IQ may have different achievements because of their experience and learning.
The concept of constancy of the IQ is generally accepted. There may be a fluctuation up to 5—10 plus or minus points. When partial blindness or deafness is removed, IQ is found to increase, because the organism can better react to the conditions in the environment.
The Binet-Simon Intelligence Tests:
In France during the first decade of this century Alfred Binet devised certain mental tests with the assistance of Theodore, Simon, for measuring the intelligence of School going children, to determine le classes for which they were fit. These tests were revised by Terman, Kuhlmann and others. The following tests are suited to different ages:
3-year level: showing one’s nose, the eyes, and the mouth when asked by the examiner, repeating two figures, repeating a sentence of six syllables after the examiner, ability to give one’s surname, and numerating certain objects in a picture.
4-year level: naming a key, a penny, and a knife, repeating three figures, and distinguishing between the lengths of two lines.
6-year level: finding omissions in pictures of faces, from which me important sense-organs are cut out.
9-year level: giving the day of the week, the month, and the year, giving the names of the days of the week giving definitions of common objects, and retaining six different ideas from a passage read.
12-year level: correct interpretation of a picture showing an indicent.
14-year level: showing absurdity in a picture shown.
(i) Performance Tests:
Performance tests measure capacity to perceive and manipulate objects. They test capacity to do things. They do not make use of language.
(a) Form Board Test:
Various performance tests are devised, which use form boards. There are blocks of different shapes. And there are holes of different shapes in a board. Blocks of different shapes are to be fitted into the appropriate holes in the board. The time of performance is measured, and the errors committed are counted.
It is suited to children of younger ages, from four to ten. The child is simply asked to draw a man with pencil on paper. The test is scored not for its beauty but for the completeness and coherence of the drawing.
(b) Picture Completion Test:
Picture is shown with square holes cut out; the cut-out pieces also are presented mixed with the squares of the same size, which have irrelevant objects pictured on them. The child has to select, from the whole lot, the proper square pieces and fit them into the holes in the picture. The better is his understanding of the picture, the better is his selection.
(c) Maze Test:
A maze is drawn on paper with many blind alleys. The shortest path has to be traced with a pencil without straying into a promising blind alley. The maze has to be examined as a whole. It should not be attacked with an imperfect understanding of it.
In schools, the pupils having IQ’s between 70 and 85 are considered as very dull and very slow. Most of them are retarded in their school progress. Children with IQ’s between 70 and 85 drop out early in their school career. The IQ’s of average children range from 95 to 105. Children of superior intelligence have IQ’s ranging between 129 and 145. The IQ’s of geniuses range between 180 and 190.
(ii) Standardization:
The intelligence tests are standardized in a very painstaking way. If we want to determine whether an intern is a satisfactory test for the eight-year mental development, it must be passed by 75% of children exactly eight years old.
It must be passed by all children who are more than eight years old and it must be failed by 75% of children who are less than eight years old. Exactly eight years old children mean one month more or one month less than eight years. Each item for all year-levels is tested with a great amount of labour and thus standardized.
(iii) Group Tests:
These intelligence tests are given to a number of individuals at the same time. They economise time. Some persons do better in a group than alone under the direct eye of the examiner. School examinations are group achievement tests.
During the Great War group intelligence tests were devised to measure the intelligence of recruits in America in order to select soldiers and officers from among them. The Army Alpha was a test for those who could read English.
The Army Beta was intended for illiterates and foreigners. The Army Alpha contained arithmetical problems ranging in complexity from extremely simple to more complex ones, synonyms and antonyms to be distinguished, and the items of information.
These tests depended on the subject’s stock of knowledge previously acquired. The sub-tests called for alertness mental flexibility. In the army Beta there was practically no use of speech. There were picture completion tests among other tests.
Uses of Intelligence Tests:
Intelligence tests find their greatest use in classifying and grading pupils. Mentally deficient children of aments should be segregated from other children and sent to special schools. Backward or dull children should be trained more in manual skill than in abstract subjects.
They should be taught every subject in a concrete manner. Superior or bright children should be given special care and be allowed to advance at their own rate. Intelligence tests show that superior children are more often retarded than dull ones. They are above the average.
So the teachers do not care for them. By allowing the brighter pupils consistently to work below their mental levels, teachers induce habits of slothfulness in them. They should be taught an enriched curriculum.
Intelligence tests help us in having homogeneous groups. Pupils of approximately the same mental age are placed in the same grade. But this procedure is defective. It throws together young bright pupils and dull older pupils of the same metal age in the same grade, though their rates of progress and social maturity differ.
Pupils should, be graded according to their IQ,’s. Pupils of the same mental and chronological age should be put in the same grade. Intelligence tests can be used as a reliable method of examination for the award of scholarships at certain standards. They can also be employed for purposes of determining admissions.
Intelligence tests help us in the diagnosis of feeble-mindedness, superior intelligence, special abilities and disabilities of children, and maladjustments of an educational and social nature wherever found .For diagnostic purposes individual tests must be employed, since a close contact with the individuals is necessary in such cases.
Intelligence tests help us in forecasting the intellectual and vocational future of young persons. Intelligence is not the only condition of success. It is only one of the factors determining success.
Moral qualities industry, perseverance, self-confidence, steadfastness, the desire to excel is important conditions of success. Personality tests are required for vocational guidance. Vocational tests, a special form of intelligence tests, are still in their infancy.
Intelligence tests, whether individual, or group, or performance tests, measure the innate mental ability of a child, and thus determine his educable capacity. Ordinary oral and written examinations lay undue stress on knowledge rather than on powers.
Further, they are subjective in that the examiner has more than his due share in the assessment. Intelligence tests are objective in that the examiner does not count for much. The intelligence tests attempt to measure native ability, rather than acquired knowledge. Intelligence tests are used in the study of racial differences. But these alone cannot find out innate racial differences.
(a) Intelligence and Schooling:
The little children of 6 years and thereabout who join school are of all degrees of intelligence except the lowest. Some of them find school work easy and make rapid progress and skip grades. Others make slow progress and have to repeat grades. The bulk of the children are between these extremes of school progress.
There is rather a definite correlation between the child’s IQ and his ability to succeed in school. The correspondence between the intelligence and school achievement is specially close if each child is given an opportunity to advance at his own rate.
But the correspondence between intelligence and academic achievement is less close in the secondary than in the elementary school and still less close in college. The correlation between IQ and school work goes down from .75 in the first grade to .60 in the secondary school and to .50 in college.
The reason, is, in part, that the college group is so highly selected that moderate success in college work is within the ability of nearly all college students who will do the work and in part, that some students do not choose to work.
Their energies may not be released at this period of their lives, or if released may be directed into some other channel. Motives for academic achievement are necessary in addition to abilities or mental aptitudes. Moral qualities such as persistence of effort, confidence in one’s powers, force of character, ambition or desire to excell are necessary for success, besides intelligence.
(b) Intelligence and Conduct: Delinquency:
Delinquency or antisocial conduct of Children is due to maladjustment of their innate intelligence to the tasks allotted to them. If a bright child is given a dull task which is too easy for him, he performs it quickly, and misuses his spare time by indulging in exciting antisocial actions such as stealing mangoes in a neighbour’s garden, or destroying saplings and the like. He does not take any interest in the task assigned to him.
Again, more often if a dull child is given a difficult task which his intelligence cannot cope, with, he is rebuked by the teacher in school, and by the parents at home, fails in the examination, is detained in the same class, does not take any interest in the task allotted to him, and delights in antisocial adventures such as beating his class-fellows, pilfering their pens and pencils, smoking cigarettes, stealing money from home, etc.
They gradually become pick-pockets and thieves. Delinquency is also due to emotional conflicts, generated by a bad environment at home and in the neighbourhood. If there are constant quarrels between the members of the family, drinking liquor, lying, cheating, flattery, insults, unrest, disquiet, violent passions, etc., the children imbibe them unconsciously, and lapse into delinquent habits.
If the home atmosphere is good, but the neighbours are drunkards, swindlers, thieves, robbers, etc., the children easily go astray and become delinquent. Delinquency is due to a ‘complex’ due to repression. The children, who are ill- treated by the step-mother, develop a ‘step-motherly complex’, do not find any interest in the drudgery at home, and indulge in antisocial conduct.
Delinquents are often found among children of lower occupational groups and of uneducated and uncultured families. That there is a positive correlation between low intelligence and delinquency is the obvious conclusion. But the relation between them has not been settled. Delinquency is often due to a bad environment and emotional conflicts.
(iv) Achievement Tests:
Achievement is actual ability acquired by an individual by the exercise of his powers. Capacity is potential ability which can be developed into actual ability by certain individuals under favourable conditions. It can be inferred from their superior achievements under equal conditions of training and experience.
Aptitude is achievement in future which can be predicted by specially devised tests. Achievement tests are different from tests of abilities and aptitudes.
Examination in different subjects held in schools is achievement tests. They show how much knowledge the subject has acquired in these subjects. Practical examinations show how much skill he has acquired in making experiments or practising arts.
Achievement tests measure the knowledge and skill acquired by the subject in different branches of learning. The test items in them are drawn from the subject-matter taught in the schools. They test the special knowledge acquired from books.
Achievement tests cannot serve the purpose of intelligence tests for several reasons. First, they are limited to school work only; they test the knowledge acquired from books taught in the schools. They do not test the general knowledge picked up by the subject from the environment outside of school.
Secondly they would give an undue advantage to the bookish child. Thirdly, they would underestimate the ability of the bright child who is not taught an enriched curriculum suited to his greater intelligence in the school. Intelligence tests are intended to measure the general knowledge of the child acquired from the environment.
They measure the innate intelligence of the subject—his innate ability to comprehend and master a novel situation in the light of his past experience and with a wide outlook.
(v) Intelligence and Occupation:
In any occupation all the persons are not genuises. In every occupation there are some intelligent persons. But different occupational groups have been found to possess different degrees of intelligence within certain limits.
Accountants, teachers and persons of professional occupations have been found to possess the highest average intelligence. Farmers and labourers have been found to have the lowest average intelligence, with a few exceptions.
Clerks, salesmen, mechanists, electricians, bricklayers carpenters, and miners have been found to possess intermediate degrees of average intelligence between accountants and farmers,—intelligence being less and less.
(vi) Intelligence, Heredity and Environment:
Intelligence is an innate or inherited capacity. But it finds an expression in a good environment. In an unfavourable environment it does not get an opportunity for adequate expression. A child with a rural environment gets a more stimulating environment in a town, and gets a better opportunity for the expression of his intelligence. The development of intelligence of one of the twins is due to the environment.
The development of intelligence of one of the two children of the same age, of the same family, in the same environment, is due to heredity. The development of intelligence may be due to both heredity and environment in some cases. How much development is due to heredity, or to environment, or to their interaction cannot be precisely determined.
Correlation of Special Abilities with General Ability:
Binet-Simon tests and other performance tests are devised to measure general intelligence. Other tests have been devised to measure special abilities.
The same group of persons may be tested as to two special abilities. If we desire to determine the degree in which two traits are likely to go together in individuals, we can measure the relation and state it by the co-efficient of correlation.
For example, in order to determine the relation between intelligence and height, we may test a group of persons and arrange them in their order. If there were a positive correlation between intelligence and height, we would find that the tallest individual would be most intelligent, and the shortest individual would be least intelligent.
If this relation held, we would have a co-efficient of correlation of + 1.0. One the other hand, if height were inimical to intelligence, we should find that the shortest individual was most intelligent, and the tallest individual was least intelligent.
In such a case, we should have a co-efficient of — 1.0. If variations were as often inverse as direct, there would be no correlation at all, i.e., it would be 0. If there were direct variations between them with but a few exceptions, there would be a high positive correlation expressed by a figure like +.9. But if the exceptions were many, there would be a low positive correlation such as +.5.
Spearman holds that every human ability consists of two factors, viz., a general ability of and a special ability or s. The presence of some correlation between different special abilities is an indirect proof of the existence of a general ability or g. The relation between a general ability or g and a special ability or s2 or s2 can be determined by the co-efficient of correlation.
Theories of Intelligence:
(i) Monarchic Theory:
Spearman divides theories of intelligence into four groups. According to the uni factor theory, intelligence is one all-pervading mental power an “inborn all-round mental efficiency” (Burt), or “general adaptability to the new problem and conditions of life” (Stern). Intelligence is a central intellectual fact which rules all mental activities. Spearman calls this theory the monarchic doctrine.
IT this view is correct, we can infer that if a person performs one intellectual task well, he will do others equally well. But this is contrary to facts. Further, in order to measure intelligence in practice we split it up. The doctrine does not give any clear idea of what intelligence, is, and constitutes a very uncertain intellectual basis for mental testing.
(ii) Oligarchic Theory:
According to this doctrine, intelligence consists not of one, but a few great powers, each of which requires separate measurement, yielding a mental profile of an individual. Intelligence is not a single faculty. It consists of a few major faculties, functioning independently of one another and capable of being measured by a single value.
Binet holds that intelligence is a sum of different faculties such as the comprehending of a problem, directing the mind to its solution, maintaining attention to it, the ability to adapt the mind to a novel situation, and the capacity for auto-criticism. This theory is a group factor theory. It regards intelligence as a group of major abilities.
This theory believes in faculty psychology which is false. It contradicts the unity of the mind. The faculties may not function independently of one another. Each faculty may not be capable of being measured by a single value.
(iii) Anarchic Theory:
According to this doctrine, intelligence is a sum of many abilities which are independent of one another. Intelligence is not a sum of a few major faculties alone, but a sum of all abilities functioning apart from one another. A person’s general intelligence is the average of his several abilities and measured by sampling.
Thorndike regards intelligence as representing the whole lot of innate mental abilities. These traits, though different, are related to one another in varying degrees.
If a person possess a large measure of one good quality, it is probable that he will possess more than the average of any other good quality. Thompson holds that the mind of each person is a sample group of qualities. The theories of Thorndike and Thompson are multifactor theories of intelligence.
Thompson’s sampling theory of ability finds support in the current practice of mental testing. It is generally agreed that a miscellany of tests, varying in character, is required for the measurement of intelligence. But this does not prove that the sampling theory is true. How can we decide which abilities should constitute the sample? Ought memory to be included? or motor ability?
Then, again, are all the constituents of the sample equally important? If not, taking an average cannot be a valid method of testing intelligence. We cannot be certain that in out sample we have no abilities overlapping or repeating one another.
If we have, such abilities would weight too much in the average. Further, if the abilities are really independent of one another, an average is meaningless. Quantities whose average is taken must be different varieties of the same thing. We cannot take an average for a person’s height and weight which are quite different from each other. There is known principle of sampling.
(iv) Two Factor Theory:
According to Spearman, intelligence consists of two factors, viz., a general ability or g and a special ability or s. The general ability comes in to play in a great variety of performances. A special ability comes into play in any particular performance.
There are many special abilities, s 1, s2, s3, etc. They are verbal ability; ability to deal with numbers; ability to deal with spatial relations; ability to deal with mechanical relations; ability in music; ability to work rapidly, etc. All these special abilities presuppose a general ability without which they cannot function.
The general factor remains the same for any one individual in respect of all his correlated abilities. But a specific factor varies in the same individual from one ability to another.
The general factor, g, varies from one individual to another, but is constant for any one individual in all his scores, while the specific factor, s, varies from one individual to another, and in any one individual varies also from one test to another A person’s score, then consists of two parts, one proportional to the. ‘general factor’, and the other proportional to his ‘specific factor’, in that particular ability.
Any mental test, then, measures g, and one s, some measuring g predominantly, others an s predominantly. It follows that we can infer, to a certain extent, a person’s ability in one direction from his ability in some other direction, the amount depending on how much g is involved in both.
Spearman’s theory seems to incorporate the truths, of the other theories. The monarchic theory is true, if ‘the central intellective factor’ is regarded as g. The anarchic theory holds good of the specific factors which are independent of one another.
The oligarchic theory is true to the extent that ‘faculties’ distinct from the universal factor, and fairly distinct from the specific factors, are revealed in the broad group factors. Spearman identifies f with ‘mental-energy’ He refuses to identify it with ‘intelligence’ as an ordinary person understands it. It has much to do with intellectual performances of all sorts. This view appears to be sound.