re: #185 Nyet

The main problem in the USA (since I cannot speak of the situation elsewhere) is the assumption by the right wingers and racists that IQ (which they say = intelligence) is predominantly determined by genetics, with the corollary being “some races are less intelligent than others, and we should just accept that.” The left wing meanwhile argues that IQ test scores also result from environmental and other non-genetic factors, and refute the RW argument that IQ (aka intelligence) is race-based. IQ scores are used as a kind of “proof” that certain genetics or certain environments are better than others, largely by people who have no background in psychology or even education, and who prefer to ignore the limitations of the tests.

Psychologists use IQ tests as diagnostic tools, and not necessarily as predictive measurements, AFAIK. They would not subscribe (I hope) to the simplistic argument that genetics determines IQ or that environment does, but would rather argue that “nature and nurture” are both involved in very complex ways, and it would be difficult to isolate one particular factor as a determiner of intelligence and/or a score on an IQ test.

Within American education, IQ tests at one time were used to track students, with high scorers tracked toward college prep and lower scorers tracked in vocational-technical curricula. Meanwhile, the typically lower scores among African-Americans were used as an excuse to keep them out of college prep classes, because educators believed in the predictive power of IQ tests and assumed such students would fail in college. Tracking was discarded by the 1970s, and nearly every student is now supposedly groomed for college — a policy I’m not sure I completely agree with — regardless of their IQ scores, though they may be divided into academic tracks (AP, honors, remedial and so on) that are as hard to break out of as the old college/vocational tracks were. And within those academic tracks, you will find relatively few African-American and Hispanic students assigned to AP and honors classes, because once again educators believe in the predictive power of intelligence testing.

IQ tests have been used as a bludgeon for decades to keep certain kinds of people — mostly PoC — away from other kinds of people — whites and to a lesser extent Asians — in classrooms. Further, those who want to keep the races separate and unequal, or want to justify unequal treatment of ethnic groups, or explain certain kinds of behavior by such groups use IQ test scores, as evidence for their claims.

The Bell Curve is the latest example of this extension of IQ tests from a psychological measurement to a broad determiner of public policy. Murray and his co-author do a credible job in the first half of the book explaining the scientific and statistical aspects of IQ tests, but then go off the rails into speculating how IQ scores determine a broad range of social, political and economic problems. The main conclusion is basically PoC will *always* score lower on IQ tests, therefore they are less intelligent, and therefore any (liberal) attempts to better their condition are doomed to fail. Needless to say, this conclusion sits very well among certain segments of the population who would like to justify their privileged positions.

So, yes, IQ tests are a useful diagnostic tool within psychology and provide doctors, families and schools with clues on how to raise and educate their kids. Past that point, their usefulness ends.