Intelligence: What Is It?

Author : Sharon White
Standardized meaning of intelligence is a property of mind that encompasses many related mental abilities, such as the capacities to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend ideas and language, and learn.
In defining intelligence, there has always been the question of
whether intelligence is measured as a remarkable occurrence or if it
has many variables that are combined. For example, is it how "smart" a
person is? Or is it their ability to perform well on standardized
tests? Are they measuring a person's intelligence? Or just some
arbitrary quantity of the person's IQ? Or is it a mixture of survival,
mathematical, social and other abilities. There are many debates
regarding whether measuring intelligence is determined from test
scores and results, or if it is measured by the person's ability to
process and problem solve. Uses of intelligence testing in an
educational setting, intelligence and achievement tests are
administered routinely to assess individual accomplishment. They are
used to improve instruction and curriculum planning. High schools in
the United States use these tests to assist in the students future
educational planning and help decide what college or type of college
to attend while elementary schools utilize screening and testing
procedures to help determine readiness for writing and reading
placement.Intelligence can be measured, by intelligence tests, among them the
Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale and the Wechsler Scale. These tests
are intended to determine an individual's intelligence quotient (IQ).
Intelligence tests usually provide an estimate of global cognitive
functioning as well as information about functioning within more
specific domains. Intelligence tests are quite stable compared to
measures of other human traits. However, the degree of stability
increases with age such that early childhood and preschool measures of
intellectual function are far less predictive of later functioning
than assessments taken during middle childhood. The stability of
intelligence test scores may change as a function due to important
environmental factors. Therefore, intelligence test scores are
descriptive of a child's functioning at that point in time when taking
a test. The test scores could also be affected by environmental
factors, child's psychiatric status or educational program. Components
of a good intelligence test are (a) Validity; does the test really
measure intelligence and not something else? (b) Reliability; does the
test produce consistent measures? (c) Norms; are the participants
being fairly compared? Components that make an intelligence test
flawed are (a) Poor validity; tests may be sensitive to social
factors. (b) Poor norms; comparing people who are different. (c) Poor
application; tests measure something that the school or job has
nothing to do with. Theories of Process Psychometric Model approach is
defined as psychology that deals with the design, administration, and
interpretation of quantitative tests for the measurement of
psychological variables such as intelligence, aptitude, and
personality traits. There are various psychometric approaches to
intelligence. The following paragraphs describe different theorists
and their psychometric model.First is Charles Spearman, who believed that intelligence is a
combination of two parts. According to his two-factory theory of
intelligence, the performance of any intellectual act requires some
combination of 'g', (general intelligence factor) which is available
to the same individual to the same degree for all intellectual acts.
(Specific factors) or's' is specific to that act and varies in
strength from one act to another. 'S' is specific knowledge such as
verbal reasoning or spatial problem solving. Spearman equated 'g' with
mental energy. If one knows how a person performs on one task that is
highly saturated with 'g', one can safely predict a similar level of
performance for another highly 'g' saturated task. The prediction of
performance on tasks with high's' factors is less accurate. Thus, the
most important information to have about a person's intellectual
ability is an estimate of their 'g' or mental energy (Plucker 1998).Guilford's theory includes 150 abilities, arranged in three
dimensions; contents, operations, and products. Guilford's
three-dimensional Structure of Intellect classified intellectual acts
into 120 separate categories. These categories are operations
dimension, products dimension and material dimension. He developed
firm convictions regarding the ability of individual difference among
people. Guilford believed that intelligence is much too complicated to
be subsumed by a few primary mental abilities and 'g' factor. His
systematic theory gave rise to what is known as
informational-operational psychology. Information-Processing
Informational theorists believe human cognition is best understood as
the management of information through a system with limited space or
resources (Bukato and Daehler 1998).Thurston's theory is based on seven primary mental abilities. In the
area of intelligence, his theory maintains that intelligence is made
up of several primary mental abilities rather than just the 'g' and
's' factors. He was among the first to purpose and demonstrate that
there are numerous ways in which a person can be intelligent.
Thurston's Multiple-Factors Theory identified these seven primary
mental abilities; Verbal Comprehension, Associative Memory, Word
Fluency, Number Facility, Reasoning, Spatial Visualization, and
Perceptual Speed. Thurston's theory has been used to construct
intelligence tests that yield a profile of the individual's
performance on each of the ability tests, rather than general that
yield a single score such as an IQ.Two theorists that promote informational processing models are
Sternberg and Gardner. Sternberg's theory consists of three parts;
cognitive components of intelligence, experience and intelligence, and
context of intelligence. They are divided into three major
sub-theories: Componential is encoding, combining and comparing
stimuli, and evaluating one own performance. Contextual is the
adaptation to one's environment. One of Sternberg's most important
contributions to intelligence theory has been the redefinition of
intelligence to incorporate practical knowledge. As Sternberg insists,
"real life is where intelligence operates and not in the classroom…the
true measure of success is not how well one does in school, but how
well one does in life" (Trosky, 1998.) Dr. Howard Gardner believed
that intelligence is the ability to find and solve problems and create
products of value in one's own culture. Gardner's theory of Multiple
Intelligence (MI) maintains that people often show marked individual
differences in their ability to process specific kinds of information
(Bukato and Daehler 1998). Gardner originally identified seven such
faculties, which he labelled as "intelligences": Linguistic, Musical,
Logic-Mathematical, Spatial, Intra-personal, Inter-personal, and
Bodily Kinaesthetic. Multiple intelligences theory is a polarized way
of understanding their intellect. Recent advances in cognitive
science, developmental psychology and neuroscience suggest that each
person's level of intelligence is actually made up of autonomous
faculties that can work individually or in concert with other
faculties. Interpreting and Grouping Methods have three common methods
for reporting performance on tests are developmental, percentiles and
standard scores. The most common is developmental scores, which are
sometimes classified as "mental age" and "grade equivalents," although
many tests provide age-equivalent scores. Many schools show reaching
of goals and objectives by utilizing these types of test scores. The
strength within developmental scores is that the result is
descriptive, meaning it can clearly show the difference in a score.
For example hearing that Bob has a mental age of seven years, or a
third grade reading level, provides what seems to be a vivid picture
of where Bob stands within the rest of the seven year olds. Percentile
scores provide an index of where one stands relative to others on a
scale of 1 to 100. A score at the first or 100th percentile does not
mean that the person got all of the questions on the test right or
wrong. Percentile score mean that the individual performed worse or
better than everybody else in the comparison group. Nonetheless, like
developmental scores the unit of measure varies across the range.
There is relatively little difference between scores at the 40th and
60th percentiles, but a 20 point difference near either tail of the
distribution will be substantial. Standard scores scales have the
advantage of being indicative of performance relative to others, but
the unit of measure remains constant across the range of scores.Standard score scales report scores in standard deviation units from
the normative sample's mean. Thus, to interpret standard scores, one
must know the mean and standard deviation of the scale on which it is
based. Grouping and Validity are one of the most important questions
that always come up regarding validity and reliability of these tools
are what are the tests really measuring? Are they measuring a person's
intelligence? What about their ability to perform well on standardized
tests? Is that alone, another measurement of their intelligence? It is
critical to examine the situations around which these tests are given.
A person may not have had lunch or breakfast, could possibly be ill
that day or is having an anxiety attack about taking the test. Many
factors go into the test itself. Other major factors are cultural
backgrounds, parenting practices and the home environments are also
very important factors. To issue a truly standardized test, the
testing environment should be the same for everyone taking the test.
No matter how carefully written, standardized intelligence tests have
particular cultural biases, and are almost always based on language
ability and mathematical prowess. These traits are important and
desirable, but they may not be the only factors in determining a
person's intelligence. Intelligence consists of abilities necessary to
adapt to the environment to achieve goals. Psychologists differ on how
they define intelligence and exactly which abilities comprise
"intelligence." Intelligence testing provides standardized and
objective measures that can be considered useful for evaluating
children and adolescents.Intelligence testing reveals something about the person's academic
type and their general mental abilities. Newer or recently developed
tests may be better equipped to encompass all of the components
necessary to evaluate a person's intelligence level. It is important
to realize the biases, cultural differences and other factors that may
interpret a score or result. IQ tests that fail usually fall into two
main groups. The first grouping is where the tests assume too much.
Examples of this flaw are the assumption that speed is always good,
vocabulary is a good indicator of intelligence, and that different
test-taking environment won't affect the outcome. The second grouping
comes because the tests gauge the wrong items. Examples of this are
different culture groups being asked to take the same tests as
everyone else, and the fact that the tests ignore so many types of
intelligence (like social and physical). These two groupings
illustrate where the major failings of popular IQ tests occur and can
be used as tools for judging others. IQ tests are not good indicators
for a person's overall intelligence, but as their use has shown, they
are extremely helpful in making predictions about how a person will
perform in an academic setting. Perhaps the problem comes in the name
intelligence tests when it is obvious this is not what they really
are. Keep in mind that the IQ tests of today definitely has its
applications in society, but the progress of a child depends on many
factors and should not be used to quantify their overall intelligence
by any means.The article was produced by the member of masterpapers.com.
Sharon White is a senior writer and writers consultant at term papers. Get some useful tips for thesis and buy term papers.
Keyword : intelligence, behavour, people