Talk:Race and intelligence (test data)

Latest comment: 16 years ago by Lobojo in topic Recreation

deleted a section edit

deleted the section on "darker skinned orientals" having lower iq scores. southeast asians are not darker skinned orientals, they are for the most part a different migratory group with highly significant australo-melanesian admixture. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.205.62.146 (talk) 05:51:35, August 19, 2007 (UTC)

Do Orientals have a higher IQ if its Summer and they have a tan then? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.225.216.157 (talk) 01:39, 21 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

African Immigrants edit

I added some information on the "Asian-American" classification. Asian-American encompasses an extremely genetically diverse population, so it's not to be confused for any sort of proof in either direction.72.205.62.146 02:29, 3 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

Deleted this:

Despite the ongoing controversy about IQ difference in the US. Gargi Bhattacharyya , Liz Ison and Maud Blair have found that IQ differences between black and white populations in the UK and elsewhere are virtually non-existent. Black Caribbean and Black African children and children for whom English is an additional language make relatively greater progress during preschool than White children or those for whom English is a first language.

(The reference was Minority Ethnic Attainment and Participation in Education and Training: The Evidence (Bhattacharyya, Ilson, Blair, 2000).)

It was inaccurate and misleading. The Bhattacharyya et al. document does not mention IQ at all, and the stuff about children making relatively greater progress merely says that children (not just Black children) who have "English as an Additonal Language" catch up, at least partly, with their native English-speaking peers.

What the Bhattacharyya et al. paper actually shows is that Black African children achieve somewhat lower attainment in school than the White group, and Black Caribbean children achieve a much lower attainment, especially the boys. More recent data shows Black African girls overtaking White boys.

Explanations for differences in immigrant populations performances have to take into account the effects of different patterns of selective migration. For instance, for an African to get into Europe is fairly tough, and to get into America is very tough (they can't paddle there from Morocco). The result is that such Africans as are found in America are very often from Africa's elite. This can account for the high educational attainment of African immigrants in the USA. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.254.200.215 (talk) 23:13, 23 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

This article may not be compliant? edit

If you mean that table at the end, I agree, WD. futurebird 00:33, 18 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Table 12.7 is meaningless and needs to come out. It apparently is nothing more than an illustration of cherrypicking data to fit. Where are the other groups (e.g. asians other than mongols)?

Racedowling 14:40, 19 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Have there been any studies involving midgets? If cranial size were a factor, certainly this would correlate. How about differences in stature? Are 4'6" white men less intelligent than 7' white men?

Racedowling 14:46, 19 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Needs Sources For all we know the Klan could have wrote this crap.

I think that the Appendix should be moved to above the footnotes. --Kevin Murray 20:44, 22 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Chart edit

I'm a bit uncomfortable with the term "Hispanic" being used in the chart below without at least a footnote explaining the definition. On an aside, do we have page numbers for the H&M ref. Not to imply that they need to be here, but I'd like to read the text supporting these numbers. Thanks! --Kevin Murray 21:08, 22 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

There was a lot of objection to this type of inclusion of multiple studies sorted in together and displayed in a high to low order, when I brought Appendix A to the "main" article in January. I had taken that from another article which was a bit POV pushing and overstated the data, specificlly Buj, where the city by city data was implied to be nationwide. I'd rather see this data broken into tables either by researcher or published source and included in a section discussing the particular study or researcher, not aggregated together to imply that common standards were used. It might be good to discuss the weakensses of the study or researcher within the context of these sections. --Kevin Murray 06:22, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Commonly cited IQ figures
for various groups
Group IQ avg Citation
Jewish Americans 113 Herrnstein & Murray (1994)
East Asians 106 Herrnstein & Murray (1994)
Lynn (1991a)
Whites 100 Herrnstein & Murray (1994)
Lynn (1991a)
Hispanics 89 Herrnstein & Murray (1994)
Native Americans 89 Lynn (1991a)
African Americans 85 Herrnstein & Murray (1994)
Lynn (1991a)
Roth et al. (2001)
Subsaharan Africans 70 Lynn (1991a)

Let's remove this table. --W.R.N. 07:16, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

SAT Scores edit

How can SAT scores be tied to IQ? More than anything these are a product of ability and environmnet, with a huge emphasis on the latter. --Kevin Murray 06:25, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

SAT measures g and correlates with other IQ tests approximately as well as other IQ tests do with one another. The cause of differences in SAT shouldn't be a matter of discussion in this article. --W.R.N. 07:15, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply
Some insecure troll changed European IQ on the page from 100 to 105. I reverted. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.205.62.146 (talk) 06:29, 6 September 2007 (UTC)Reply

moved from article edit

the SAT charts are redundant with the GRE chart. the social background chart seems to be inappropriate for this article (isn't that explanations?), and the flynn chart is redundant with the BW gap table --W.R.N. 07:27, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

It seemed to be more about the gap closing... where are the other SES charts?
The black scores on four tests should stay... Caption is about how the gap has been closing per flynn.futurebird 07:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply
If it is, then it should be here, starting with a description in the text. Which ever. The Flynn chart is redundant with the table in that section, but it would seem that the table is safer (wrt NPOV) because it's the raw data rather than Flynn's analysis, which Murray objects to. --W.R.N.
 
2003 SAT results by race/ethnicity. Redrawn from College Board statistics. College Board classifications, like other "race" classifications are not homogeneous; for example, "Asian" includes East Asians and South Asians; "White" includes Jewish Americans and other Whites. Similarly, "East Asians" are not homogenous, nor are "South Asians".
 
Distribution of SAT math scores by race and ethnicity. [1]
 
Percentage of race/ethnic groups that scored above 600 on the math SAT [2]
 
Min-Hsiung Huang and Robert M. Hauser found that, controlling for social background, the Black-White test score gap narrowed significantly over the period from 1974 to 1998. For Whites, however, improvement in social background across time does not raise test scores correspondingly. [1]
 
William T. Dickens and James R. Flynn write that blacks have gained 5 or 6 IQ points on non-Hispanic whites between 1972 and 2002. This graph shows the gains for various tests.[2]

appendix edit

here are the data tables from Lynn (2006). If, for example, they were all included here, I think that would be too much. But what criteria could be used to select a subset? --W.R.N. 07:38, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Maybe we shouldn't include any large data tables here, but merely reference them to their original source? We don't have to select a subset, we can simply refer to them at a different location. --JereKrischel 15:40, 23 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

Pre WW II skull data edit

Undue weight and outdated material. Skull size has been changed to no longer particularly relevant. Should be removed. Objections?Ultramarine 13:00, 25 February 2007 (UTC)Reply


Do Murray, Herrnstein and Lynn think Jews are a race? edit

Attempted compilations of average IQ scores by race published by Richard Lynn in Mankind Quarterly and Murray, C. and Herrnstein, R. J. in their book The Bell Curve place Ashkenazi Jews at the top, followed by East Asians, Whites, Hispanics and Native Americans, and African Americans.[3]


Or should this read "ethnic groups" ? futurebird 21:53, 26 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

  • Or I proposed "populations" at the mediation discussion. I think WRN suggested "human populations." I don't strongly object to ethnic groups, but I think the term implies a broad range almost to the extent of race. --Kevin Murray 22:05, 26 February 2007 (UTC)Reply
I don't know if I agree with the general move to rename. This question is really just about how Murray, Herrnstein and Lynn describe these differences and making this text match the sources. futurebird 23:39, 26 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

various sources use various terms, but the overall encompassing phrase is self-described race and ethnicity. --W.R.N. 05:41, 27 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

The problem is, Murray and Herrnstein themselves conflate ethnicity, race, and of course population. Slrubenstein | Talk 11:48, 12 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

UK educational attainment edit

This sentence:

In fact, Blacks of African descents in the UK, on average, earn more money and obtain higher levels of education than the native white populations.

seems to be at complete variance with current UK data and so is either out of date or suspect. There has been a lot of UK government & media concern recently about low educational achievement of UK black schoolchildren. Take for example this (admittedly patchy) data from the Institute of Race Relations, no less, showing blacks to be the lowest achieving ethnic group at GCSE level: [3] (though it doesn't distinguish African from Caribbean blacks, and I should think most available stats wouldn't either). Ben Finn 00:02, 6 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

The article name? edit

All this article does is provide data from Lynn 2006 study. Either this article must be renamed or its contents changed to appropriately include results from other studies. No one study can be considered more conclusive than the others.

Chitlin Test edit

I respect FB in her integrity, but including the Chitlin Test seems over the top. I understand that it makes a point, but is it necessary to be so offensive? While the Irish may know more specifics about corned beef and cabbage and little green men, that is hardly indicative of the breadth of their range. I think that inclusion of this denigrates the stature of WP, as an unintended consequence. --Kevin Murray 18:03, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

How is the test offensive? futurebird 19:22, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
You've got to be kidding me. --Kevin Murray 19:30, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
I'm not kidding. I'm sorry, but maybe I'm just missing your point here. Can you explain why it is offensive? And who would be offended by it? futurebird 19:57, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
OK, if you don't see it: I can't convince you. We'll have to agree to disagree. --Kevin Murray 19:59, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

If you won't explain your position or reasoning I can't possibly understand it. We may not disagree, but we won't find out if you refuse to open a dialogue about this. To be honest, I'm intrigued by the idea that this test could be offensive. Do you mean offensive to African-Americans in some way? or to White Americans? Or did you have something else in mind? futurebird 20:06, 5 April 2007 (UTC)Reply


I was not offended - and I am a white (OK ... 'half'-Ashkenazi-Jewish) male. It seems to me that the essence of the test is well-crafted to highlight the 'stupid' feeling amongst people not well-versed in (American) Black culture, whilst also drawing attention to some of the real issues involved in being a part of that culture. As such, I'm not sure if it contravenes any of Wikipedia's rules? 81.159.196.76 11:25, 6 April 2007 (UTC)Reply


It is cited in a few journal articles and I've include one of these as a reference. So it meets the content requirements. I ought to add that this isn't the only thing in this article that will make people "uncomfortable" it's an uncomfortable topic. futurebird 15:47, 6 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

it is very offensive and also irrelevant. It's the kind of thing that people get fired over for sending to their coworkers:

Hattie Mae Johnson is on the County. She has four children and her husband is now in jail for non-support, as he was unemployed and was not able to give her any money. Her welfare check is now $286 per month. Last night she went out with the highest player in town. If she got pregnant, then nine months from now how much more will her welfare check be?

(a) $80, (b) $2, (c) $35, (d) $150, (e) $100.

it's irrelevant because IQ tests haven't had culturally dependant tests for a hundred years...so how does this belong for on the "test data" section?

The SAT and GRE are still culturally dependant and they are used as a proxy for IQ. futurebird 16:53, 6 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
Sorry futurebird, the SAT and GRE are nothing like the chitlings test, and this has nothing to do with "test data"

An issue I have with "The Chitling Intelligence Test" is that it does very little in the way of measuring intelligence or congnition, however, it is called by its author an "intelligence test". This is quite misleading. Let's call it exactly what it is... a test which measures one's level of knowledge of specific terms in a particular vernacular. The more you know the meaning of the terms prsented the better you will do on the test and while that does display the concept of cultural bias it does not measure intelligence. A true test of intelligence requires the subject to make critical reasoning decisions from a set of information thus presented, not simply to "translate" words from one language to another. A few of the test questions presented do ask the subject to use reasoning to arrive at an answer but the vast majority of the questions simply ask "do you know the meaning of the word X?". Such a test is not a test of intelligence, it's a foreign langague exam and should be labeled as such.

Just like the Verbal SAT. futurebird 15:44, 10 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
Yes, but the SAT doesn't purport itself as being a "test of intelligence". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 76.104.126.128 (talk) 17:38, 10 April 2007 (UTC).Reply

Whoo-boy are you opening a can of worms. Arguably, the SAT does not measure anything. The letter "A" stands for "apptitude" and yes, this is a pretty close surrogate for "intelligence;" the test was meant to demonstrate a candidate's general apptitude for higher education and was meant to be predictive of future academic success. Note: this is not culture-bound as a US college student can study math or physics, or German literature or Swahili; the SAT was meant to test general apptitude. The problem is that the SAT turns out not to be predictive of success in college. The ETS people who own the test eventually admitted that the test does not actually test for aptitude, and now claim that SAT does not stand for anything (i.e. the A no longer stands for aptitude). What does it test for? Well, that is just not very clear. The claim I guess is "general knowledge" and they may try to make that as unculture-bound as possible but there is no compelling evidence that they have succeeded. Slrubenstein | Talk 11:54, 12 April 2007 (UTC)Reply

The SAT measures one's aptitude in English and Mathematics, both subjects taken by all college students. You'd be hard pressed to find a major for which strong English skills or strong Math skills would not be required. With the exception of Art related majors. Though your are perfectly right about it not measuring success in college accurately, i scored a 1550 SAT (under the old scale system) and have managed to fail four or five college courses. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.108.139.214 (talk) 10:59, 18 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

chart edit

the chart which has black scores increasing over time is misleading. the scores have improved, but not to the extent the chart implies. the range should be centered around 100, included 2-3SDs and possibly include data from other races.


It's the scale used in the Flynn paper. futurebird 16:54, 6 April 2007 (UTC)Reply
Bad paper then. Maybe we should not cite such misleading work.
Please cite these reliable sources which say it is a bad paper and the work which contradicts the Flynn paper Nil Einne 08:52, 4 July 2007 (UTC)Reply

No transcluding edit

Please note you should not transclude other articles into here. See Talk:Eurasian hybrid vigor#Removing my OR Nil Einne 08:51, 4 July 2007 (UTC)Reply

Reaction time edit

The article states "In a study by done by Dennis Saccuzzo on information-Processing for African-American, Latino, Filipino, and White elementary school children enrolled in gifted versus non-gifted school programs, gifted African-Americans showed the fastest reaction times of the ethnic groups tested while nongifted African-Americans showed the slowest. The study, however, found only a "modest" correlation between reaction time and IQ.[98]"

This is self-contradictory. Either there is a correlation between RT and IQ or there isn't. What are the actual numbers? What is meant by gifted? IQ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.68.243.6 (talk) 19:54, 19 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

Recreation edit

I unredirected this article as (A) The AfD was marginal at best, certainly no consensus was achieved. (B) The links to this article remain in the main article (C) The result of the AfD was merge. This has not been done, the content that presently exists bears no relation to the content of this article. Lobojo (talk) 22:53, 12 December 2007 (UTC)Reply

  1. ^ Convergent Trends in Black-White Test-Score Differentials in the U.S.: A Correction of Richard Lynn Min-Hsiung Huang and Robert M. Hauser 2000
  2. ^ Black Americans reduce the racial IQ gap: Evidence from standardization samples William T. Dickens and James R. Flynn. Oct. 2006
  3. ^ Herrnstein and Murray 1994; Lynn 1991a; Lynn 2006