Intelligence And Intelligence

Intelligence: Are you smart enough to know about it?

Intelligence, a simple yet complex term, present in everyday, layman vocabulary and argued by the foremost minds of psychology. Intelligence is currently defined as capacity for goal directed, adapted behaviour (Myers, 2014). The definition has gone multiple revisions because we have changed our very understanding of intelligence, initially used to describe academic brilliance and rote memorization, the current definition encompasses more fields such as street smarts, word play, interpersonal interactions and abstract reasoning. Perhaps the most interesting factor of all is how intelligence changes from culture to culture; a good farmer is a genius in an agricultural society and a dullard

Flynn made a surprising discovery; his research indicated that IQ scores have been on a continuous rise since the beginning of the 20th century, or more precisely increasing at a rate of .3 points a year or 3 points a decade. (Folger. 2012) This steady increase in IQ scores has been termed as the Flynn effect and there are a few interesting theories explaining it. Higher IQ scores have been recorded based on data from the standardized test WISC (Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children), surprisingly the increase in IQ isn’t a general rise but rather a higher score in two subtests that focus on abstract reasoning, and thus an increase in abstract logic is cited as a reason for the Flynn effect. (Folger, 2012) Another possible explanation is the modern world we live in, in our technological age we have machines that need high levels of logic to operate and interact with, furthermore, these machines have a high rate of information processing and as a result of which created a need for people that can compute faster, and they will in turn, build faster machines, setting up a feedback loop that steadily increases intelligence. (Folger,

Firstly, Rodger says improved childhood nutrition, secondly, universal education, thirdly, smaller families, and lastly the influence of educated mothers on they’re children. (Folger, 2012) Another reason support the rise in intelligence would be the way our culture looks at formal education. Until the start of the twentieth century, most Americans had only about seven years of schooling; today findings indicate that over half of adults have at least some tertiary education. (Folger, 2012) these findings are further reasons for an increase in intelligence. Moreover the change of occupations from agricultural based ones to technical and managerial jobs has created a more intellectual society, which has led to an increase in logic abilities and as a result of which increased intelligence test scores. (Folger,