Why g matters: The complexity of everyday life
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors provide evidence that intelligence has pervasive utility in work settings because it is essentially the ability to deal with cognitive complexity, in particular, with complex information processing, and the more complex a work task, the greater the advantages that higher g confers in performing it well.
About: This article is published in Intelligence.The article was published on 1997-01-01 and is currently open access. It has received 1300 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Everyday life & Cognitive complexity.
Summary (1 min read)
Jump to: [Why g Matters: The Complexity of Everyday Life] – [WHAT DOES “IMPORTANT” MEAN?] – [INFLUENCE OF INTELLIGENCE ON OVERALL LIFE OUTCOMES] and [THE FUTURE]
Why g Matters: The Complexity of Everyday Life
- This article provides evidence that g has pervasive utility in work settings because it is essentially the ability to deal with cognitive complexity, in particular, with complex information processing.
- Few claims in the social sciences are backed by such massive evidence but remain so hotly contested in public discourse.
- Besides demonstrating that g is important in practical affairs, I seek to demonstrate why intelligence has such surprisingly pervasive importance in the lives of individuals.
- I then use both the employment and literacy data to sketch a portrait of life’s challenges and opportunities at different levels of intelligence.
WHAT DOES “IMPORTANT” MEAN?
- The nature of the job and its context seem to determine whether g has any direct effect on task proficiency, net of job knowlege.
- As is well known in psychometrics (see also Gordon, 1997), the fact that an individual passes or fails any single test item says little about that person’s general intelligence level.
INFLUENCE OF INTELLIGENCE ON OVERALL LIFE OUTCOMES
- The effects of intelligence-like other psychological traits-are probabilistic, not deterministic.
- White adults in this range marry, work, and have children (Hermstein & Murray, 1994), but, as Table 10 shows, they are nonetheless at great risk of living in poverty (30%), bearing children out of wedlock (32%), and becoming chronic welfare dependents (31%).
- At this IQ level, fewer than half the high school graduates and none of the dropouts meet the military’s minimum AFQT enlistment standards.
- Most occupations are within reach cognitively, because these individuals learn complex material fairly easily and independently.
- Such as divorce, illness, and occasional unemployment, they rarely become trapped in poverty or social pathology.
THE FUTURE
- Complexity enriches social and cultural life, but it also risks leaving some individuals behind.
- Society has become more complex-and g loaded-as the authors have entered the information age and postindustrial economy.
- Accordingly, organizations are “flatter” (have fewer hierarchical levels), and increasing numbers of jobs require high-level cognitive and interpersonal skills (Camevale, 1991; Cascio, 1995; Hunt, 1995; Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills, 1991).
- There is evidence that increasing proportions of individuals with below-average IQs are having trouble adapting to their increasingly complex modern life (Granat & Granat, 1978) and that social inequality along IQ lines is increasing (Herrnstein & Murray, 1994).
- As the military experience also illustrates, however, what is good pedagogy for the low-aptitude learner may be inappropriate for the high-aptitude person.
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TL;DR: This paper focuses on a basic misunderstanding that permeates many of the recent reports of increased intelligence following short-term cognitive training, and suggests that simple interpretation of intelligence test score changes impossible.
Abstract: OPINION ARTICLE published: 12 March 2014 doi: 10.3389/fnsys.2014.00034 SYSTEMS NEUROSCIENCE Increased intelligence is a myth (so far) Richard J. Haier * Emeritus, Pediatrics, School of Medicine, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA *Correspondence: rjhaier@uci.edu Edited by: Mikhail Lebedev, Duke University, USA Reviewed by: James M. Broadway, University of California Santa Barbara, USA Michael Linderman, Norconnect Inc, USA Keywords: intelligence, g-factor, brain imaging, cognitive training, ratio scales, IQ testing On one hand, intelligence testing is one of the great successes of psychology (Hunt, 2011). Intelligence test scores predict many real world phenomena and have many well-validated practical uses (Gottfredson, 1997; Deary et al., 2010). Intelligence test scores also correlate to structural and func- tional brain parameters assessed with neu- roimaging (Haier et al., 1988; Jung and Haier, 2007; Deary et al., 2010; Penke et al., 2012; Colom et al., 2013a) and to genes (Posthuma et al., 2002; Hulshoff Pol et al., 2006; Chiang et al., 2009, 2012; Stein et al., 2012). On the other hand, intelligence test scores are often misunderstood and can be misused. This paper focuses on a basic misunderstanding that permeates many of the recent reports of increased intelligence following short-term cognitive training. Several of these reports have been pub- lished in prominent journals and received wide public attention (Jaeggi et al., 2008, 2011; Mackey et al., 2011). The basic misunderstanding is assum- ing that intelligence test scores are units of measurement like inches or liters or grams. They are not. Inches, liters and grams are ratio scales where zero means zero and 100 units are twice 50 units. Intelligence test scores estimate a construct using inter- val scales and have meaning only rela- tive to other people of the same age and sex. People with high scores generally do better on a broad range of mental abil- ity tests, but someone with an IQ score of 130 is not 30% smarter then some- one with an IQ score of 100. A score of 130 puts the person in the highest 2% of the population whereas a score of 100 is at the 50th percentile. A change from an IQ score from 100 to 103 is not the same as a change from 133 to 136. This makes Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience simple interpretation of intelligence test score changes impossible. Most recent studies that have claimed increases in intelligence after a cognitive training intervention rely on comparing an intelligence test score before the inter- vention to a second score after the inter- vention. If there is an average change score increase for the training group that is statistically significant (using a depen- dent t-test or similar statistical test), this is treated as evidence that intelligence has increased. This reasoning is correct if one is measuring ratio scales like inches, liters or grams before and after some inter- vention (assuming suitable and reliable instruments like rulers to avoid erroneous Cold Fusion-like conclusions that appar- ently were based on faulty heat measure- ment); it is not correct for intelligence test scores on interval scales that only estimate a relative rank order rather than measure the construct of intelligence. Even though the estimate has considerable predictive value and correlates to brain and genetic measures, it is not a measurement in the same way we measure distance, liquid, or weight even if individual change scores are used in a pre-post design. SAT scores, for example, are highly cor- related to intelligence test scores (Frey and Detterman, 2004). Imagine a student takes the SATs when quite ill. The scores likely are a bad estimate of the student’s abil- ity. If the student retakes the test some- time later when well, does an increase in score mean the student’s intelligence has increased, or that the newer score is now just a better estimate? The same is true for score changes following SAT prepara- tory courses. Many colleges and univer- sities allow applicants to submit multiple www.frontiersin.org SAT scores and the highest score typically carries the most weight; there are many spurious reasons for low scores but far fewer for high scores. Change scores from lowest to highest carry little if any weight. By contrast, change in a person’s weight after some intervention is unambiguous. In studies of the effect of cognitive training on intelligence, it is also impor- tant to understand that all intelligence test scores include a certain amount of impre- cision or error. This is called the standard error of measurement and can be quanti- fied as an estimate of a “true” score based on observed scores. The standard error of measuring inches or liters is usually zero assuming you have perfectly reliable, stan- dard measurement devices. Intelligence tests generally show high test-retest relia- bility but they also have a standard error, and the standard error is often larger for higher scores than for lower scores. Any intelligence test score change after an inter- vention needs to be considered relative to the standard error of the test. Studies that use a single test to estimate intelli- gence before and after an intervention are using less reliable and more variable scores (bigger standard errors) than studies that combine scores from a battery of tests. Change scores are never easy to inter- pret and require sophisticated statistical methods and research designs with appro- priate control groups. If you try a training intervention in individuals all of whom have pre-intervention scores below the population mean, for example, re-testing with or without any intervention, may result in higher scores due to the sta- tistical phenomenon of regression to the mean, or due to simple test practice, espe- cially if equivalent alternative forms of March 2014 | Volume 8 | Article 34 | 1
40 citations
Cites background from "Why g matters: The complexity of ev..."
...Intelligence test scores predict many real world phenomena and have many well-validated practical uses (Gottfredson, 1997; Deary et al., 2010)....
[...]
TL;DR: Although these findings provide modest evidence regarding the efficacy of an integrated cognitive training program, more research is needed to determine the utility of Mind Frontiers as a cognitive training tool.
Abstract: Although some studies have shown that cognitive training can produce improvements to untrained cognitive domains (far transfer), many others fail to show these effects, especially when it comes to improving fluid intelligence. The current study was designed to overcome several limitations of previous training studies by incorporating training expectancy assessments, an active control group, and "Mind Frontiers," a video game-based mobile program comprised of six adaptive, cognitively demanding training tasks that have been found to lead to increased scores in fluid intelligence (Gf) tests. We hypothesize that such integrated training may lead to broad improvements in cognitive abilities by targeting aspects of working memory, executive function, reasoning, and problem solving. Ninety participants completed 20 hour-and-a-half long training sessions over four to five weeks, 45 of whom played Mind Frontiers and 45 of whom completed visual search and change detection tasks (active control). After training, the Mind Frontiers group improved in working memory n-back tests, a composite measure of perceptual speed, and a composite measure of reaction time in reasoning tests. No training-related improvements were found in reasoning accuracy or other working memory tests, nor in composite measures of episodic memory, selective attention, divided attention, and multi-tasking. Perceived self-improvement in the tested abilities did not differ between groups. A general expectancy difference in problem-solving was observed between groups, but this perceived benefit did not correlate with training-related improvement. In summary, although these findings provide modest evidence regarding the efficacy of an integrated cognitive training program, more research is needed to determine the utility of Mind Frontiers as a cognitive training tool.
39 citations
TL;DR: This article investigated the interplay of the effects of intelligence at the individual and interindividual levels by manipulating the intelligence-based composition of dyadic training teams, and found that high ability trainees acquired significantly more skill when paired with high-ability partners instead of low ability partners.
39 citations
Cites background from "Why g matters: The complexity of ev..."
...For example, stronger correlations are found for more complex criteria (Gottfredson, 1997)....
[...]
...It is well established that intelligence is not only a robust predictor of scholastic achievement (Jensen, 1993) and job performance (Ree & Earles, 1992; Schmidt & Hunter, 1998) but also a critical variable associated with behavior across the majority of everyday life events (Barrett & Depinet, 1991; Gordon, 1997; Gottfredson, 1997)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors test the hypothesis that the Flynn effect may be even more independent from g than previously thought and find that the effect is positively associated with subtest g loadings.
38 citations
Cites background from "Why g matters: The complexity of ev..."
...The outcomes based on a large number of studies all of a sudden became crystal clear and started making theoretical sense (Gottfredson, 1997)....
[...]
References
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