IS EACH GENERATION OF CHILDREN SMARTER THAN THE GENERATION BEFORE IT?

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IS EACH GENERATION OF CHILDREN SMARTER THAN THE GENERATION BEFORE IT?

Over the past decades, evidence has arisen which supports the claim that each generation of children are smarter than the previous generation. This is based on what has been dubbed the "Flynn Effect", named after James Flynn who in 184 officially reported a steady rise in the average scores on intelligence over the last half century in developed countries. Many explanations have been suggested to account for this rise but there is no generally accepted explanation for these results. Despite this evidence, studies on the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) have shown a fall in average scores. This has led some scientists to question the validity of Flynn's findings. However, this argument for an increase in intelligence is focused on standardised tests, it does not distinguish other forms of cognitive abilities, such as creative, practical and social intelligence.

Since the development of the first successful intelligence test by Alfred Binet and Theodore Simon in 105, which was used as a measure of predicting academic success, the measurement of intelligence has developed to incorporate a wider range of abilities. However, there is no formal definition of intelligence, and as a result, many have described intelligence as what intelligence tests measure (e.g. Boring, 1; Stelzl, Merz, Ehlers, & Remer, 15). Broadly speaking, intelligence is an abstract construct that encompasses many abilities like the ability to learn, to reason, to adapt to novel situations and the ability to apply abstract concepts (Vasta, Haith, & Miller,15).

Following Binet and Simon's pioneering work, many adaptations and developments were made in intelligence testing. Today, the most well known intelligence tests are Stanford-Binet and Wechsler tests. These IQ tests have been periodically adjusted for modern times and the revised versions of these tests are then standardized on new samples and scored with respect to those samples. In order to determine the differences in difficulty between the old and updated test, the same participant takes both versions of the test. Using this method, studies by Flynn (184, 187) have shown massive IQ gains, ranging from 5 to 5 points on standardised intelligence tests over a single generation.

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In other words, researchers have found that contemporary participants have scored higher norms on the old version of the test than those who had taken the same test decades ago. For example in one study by David Wechsler (cited, Neisser, 17), a group of participants scored an average of 10.8 on the new Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R), but averaged 111. on the older WAIS. Implying that performance on this IQ test was increasing at a rate of 0. IQ points a year, between 15 and 178. Flynn used scores on the Stanford-Binet and Wechsler intelligence tests, but found the greatest increases in the "culture fair" intelligence test, Raven's Progressive Matrices (Flynn, 1).

The most widely used tests of intelligence, Stanford-Binet and Wechsler have subtests that test school-related content like vocabulary, arithmetic and general information. This type of knowledge is known as "crystallised" intelligence because it has to be learned or acquired through experience. With improvements over time in schooling and other environmental changes that could improve intelligence of this form, the natural assumption would be that scores on these tests would increase the most. On the other hand, test like Raven's Progressive Matrices test (RPM), which is culture-reduced, would show the least gains because it is supposedly measuring the purest measure of g or general intelligence. It is "pure" in the sense that it is measuring fluid intelligence, a form of intelligence that is supposedly inherent and cannot be learnt. However, these deductions have been contradicted by the data collected in numerous studies (e.g. Flynn, 187; Koppen-Thulesius, & Teichmann, 17).

The problem with g is that by definition the test that best measures it, is the test that has the highest correlations with all the other intelligence tests. What g really measures is therefore unknown, we only know how to measure it (Neisser, 17). RPM is the accepted best measure of g and consists mainly of tests involving visual-spatial reasoning, like identifying missing parts of a pattern. However, there is dispute on whether RPM is as culturally reduced as it claims to be (e.g. Cahan & Cohen, 18; Carpenter, Just, & Shell, 10; Stelz, Merz, Ehlers, & Remer, 15). Cahan and Cohen (18) showed that schooling has a considerable effect on all intelligence test scores, including those measuring fluid intelligence.

Studies have shown that exposure and practice on visual abilities, on which Raven is based, actually improves performance on certain parts of IQ tests. For example, Patricia Greenfield (cited, Neisser, 17; Flynn, 1) argued that exposure to a video game lead to better performances on subtests of intelligence tests, testing the same ability that the children were exposed to during the game. Access to computers a decade ago was not as prevalent in society as they are today and as a result, children may be performing better as a result.

What seems to be happening is that although the technological environment is changing, the tests measuring this performance is static. Flynn (1) argues that a subtest on the WISC (Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children), called Similarities is also measuring g, and shows large gains, but it's not a test on visual problem solving, it is a verbal test and these scores have been increasing as well. Also the gains on Raven's matrices were observed before the invention of the television (Flynn, 1), so the argument for technological improvements including more media, as reasons for the increases is weak.

Flynn also found increases of scores on the Wechsler scale, but on some of the scores analysed, inconsistencies with respect to rising IQ scores have been found (e.g. Spitz, 18). This is not the only discrepancy with the evidence of a rise in intelligence. Comparing Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores over time has shown that they have actually declined, which does not follow from rising IQ scores. In 141, the standardised SAT score was 500, but in the 10s, comparative test scores on verbal SAT is 44, and a mathematics score of 478, showing a decline in average performance. If IQ scores are supposed to be measuring success at school, and people now have higher IQs, it does not make sense that over the last two decades the SAT scores would be falling. Flynn has suggested that Raven's test does not measure intelligence but a "correlate with a weak causal link to intelligence" (Flynn, 187, p.187), and he even suggested that this was the case for all IQ tests.

Therefore the amount of schooling does not seem to explain the rise in IQ scores because SAT scores are falling, and the SAT is supposed to measure learned content. However, studies besides studies by Flynn on the pattern of intelligence scores have lead to a general acceptance that scores on standardised tests are on the rise, although there have been some which have questioned the method used to analyse data (e.g. Brand, Freshwater, & Dockrell, 18). The explanations given to justify the Flynn effect have not been definitive, rather intelligence is believed to be influenced by a wide range of these explanations.

One of the justifications given in support of rising intelligence scores is a biological one that argues that with improvements in nutrition, adults become physically developed, as seen in increases in the average height of human adults. With this developmental growth, the neural structures in the brain also become more complex, accounting for an increase in intelligence (Lynn, 10). However, it is difficult to show that there is a direct effect between diet and intelligence without taking into account other types of deprivation that usually co-occurs with malnutrition.

Neisser (17) argues that the fact that we have not changed genetically and the rise in scores seems so large, that genetic explanations are implausible. So many of the explanations are attributing the increases in IQ scores to changes within the environment, including cultural and social changes. If IQ varies as a result of environment, comparing different cultures seems futile. But this explanation that environmental changes have caused improved IQ scores seems to agree with Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development. Piaget viewed human intelligence as an adaptive phenomenon, and the way in which they adapt is caused by environmental changes (Vasta et al, 15).

Not all forms of intelligence are measurable, like wisdom, creativity, practicality, and social competence. However, one kind of intelligence that can be measured is IQ, which measures some form of cognitive ability that is predictive of performance in school. It is scores on these standardised tests that are steadily increasing and have led people to suggest that over generations, children are getting smarter. However, it is easy to simplify intelligence to a statistic like an IQ quotient or SAT score based on "intelligence" tests for the benefit categorising and assessing a mass of people. But two people with identical IQ scores have different minds, not identical thoughts, and saying that a lower IQ means less "intelligent" than someone with a high IQ will be overlooking characteristics that could signify "real" intelligence.

References

Cahan, S., & Cohen, N. (18). Age versus schooling effects on intelligence development. Child Development, 60, 1-14.

Carpenter, P.A., Just, M.A., & Shell, P. (10). What one intelligence test measures a theoretical account of the processing in the Raven progressive matrices test. Psychological Review, 7, 404-41.

Flynn, J.R. (10). Massive IQ gains on the Scottish WISC Evidence against Brands et al. Hypothesis. The Irish Journal of Psychology, 11, 41-51.

Flynn, J.R. (1). Searching for justice The discovery of IQ gains over time. American Psychologist, 54, 5-0.

Koppen-Thulesius, L.K, & Teichmann, H. (17). Accelerative trends in intellectual development. British Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 11, 84-4.

Lynn, R. (10). The role of nutrition in secular increases in intelligence. Personality and Individual Differences, 11, 7-85.

Neisser, U. (17). Rising scores on intelligence tests. American Scientist,

Spitz, H. (18). Variations in Wechsler interscale IQ disparities at different levels of IQ. Intelligence, 1, 157-167.

Stelzl, I., Merz F., Ehlers, T., & Remer, H. (15). The effect of schooling on the development of fluid and crystallized intelligence a quasi-experimental study. Intelligence, 1, 7-6.

Zigler, E., Abelson, W.D., Trickett, P.K., & Seitz, V. (18). Is an interventioin program necessary in order to improve economically disadvantaged children's IQ scores? Child Development, 5, 40-48.

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