Tue 31 Oct 2006
How does Williams handle this problem?
Psychologists and other behavioral scientists who teach courses containing material on individual differences often find themselves presenting research findings that are politically unpopular in today’s social climate. For example, segments of most introductory psychology courses deal with intelligence and mental abilities. An honest treatment of this material requires that evidence be presented indicating that both environmental and genetic factors determine intelligence. The evidence for heritable factors in intelligence is supported by data from selective breeding studies using animal subjects, from twin studies, and from family studies. In exploring the implications of this work the lecturer generally presents the evidence that different racial groups score differently on intelligence tests, and then analyzes the factors that contribute to this observed difference. Most researchers (and most textbooks) agree that although environmental factors are important, genetic contributions cannot be ignored, since they play a large role in determining group differences in mental abilities scores./1/ The case is quite similar in the discussion of sex differences in cognitive abilities. There are systematic differences in the pattern of abilities displayed by males and females on standardized tests. Although many of these differences may be environmental in origin or reflect differences in the socialization of males and females, some ability differences appear to be genetically determined. It appears that the disparity between male and female scores on certain abilities measures are the direct consequence of hormonal, neurological, and even brain structure differences between the sexes. The conscientious lecturer interested in presenting the full picture must discuss these physical differences as well as the environmental factors.
My goal for now is not to argue about the substance but to determine how Williams currently handles this. Can someone enlighten me? What is taught in courses like PSYC 101 and 221? How are these controversial topics handled? Just curious.
October 31st, 2006 at 11:09 pm
It might just be me, but I believe they use the last 13 years of research that put dog researcher Stanley Coren’s argument into doubt. They might use books like Inequality by Design to explain away. they might present both sides of the argument and let students decide.
But, that’s just me…
October 31st, 2006 at 11:09 pm
because this piece was written in 1993. i meant to make that clear in the first comment.
October 31st, 2006 at 11:58 pm
Why am I dismayed that the catalog pages linked above do not have “up” or “back” links, and none of the three directories above them have ./index.htm(l) files?
Attention to standards, please!
As for the topic of discussion, I remember Prof. Solomon explaining that wonderful experiment, in which researchers changed the reported IQ scores of primary school students– boosting them.
Across class and gender, as a group, the students then performed at the level predicted by the altered scores.
Isn’t resource competition and allocation interesting?
If someone can speak to how Prof. Sundermeier introduces the issues to a room of doe-eyed frosh, I’d be most interested, as well.
As a footnote of sorts, I’ve always had a sneaking suspicion that I was a product of that kind of experiment, and the reason that I felt entirely entitled to sit in the second row of PSYC 101 and treat it as a tutorial (when I wished), was that I had learned the terms of certain games to produce attention, “how to work the system.”
Perhaps the most valuable lesson of all.
Now, as for Charles and and the Catalog copy… oh, old arguments! Time to go back to writing Chris about Diversity…
November 1st, 2006 at 4:51 pm
I remember Prof. Solomon explaining that wonderful experiment, in which researchers changed the reported IQ scores of primary school students– boosting them.
Across class and gender, as a group, the students then performed at the level predicted by the altered scores.
Your professor should stop shoveling folklore at his students. The phenomona to which the professor is referring is called the Pygmalion Effect and it’s been debunked. Here is the meta analysis
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/links/doi/10.1111/1467-8721.ep10772605/enhancedabs/
and if you want a synopsis see here:
http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/paleopsych/2004-August/000219.html
“The late Richard Snow made a meta analysis of 18 studies of effect of teacher expectancy on children’s IQ. Excluding the methodologically flawed original Pygmalion study mentioned below, the other 17 (more sound) studies yielded a positive effect of less than 0.5 IQ points (R.E.Snow /Pygmalion and Intelligence? /Current Directions in Psychological Science 4 (1995): 169-171.”
I’m curious as to why you call it a “wonderful experiment.” I’m guessing that it has to do with the wonderfulness of the ego-affirming results that it purported to uncover.