PSYCHOLOGY CLASS # 10
THINKING, INTELLIGENCE AND LANGUAGE - PART 2
Thinking CreativelyCreativity, like critical thinking, is a skill associated with superior problem-solving
Creativity - the ability to produce ideas that are both novel and valuable
Creative people tend to be divergent thinkers
Divergent thinking - produces many answers to the same questionAs compared to Convergent thinking - which produces one correct answer to a question
Convergent thinking is usually required in testing
Creative people have been describe as exhibiting the following characteristics:
1. Flexibility and playful thinking includes humor and brainstorming
2. Inner motivation
3. Willingness to face risk
4. Objective evaluation of work
In a creative work environment you need:
1. To have enough trust to explore ideas through play
2. To think with your hands - build
3. To role-play in order to develop empathy and authentic services
4. To use divergent as well as convergent thinking in other words to be playful as well as serious.
Chick-zent-mee-high…..Csikszentmihalhy - has studied creativity and developed the theory of flow.
Flow - in psychology is a mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in a state of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.
Researchers have consistently found high correlations between being in a flow state and increased artistic and scientific creativity.
It is completely focused motivation and accompanied by a feeling of spontaneous joy in performing the task
Terms that we use to describe this kind of mental state include….in the moment, keep your head in the game, being fully present, in the zone, in the groove
Flow has been described across cultures and throughout history
For ex. The teachings of Buddhism speak of a state of mind of ‘doing without doing
’ Historians have describe Michaelangelo as having been in a flow-like state when painting the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in Rome. He was reported to have painted for days at a time and was so absorbed that he did not stop to sleep or eat. When he did stop to sleep, he awoke refreshed and within a short time of resuming his painting he was back into total absorption …flow.
The autotelic personality - people who can more easily achieve flow than the average person
Personality traits include -
1. Curiosity
2. Persistence
3. Low Self-centeredness
4. Intrinsically motivated - enjoy what they’re doing - not motivated by $/fame
5. Seek high-challenge, high-skill situations
Applications of flow theory -
1. Playgrounds -
2. Education - Montessori method provides more opportunity for flow experiences
3. Music - hip - hop refers to ‘flowing’ when rhyming off the top of your head
Base guitar - refer to being ‘in the pocket’ when playing between melody and percussion
4. Sports - flow is described as ‘being in the zone’
Sports psychology has measured improved reflexes and coordination when athletes are ‘in the zone
’5. Gaming - video game designers apply this theory to maximize the experience for gamers
6. Developers of computer software describe being in ‘hack mode’ when they’re in an undisturbed state of concentration
7. Stock market traders use the term ‘being in the pipe’ to describe the flow state when they are trading in high volume
Flow is a transcendent experience - meaning the loss of self-consciousness
Perhaps further research will result in classifying flow as an altered state of consciousness.
INTELLIGENCE
The text discusses biases that can effect problem solving on pages 332 and 333.
They are : 1. confirmation bias - which is the tendency to look for information that supports our ideas and opinions rather than being objective….and
2. hindsight bias - the ‘I knew it all along’ effect…..and
3. the availability heuristic - predicting the probability of something based on familiarity.
In discussing intelligence it is crucial to understand another reasoning error called REIFICATION - which is our tendency to view an abstract, immaterial concept as if it were a concrete thing.
To reify is to invent a concept, give it a name, and then convince ourselves that such a thing objectively exists in the world.
This is frequently the case when it comes to the concept of IQ.
When someone says, ‘She has an IQ of 120’, they are reifying IQ. They are imagining IQ to be a thing this person has, rather than a score she once obtained on a particular intelligence test. Better to say, ‘She scored 120 on the intelligence test’
.Intelligence is a socially constructed concept.
In the U.S., we generally define intelligence as the ability to do well on cognitive tasks,to solve problems, and to learn from experience.
Other cultures define intelligence by whatever attributes enable people to be successful in their cultures
.For ex. In the Amazon rain forest, intelligence is considered to be the ability to understand the medicinal qualities of local plants.
For research purposes, intelligence is what intelligence tests measure…..and historically that has been the type of intelligence known as school smarts.
The following video shows an excellent example of a person who was not successful at “school smarts”, but who has gone on to develop an expertise that may be different but surely requires a high degree of intelligence
.www.ted.comWillard Wiglin - Hold your Breath for micro sculpture
MEASURING INTELLIGENCE - A good intelligence test must have good validity, reliability, and standardization
1. Validity - Does the test measure what it intends to measure?
An important way to measure validity is the degree to which it predicts a person’s performance on another test or measure For ex. Correlating an intelligence test with a work performance measure such as performance evaluation
2. Reliability - Is test performance consistent (repeatable)?
In other words, if you took the same test 6 months later…or yr later..would you get the same results?
Reliability is tested by re-testing to see if the results are consistent
Can you have a test that is reliable but not valid? Yes
For ex. You could measure height with a tape measure…the results would be reliable…but if the tape measure was inaccurate, it would not be valid….
3. Standardization - using uniform procedures for administering and scoring a test This includes norms - performance standards.
Norms are based on giving the test to representative groups/samples of people and they tell us which scores are considered high, low, or average
Your scores can then be compared to the scores of other people in your group…usually age group
IQ Tests - The first intelligence test was developed by Alfred Binet in 1904 when he was asked to develop an intelligence test after France made a law requiring public education for all children.
The purpose of the intelligence test was to determine which children would benefit from regular education, and which children might require special education.
Binet developed the concept of mental age MA…which is an individual’s level of mental development compared to that of others
Average MA is the same as chronological age ..
CA Below average intelligence would result in an MA lower than CA
Above average intelligence would result in an MA higher than CA
Binet was outspoken and concerned about intelligence testing…..He was concerned that this measure would be reified and see intelligence as a fixed quantity., rather than as a test to simply identify those children in need of remedial help
He was afraid that the test would be used to label children and limit their opportunites.
Unfortunately his fears were realized shortly after his death in 1911.
IQ stands for Intelligence quotient
The term was developed in 1912 by William Stern
IQ = (MA/CA) x 100
Lewis Terman, a Stanford University professor, took Stern’s concept of IQ and applied it to Binet’s test which he then adapted to be used as a numerical measure of inherited intelligence. .
.The test became known as the Stanford-Binet…and keeps the same name today although after many revisions.
Terman promoted the widespread use of intelligence testing.
He was a supporter of eugenics - which was a movement in the 1900’s that supported measuring different traits and using the results to encourage only smart and fit people to reproduce.
Terman then worked with the U.S. government to conduct the world’s first mass administration of an intelligence test.
It was administered to WWI army recruitsand newly arriving immigrants
The results led to a change in the immigration laws of 1924 that reduced the quotas of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe in comparison to those from Northern and Western Europe…..so that groups with higher intelligence scores would be more easily admitted to the U.S.
Binet would have been horrified that his intelligence test had been adapted for this use
.The field of psychology soon became embarrassed by the earlier use of intelligence testing, but they are important reminders of how tests can be misused and misunderstood as well as effected by ideology and bias.
Cultural Bias in Testing
As intelligence tests were developed, it became apparent that test construction was often culturally biased in favor of urban rather than rural environments…..middle socioeconomic status vs. low SES…and white rather than African American populations.
Revisions have been made to revise and remove items that reflect cultural bias.
Bias means that the validity of a test would be reduced, since it would be not be measuring something the same way for different groups.
As of 2007, nearly all psychologists as represented by the APA’s Task Force on Intelligence….agree that the major U.S. intelligence tests and aptitude tests….the SAT and the ACT are not biased.
Their validity does not vary significantly between gender, or ethnic groups or economic groups.
Even so, researchers are continuing to work on the development of culture-fair tests -Tests that are completely without cultural bias
They have designed
1. Tests that have questions familiar to all groups of peopleAnd
2. Nonverbal tests
Genetics and Environmental Influences on Intelligence
How much is intelligence influence by genetics?
Heritability -the proportion of variability among people that we can attribute to genes…vs environment
Heritability index for intelligence is .75
this is a positive correlation between parental IQ and children’s IQ………. This suggests a strong genetic influence..
What is the influence of the environment on intelligence?
One interesting phenomenon is the Flynn effect
Researchers have noted that performance on intelligence tests has been rising steadily and that this increase had been reported in 20 countries.
Because the change has been happening so rapidly, it cannot be due to genetic factors, and therefore must be due to environmental factors…but it is still a mystery as to the exact causation.
Some possible explanations:
1. Rising levels of education
2. Better nutrition
3. More stimulating environments
4. Less childhood disease
5. More exposure to information
6. Smaller families with more parental involvment
7. One possible genetic explanation - Theory of ‘hybrid vigor’ - when cross-breeding occurs in livestock or produce such as corn, it results in offspring that are superior to parent….this may be a phenomenon in global mixing…multiracial offspring
Extremes of Intelligence
Scores on IQ tests generally conform to a normal distribution - the bell-shaped curve.
With the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale….the average IQ is 100
The standard deviation is 15 points
68% score between 1 +/- SD from the mean….scores between 85 and 115
95% score between 2 +/- SD scores between 70 and 130
Above 130.…is considered the Superior range of intelligence or giftedness
Below 70.…is termed mental retardation………intellectual disability
Giftedness - 2.5% of population
First studied by Terman who gave us the IQ quotient. He studied a group of 1,500 children with IQ’s of 150...called the Termites…
.he found that not only were they academically gifted, but they were socially adjusted as well.
A follow up longitudinal study showed that many of them became experts in their fields, but did not become creative geniuses in terms of change…they did not revolutionize their fields.
It has been suggested that gifted people are better off now because of less societal constraints due to racism and sexism and better access to information through technology.
A more current longitudinal study is the SMPY or the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth…started in 1971.
320 participants with average IQ’s of 180.
At age 23 they were pursuing doctorates at 50 times the average rate.
They were also socially well-adjusted as in Terman’s study, but they were more creative in their accomplishments.
There is a syndrome that includes both extremes of intelligence..high and low - Savants
- Savant Syndrome is a condition in which a person otherwise limited in mental ability has an exceptional specific skill, such as in computation or drawing.
This has been described as ‘having an island of brilliance’.
--------------------------------
Intellectual Disability
- defined as:
1. IQ below 70 as measured on a traditional intelligence test
2. Has difficulty adapting to everyday life…..deficits in independent living skills
3. Has these characteristics prior to the age of 18.
Only 1% of the population meet this definition.
And 50% more males than females.
There are many causes…one is Down Syndrome, a genetic cause…an extra chromosome #21.
Societal Changes concerning individuals with intellectual disabilities:
During the 1800’s, the intellectually disabled were cared for at home.
Those with the most severe disabilities often died, but the others found a place in the then mostly farm-based society.
From the late 1800’s to the 1970’s ‘state schools” - residential schools under the jurisdiction of state governments were established for the lifetime care of the ‘mentally retarded’.
This was the time of institutionalization, but many became warehouses with inadequate services.
At that time, when a disabled child was born, many parents were told to institutionalize them and to separate permanently before they became too attached.
In the 1970’s, across the country, states began the process of de-institutionalization - not only with the State schools but also with the state hospitals for the mentally ill.
The State schools were gradually closed as children and adults were either returned home with social services to help them, or were moved into residential group homes established throughout the communities to provide home-like environments for residents.
Many children were mainstreamed back into public schools with the goal being to provide children and adults with the ‘least restrictive” environment possible
The final topic under the section on Intelligence involves Theories of multiple intelligences.
The book discussed Sternberg’s Triarchic Theory and Gardner’s Eight Frames of Mind.
These theories propose multiple areas of intelligence…
.traditional intelligence tests tend to be divided into two main forms of intelligence for assessment - verbal and spatial (performance).
The theories of multiple intelligence have had an impact on education and motivated teachers to identify the different ways in which their students learn and process information.
,Next, I’d like to discuss the concepts of social intelligence and emotional intelligence.
Social intelligence - the know-how involved in comprehending social situations and managing oneself successfully.
The concept of social intelligence was first coined in 1920 by the famous psychologist Edward Thorndike who stated that “the best mechanic in the factory may fail as a foreman for lack of social intelligence”.
It is this awareness that is at the root of management training programs in various companies that realize that performing tasks and leading people require different skills.
One type of social intelligence is emotional intelligence which consists of 4 components
The ability to:
1. Perceive emotions - recognize them in faces, music, stories
2. Understand emotions - predict them and how they change and blend
3. Manage emotions - know when and when not to express them
.4. Use emotions - to enable adaptive or creative thinking
Research indicates that people who score high on measures of emotional intelligence, are emotionally in tune with others, and are more likely to succeed in career, marriage, and parenting in comparison to people who are academically smarter, but emotionally less intelligent.
