C800 Psychology : Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life

The Race/IQ controversy that emerged following the 1969 publication of Jensen How Much Can We Boost IQ and School Achievement? paper which implied that the average Black White group difference in IQ was genetically grounded.'

This lecture is called 'Conceptual and Historical Issues and Individual Differences.'

The history regarding the race and the intelligence controversy is related to the historical development of debate which relates to the possible explanation on the differentiations which are encountered in the race and intelligence study. The IQ testing began around the First World War and since then it has been observed that there is a difference between the average scores of population groups (Boucher, 2014). However, till date, there is a lack of agreement upon whether the same was due to the cultural factors or environmental factors, or possibly through some genetic factors or a dichotomy between genetic and environmental factors. In 1969, a long article was published by Arthur Jensen where it was suggested that there had been a failure n compensatory education owing to the genetic group differences. Jensen implied that there was a genetic difference in the IQ of black and white people and this was inherently grounded (Jensen, 1969). This articles remains as the most controversial article in the field of psychology till date. In the following parts, an attempt has been made to go behind this controversy and to establish if the statements made by Jensen had proper backing and whether these were more of a racial discrimination.

Arthur Jensen was an education psychologist who lit fire which became a global firestorm with the publication of his 1969 article in which it was suggested that there was a gap in the IQ test scores between the white and the black students and this was due to the genetic difference between these races. His work not only opened the channel gates of claims of racial bias, but also on the different theories which had an impact over the difference in IQs of different people (Miele, 2009). In his article, he stated that there were two kinds of learning abilities, level one was associative ability which covered the role of retaining the facts, and the level two was one which covered problem solving, and had conceptual ability, which involved abstract thinking. This type was a rough equivalent to the general intelligence which was denoted through letter ‘g’ in psychology. When he conducted the IQ tests on different group of students, he found that Level one was consistent fairly throughout all the races (Lynn, 2015). However, when level two was examined, it was found to be more prevalent in the case of white students in comparison to the black students and was even more prevalent amongst the Asians instead of whites (Gallagher and Lippard, 2014). These findings led Jensen to make the argument that the general intelligence was majorly determined on the basis of genes of a person, factored in with the cultural forces which shape it to a certain extent. This led him to write back in 1969 that the Head Start and other compensatory programs were bound to fail big (Fox, 2012).

Even though there were observers who did praise the work of Jensen, particularly for being a scientist who was not afraid to go in the direction which the data led him; however, the majority deemed Jensen as a racist person. Throughout his speaking engagements in his career, he was heckled and even his effigies were burnt in some college campuses, along with him receiving death threats which led him to be accompanied by the bodyguards. Jensen’s idea regarding the intelligence being cleaved in the racial lines was deemed as Jensenism and this became a source of heated public discussion. The claims of Jensen were majorly claimed upon by Stephen Jay Gould through his 1981 book. However, his work was approved by Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray through their 1994 book (Herrnstein and Murray, 2010). There is also a faction of psychologists who claim that the work of Jensen had been widely misunderstood. For this, emphasis is made on the paper which Jensen had actually written where it was stated that there was a possibility of the genetic differentiation amongst the racial groups. When Jensen wrote the paper, a large portion of it was based on the hereditary basis for the intellectual ability. This issue had negligence arguments against it. What made the discussion of Jensen was the difference between races which continue to be a controversial topic till date (Martin, 2008).

The work of Jensen has been notably opposed by Professor Flynn who has argued that the IQ gap between black and white was merely because of the difference in the environment of origin. Due to these environmental factors, the academicians have maintained that the work of Jensen did not take into consideration the environmental factors (Byrd and Clayton, 2015). In terms of Sonja C. Grover, who is a Lakehead University’s education psychologist, socioeconomic status was the best indicator for the IQ score of a person. The socioeconomic status was related to the quality of teacher and quality of schooling which a person is exposed to. A number of people who did poor on the IQ tests had poor funds of knowledge; but this was not an indicator of such individuals not being intelligent. Jensen’s work has also been opposed by Professor Grover who stated that there was a need to construct such tests of general intelligence which were free of cultural bias, which makes the isolation of heredity as a source of intelligence, a possibility (Fox, 2012).

The social scientists have stressed on the environmentalist view of intelligence. Sandra Scarr and Richard Weinberg had studies the difference between the African American children growing up in adopted families and those growing up in their biological families. They came to the conclusion that the environment effects outweighed the heredity effects. The IQ scores of different ethnic groups between 1920 and 1970 were examined by Thomas Sowell who found that the scores of some groups had improved in a key manner (Sowell, 2010). There have been other studies which have stated that the scores for other groups have also increased with improvements in living conditions and teachings. After reviewing large data, Torste Husen concluded with his colleagues that the improvements in social and economic conditions, along with the availability of schooling produced major gain in the average IQ between two consecutive generations. Thus, this view showed that the educators were able to improve upon the scores of low-achieving students (Ornstein et al. 2013).

Even with so much controversy surrounding his views, Jensen never recanted his views and continued with the claim of his work having been misunderstood. However, the critics still continued on the lack of clear evidence, which could be scientifically satisfactory, to show that the difference between IQ of two groups was due to their classification as black and white people. The only thing which is agreed upon by the individuals is that this difference is an open question due to the idea of inherited general intelligence (The Telegraph, 2013).

There have been culture-only theorists who point out that the white have an advantage in the shared family environment and these are the key reasons for their high IQ. Though, this theory fails in predicting the research results over last decades. This is established through the reverse digit test where the subjects are made to listen to strings of numbers, which have to be repeated in reverse order, which becomes harder task in comparison to repeated the same in the order in which they were made (Plotnik and Kouyoumdjian, 2013). Repeating numbers is a part of “culture” but reverse repeating is not. So, where the whites have cultural advantage over the black people, why is it that there is a big ability gap in the reverse rest, which tests nothing in the environment, which the whites are prepared for. The scientists have thus depicted that the demanding tests are more heritable in comparison to the easier tests, which disproves the environment theory. Performance over the reverse digit test was a matter of native ability, which cannot be improved through fancy environment. The culture only theory also fails in explaining the reason for the children of high income black groups scoring lower than children of low income whites. Where the IQ scores could improve with the help of good surroundings, such rich black kids should have boosted IQs in comparison to the poor white kids (Rushton and Jensen, 2005).

There is also a fact that wealthy people are wealthy as they are smart and they are aware of the means to make money and this trait is found in their children, not because they are rich but because they get the genes from their smart parents. Where it happens that the whites and blacks are matched in economic and social status, the IQ gap is reduced just by one third, and the black-white gap for children of the wealthiest parents continues to be higher in comparison to the gap for poorer parents’ children. A regression towards the mean, which is a genetic phenomenon strictly, explains this in the best manner. Nature has the tendency of tempering extremes, so tall people have tall children but not as tall as themselves and the same is true for short people. Studies have also shown that the children of blacks and whites are also regressing towards their means, which is 100 for whites and 85 for blacks. This is the reason for holding Jensen as a pioneer in the field on the basis of the reaction time tests (Rushton and Jensen, 2005).

A middle position has also been attained by certain sects. The synthesizer’s view has been adopted by some social scientists who have synthesized the position on this controversy. This view of intelligence of the synthesizers provides that in the measuring of intelligence there is a need to consider the role of both heredity and environment for measuring intelligence. In this regard, Christopher Jencks reviewed large chunk of data and came to the conclusion that the heredity has 45% responsibility for variance in IQ and the environment holds 35% responsibility, and 20% is due to the interaction between these two factors. This data, along with other data had been reviewed by Robert Nichols and he concluded that the true value of heredity was between 40-80%, though the exact value did not hold significance for policy. It has been maintained in general by the synthesizers, including Nichols that heredity determines a fixed limit of range and in these limits, the heredity and environment react wand yield the actual intelligence of a person. Through recent case studies, this view has been supported and has shown that in impoverished families, the majority of variations in IQ were related to the quality of environment; whilst in the case of wealthier families, where it is presumed that more adequate environment is provided heredity puts a major influence over the intelligence of children. As a result of this view, even when there is an interaction between environment and heredity, and the same limits the ability of specifying exactly how much of the intelligence of a person is reflected in the environmental factors, the parents and teachers would have to provide every child with the productive environment for realizing their maximum potential (Ornstein et al. 2013).

Thus, from the discussion carried on in the previous segments, it becomes clear that with the article published by Jensen, the floodgates were opened against his theory being a wrong one. His reasoning of difference in the IQ as a result of the difference in race of people was deemed as a racial discrimination and had been widely criticized by different scholars. The opponents stated that there were environmental factors or other reasons which resulted in difference in the IQs of different people. However, Jensen was adamant on his work and proved that environmental factors had little effect over the IQ of people, by collaborating with other authors. Even with these explanations, the controversy continues, and time and again things are stated by proponents and opponents. This has even led to amalgamation of the different views being attained by different scholars, where they have shown interconnectivity between the environmental and the heredity factors as the reasons for the difference in IQ. Nevertheless, the view of the writer supports the view of Jensen and denies the allegations of Jensen’s work being discriminatory in any sense.

References:

Boucher, E. (2014) Empire's Children: Child Emigration, Welfare, and the Decline of the British World, 1869–1967. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Byrd, W.M., and Clayton, L.A. (2015) An American Health Dilemma: Race, Medicine, and Health Care in the United States 1900-2000. 2^nd ed. Oxon: Routledge.

Fox, M. (2012) Arthur R. Jensen Dies at 89; Set Off Debate About I.Q. [Online] The New York Times. Available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/02/science/arthur-r-jensen-who-set-off-debate-on-iq-dies.html?module=ArrowsNav&contentCollection=Science&action=keypress&region=FixedLeft&pgtype=article [Accessed on: 30/11/17]

Gallagher, ‎C.A., and Lippard, C.D. (2014) Race and Racism in the United States: An Encyclopedia of the American Mosaic [4 volumes]. California: ABC-CLIO.

Herrnstein, R.J., and Murray, C. (2010) Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life. New York: Free Press Paperbacks.

Jensen, A.R. (1969) How much can we boost IQ and scholastic achievement? Harvard Educational Review, 39(1), pp. 1-123.

Lynn, R. (2015) Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis. 2^nd ed. Whitefish, Montana: Washington Summit Publishers.

Martin, G.N. (2008) Psychology: A Beginner's Guide. Oxford: Oneworld Publications.

Miele, F. (2009) Intelligence, Race, And Genetics: Conversations With Arthur R. Jensen. New York: Avalon Publishing.

Ornstein, A.C., et al. (2013) Foundations of Education. 12^th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Plotnik, R., and Kouyoumdjian, H. (2010) Introduction to Psychology. 10^th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Rushton, J.P., and Jensen, A.R. (2005) Thirty Years of Research on Race Differences in Cognitive Ability. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 11(2).

Sowell, T. (2010) Black Rednecks and White Liberals. New York: Encounter Books.

The Telegraph. (2013) Arthur Jensen. [Online] The Telegraph. Available from: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/9774459/Arthur-Jensen.html [Accessed on: 30/11/17]