1. Gould (1982) (A2) A Nation of Morons

2. Is your intelligence fixed?
What is intelligence?
Are you intelligent?
Is your intelligence fixed?
Are you born intelligent?
How can you measure intelligence?

3. Activity
Have a go at the IQ test on your handout – half of you should have a handout with a key and half without.
Answers:
a. Fourth Thursday of November (when Thanksgiving takes place)
b. American footballer (plays Quarterback for the Green Bay Packers)
a. Bed (as in river bed)
c. 18 (two previous numbers added together)
d. 9 (7 + 2)
b. Hawaii (the fiftieth state to joint the USA)
d. Down (the opposite of up)
b. Money (‘change’ is money)
a. Red (it is the political colour of the president – red is Republican. Obama is 44 (blue), Clinton is 42 (blue) and Bush is 43 (red))
c. Lion (not a traditional domestic pet)

4. Scoring
If you scored 7+ then you are a genius and have a great chance of getting an A in psychology. I will make sure you are stretched in lessons so you can reach your potential.
If you scored 4–6 then you did okay but a C may be most likely for you.
If you scored less than 4 then you will have to work very hard just to pass the course.

5. Before a riot ensues… What is this activity designed to do?
What does it illustrate?
What is the purpose of the symbols and the key?
Does it test IQ?
Many of you will have scored poorly. This will be due to not having the symbols and due to a lot of questions being based around American culture. Don’t worry, it does not test IQ. However, this exercise does link well to our next study…

6. Gould and Yerkes The research we are going to look at is by Yerkes.
Stephen Gould did the very same when he published ‘A Nation of Morons’ in 1982, in which he reviewed Yerkes’ study.
Gould, along with many others, was very critical of the research and the impact that it had on many people’s lives.
This key study is about Gould. He conducted a review article of Yerkes’ original study. This presentation will discuss Yerkes in order to critique his work, just like Gould did.

7. Yerkes (1876–1956)
Yerkes wanted psychology to be considered a science (it was currently – early twentieth century – being viewed as a ‘soft science’).
He believed that to be a science psychology needed to concern itself with number and quantification.
The area that interested Yerkes was the field of mental testing.
Yerkes needed a large sample of men to test. Where could he find such a group around the mid-1910s?

8. Sample
Yerkes used the US military for his testing and in total tested 1.75 million men.
The varying educational levels of the men meant that multiple tests had to be designed.
They were …

9. Army Alpha
Literate recruits would be given the Army Alpha – a written test.
Army Beta
Illiterates and those who failed the Alpha would be given the Beta. If you failed the Beta you would be called back for an individual examination (the third test).

10. Army Alpha
The Alpha included eight parts, took less than an hour, and could be given to large groups at the same time. Most of the items in the test comprised such tasks as filling in the next number in a sequence, unscrambling sentences, and analogies. If you have ever taken an IQ test these types of questions would seem familiar as this test was the beginning of what would become a prominent area of psychology. Example questions are given below:
Washington is to Adams as first is to …
Crisco is a: patent medicine, disinfectant, toothpaste, food product
Christy Mathewson is famous as a: writer, artist, baseball player, comedian
Any issue with these questions?
Answers – first question is ‘second’ (first and second US presidents); Crisco is a food product; Mathewson was a baseball player.

11. Army Beta
The Beta was a series of tests designed for illiterate recruits and those who failed the Alpha. An example of the pictorial test section of the test is opposite.
What is missing from each picture?
[insert 15_03 PH]

12. Scoring the tests
Army psychologists would give a grade to each man, ranging from A to E (with plusses and minuses).
Yerkes suggested that recruits with a score of C− should be classed as low average intelligence and would be best suited to ordinary private. Men getting a D grade were considered ‘rarely suited for tasks requiring special skill’.
What is the potential damage done by these tests?

13. Issues
Yerkes found that many recruits had spent little time in education and so the queue for the Beta test grew.
The standards required to take the Alpha were lowered, but not consistently across all army camps. In some, schooling up to the third grade counted as literate (so they would have to take the Alpha) and in others anyone who could read took the Alpha.
Those individuals who failed the Alpha should have filtered through the system and taken the Beta, but due to time constraints they didn’t and as a result many scored zero.

14. Results – Impact of the tests
Before the First World War there were 9000 US officers; by the end of the war there were 200,000. Two-thirds of these came from camps where the tests were done, suggesting that the tests had a major impact on soldiers’ roles.
In some camps, no man scoring a C or below would be considered for officer training.

15. Results from the tests
The average mental age of a white American soldier (13) was just above that of a moron (the standard score was set at 16). This was used to suggest a decline in intelligence and that breeding of the poor and the spread of negro blood though inter-breeding was to blame.
The results from the tests showed that the darker people of southern Europe and the Slavs of eastern Europe were found to be less intelligent than the fair people of western and northern Europe.
Black recruits lay at the bottom of the scale, with an average mental age of Some camps furthered this by separating black individuals into three groups based on intensity of skin colour.
Lighter individuals scored higher!

16. Discussion
The results were used to suggest that some racial groups were superior to others.
This helped inform political policy and in particular was used as ‘evidence’ to restrict immigration (The Immigration Restriction Act, 1924).
This caused a huge issue for many, but for one particular group it would be hugely important as it meant they would be unable to travel to America in a time when they needed to leave their own country.

17. Historical impact
It is estimated that 6 million people from southern, central and eastern Europe (all areas that scored low on the tests) tried to enter America between 1924 and 1939 but were denied. Many of these people suffered due to not being allowed to enter.
One of the groups that was found to be low in intelligence were the Jews. Many tried to leave Germany to come to the USA before the Second World War started, but were unable to due to the immigration restrictions.

18. ‘I believe those tests were worth what the war cost, even in human life, if they served to show clearly to our country, and the degrees of intelligence in different races who are coming to us, in a way which no one can say is the result of prejudice … We have learned once and for all that the Negro is not like us. So in regard to many races and sub-races in Europe we learned that some which we had believed possessed of an order of intelligence perhaps superior to ours [i.e. Jews] were far inferior.’
Henry Fairfield Osborn (president of the American Museum of Natural History), 1923
‘We know what happened to many who wished to leave but had nowhere to go. The paths to destruction are often indirect, but ideas can be agents as sure as guns and bombs.’
Gould, 1982

19. Yerkes’ view on his research
‘There are indications to the effect that individuals handicapped by language difficulties and illiteracy are penalised to an appreciable degree in Beta as compared with men not so handicapped.’
(So Yerkes did note that there may be some issue with his tests.)
When it was suggested that there was a positive correlation between length of time someone had lived in America and their test score, Yerkes said this may be a possibility but that a heredity difference between the races was more likely. It was also suggested that maybe the first wave of immigrants had been more intelligent and that the latest wave was from the dregs of Europe.

20. Criticisms of the tests
The data was analysed subjectively. One of Yerkes’ followers carried out the analysis and the conclusions were made to fit the hereditary argument.
Many individuals took the Alpha when they should have been taking the Beta. They then should have been picked up due to their low score and completed the Beta, but many weren’t.
The Beta test still relied on certain skills, like number, etc. (see next slide for more).
Criticisms of the tests
Many of the questions were culturally biased. Think back to the pictures in the Beta test. How are these culturally biased?
Black recruits and recent immigrants were the ones most likely to be taking the wrong test. This is because they often couldn’t read/use a pencil but due to demand they had to take whatever test was available.

21. Issues with the Beta Test
‘It was touching to see the intense effort … put into answering the questions, often by men who never before had held a pencil in their hands.’
Examiner for the Beta test, 1968, recalling his experience
The Beta test was designed to be used by illiterate men, but it still relied on pencil work (writing), knowledge of numbers and how to write them.

22. Evaluation Validity Ecological validity Reliability Ethics Other
Did the tests measure intelligence?
What extraneous variables were there?
Ecological validity
Is being tested an everyday experience?
Was the study conducted in the real world?
Reliability
Was the criteria for who did what test consistent across all camps?
Did all camps receive the same questions?
Sample size?
Ethics
Did the participants give fully informed consent?
Could they withdraw?
Any harm? Short term or long term?
Other
Do the results support the nature or the nurture debate?
Is the study scientific?
Is the study useful? If so, who is it useful to?

23. Links to debates
One of the major ideas in this study is the role of nature and nurture. Where would you place Yerkes on this debate? Where would Gould be placed? Where would you place yourself?
Yerkes wanted psychology to be considered a science. Did he succeed? If he failed, where did he fail?
The third important debate is whether the research is socially sensitive. Was the research that Yerkes conducted socially sensitive? Did he consider the ways his research would be used?

24. Links to areas/perspectives
Gould’s study falls within the individual differences area because it is reviewing an attempt (by Yerkes) to develop a way of measuring how individuals differ in their intelligence.
It is worth noting that many studies can come under more than one area. For example, Gould could also be said to come under developmental psychology.

25. Links to key themes
The key theme of this study is ‘measuring differences’; Yerkes attempted to measure the intellectual differences of First World War recruits.
Gould argues that psychologists should be careful when measuring differences as cultural biases may impact the findings. There is also the possibility of the results not being socially sensitive and being misused.

26. 5 points improvement plan
Write at least five improvements Yerkes could have made. Use keywords.
Psychology warning poster
Design a poster that explains in what ways psychological research needs to be treated carefully by
Psychologists
Media
Government
People reading about research in the news

27. Psychologists warning poster should contain
Examples of how research could be used negatively
Examples of people that might misuse your research
Ways in which psychologists can
- Ensure their work is valid
- How can they make sure they don’t succumb to confirmation bias
- How can they draw careful conclusions