Intelligence and IQ

1. Intelligence and IQ

2. Current Controversy - Delinquency, Race, IQ • What does IQ really measure? • Innate factors? • Learned factors? • Academic achievement, reading ability, test-wiseness? • Is IQ culturally biased? • If there are innate differences, are they caused by genetics or the environment?

3. IQ and Crime • Mental deficiencies  crime • IQ expresses numerical differences in “mental abilities” • Early 1900’s, Simon and Binet, France • Large number of everyday tasks, by difficulty • Age levels assigned to tasks • “Mental age” based on tasks that test-takers can complete • IQ = Mental age/chronological age X 100 • For example: Test taker is 9-years old, can complete tasks for a 9-year old, IQ=100 • Smarter 9-year olds, higher IQ; duller, lower IQ • Binet felt that persons could raise their IQ through training

4. IQ Testing in America • Unlike Binet, Americans felt that IQ was fixed (inborn) • Early purpose to sort people into appropriate roles • IQ’s above 115 appropriate for the professions • Identify the subnormal, institutionalize them to prevent reproduction • Goddard • For an adult, a mental age 13 is the lower limit of normalcy, mental age 12 is “feeble-minded” • In one study 70 percent of incarcerated inmates were found to be feeble-minded • Goddard - feeble-minded persons are potential criminals, should be institutionalized & not reproduce

5. Studies in America • WWI, military used age 12 & below as disqualifying for service • 37% of whites and 89% of blacks were disqualified, meaning that nearly half the population was “feeble-minded” • Goddard’s reaction • He changed his mind • Cannot equate IQ tests with native abilities • Feeble-mindedness can be remedied by education • Later studies • No difference in IQ scores for prisoners & draftees • Cannot conclude that most criminals are feeble-minded

6. 1967 - William Shockley • IQ measures a “fundamental social capacity” • Differences between Afro-Americans and Euro-Americans due to genetic differences • Differences in IQ explain differences in poverty and in crime rates

7. After Shockley • 1969 article by Arthur Jensen • IQ measures a factor important in Western industrialized societies • 80 percent of differences due to genetics, rather than the environment • 1976, 1987 articles by Robert Gordon • Variations in delinquency rates best explained by IQ • Social class does not explain away the relationship (IQ a better predictor of delinquency than social class) • 1977 article by Hirschi and Hindelang • IQ as important as race & social class in predicting delinquency • IQ has been ignored because of bias against it

8. “Verbal” -v- “Performance” IQ • For most, the scores are similar • Delinquents have large gaps, with poor verbal but “basically” normal performance IQ’s • Poor verbal ability  Delinquency • Yes but there’s an intervening variable • Poor verbal ability  school problems  delinquency • Poor verbal ability  poor problem-solving abilities  delinquency • No - it’s a spurious relationship. The actual cause is... • Scholastic underachievement  delinquency • Social conditions  delinquency

9. Three competing conceptsof what IQ really measures • Abstract reasoning/problem-solving ability, largely inherited (nature) • May be affected by environmental factors • Low IQ parents may poorly rear children, holding back their IQ’s • Qualities related to the dominant culture (cultural bias) • General abilities, largely determined by environment (nurture) • Performance may be affected in low-income areas • Ineffective child-rearing • Poor schooling • Weak family supports

10. Personality

11. What is “personality”? • Individual emotional and behavioral attributes and qualities (other than intellectual ability) that remain relatively constant • Aggressiveness • Impulsivity • Introversion/extroversion • Friendly/hostile • Cooperative/uncooperative

12. Personality studies • 1950 – Gluecks • Compared 500 delinquent and 500 non-delinquent boys • Mix of characteristics was different • Delinquents more extroverted, impulsive, hostile • Delinquents less fearful of failure, less deferential to authority • Predictors of delinquency • Social background • Character traits (Roscharch test) • Personality traits (psychiatric interview) • MMPI demonstrates similar results • 550 statements used for psychiatric diagnoses • Scale 4 used to predict delinquency. Has been criticized because... • Some items are delinquency (“when I was young I stole things”) • Other items are non-delinquency (“I like school”) • Ignores environment

13. Antisocial Personality Disorder(psychopathy) • APA DSM defines (doesn’t explain) criminal and delinquent behavior • APA DSM-4 - Antisocial personality disorder (APD): “pervasive pattern of disregard and violation of the rights of others that begins in childhood and continues to adulthood”. • At least 3 characteristics: repeated lawbreaking, repeated lying and deceit, impulsivity, repeated physical fights, repeated failure to work, lack of remorse • Characteristics must be: inflexible, maladaptive, persistent, cause significant functional impairment or personal distress • Adult antisocial behavior (criminal behavior in absence of APD) • Some gang researchers see “core” gang members as sociopaths who use the mob to act out their own aggression • Mc Cord - recidivism rates of delinquents diagnosed as psychopaths only slightly worse than those for others

14. Psychiatric prediction offuture dangerousness • 10-year study by Kozol, Boucher and Garofalo of high-risk offenders being released from prison • Psychiatric evaluation failed to predict two-thirds of subsequent violent offending • Two-thirds of those predicted to become violent did not • Monahan – clinical prediction difficult, requires that individual’s general situation not change • Compare context of past offending with new circumstances • Time since, severity and frequency of past violence • Yields probability for persons of like demographic characteristics

15. “Actuarial” prediction ofcrime and delinquency • Move away from predicting whether individuals will commit violence • Actuarial prediction: what factors are associated with an increased likelihood of future offending? • Best predictor of future delinquency is early childhood behavior • Disruptive classroom behavior, aggressiveness, lying, dishonesty (tautology problem) • May be affected by personality characteristics not measured by testing • Other predictors of future delinquency • Poor parental supervision • Separation from parents • Offending by parents and siblings • Low intelligence and educational attainment • Optimism about the possibility of intervention

16. Impulsivity and crime • Definition • High level of activity, impatience for rewards, seek immediate gratification, easily distracted • Wilson & Herrnstein : Impulsivity  Conscience  Crime • Crime is naturally rewarding • We must be restrained by internal inhibitions (conscience), developed in early childhood through family rearing • Key factor: considering long-term rather than just the short-term consequences of one’s actions • Contributing factors • Poor child-rearing produces weak inhibitions • Membership in deviant subcultures • Mass media (modeling), learning one is a “victim” • Economic system/legitimate opportunities to gain rewards • Schools

17. Impulsivity and persistenceof criminal behavior • Walters – “lifestyle criminals” • Irresponsibility, self-indulgence, chronic violation of social rules • Feelings of entitlement, being a “victim” • Power orientation – “dog-eat-dog world” • Superoptimism – feeling of invulnerability • Cognitive indolence – not paying attention to life details • Discontinuity – failing to set goals, carry out commitments • Moffitt – “life-course persistent offenders” - engaging in anti-social behavior at every stage of life • Early neurophysiological problems: nutrition, mother’s drug use, birth complications, • Home situation: child abuse, lack of affection & supervision • Disrupts schooling, less ability for legitimate rewards • Caspi, Moffitt et al study of “crime-proneness” • Children who experience excessive anger, anxiety, irritability may be “quicker on the draw” (more impulsive)

18. Policy implications • Impulsivity seems to be best psychological candidate as a cause of crime and delinquency (author’s favorite) • Some theories (e.g., Moffitt) specify causes of behavior (e.g., early psych. problems, poor parenting) & suggesting interventions • Clinical • Parenting classes • Special education • Author downplays psychological causes • IQ differences & school achievement can supposedly be explained by environment alone • Methodological problems – attaching personality labels simply because of differences in rates of offending • “Crime” is a societal definition, while “behavior” is the end result of a complex individual process • Difficulty in using personality to explain crime in general