Has the average level of intelligence went down?

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I feel like as we go on, the average level of intelligence has gone down. Look at today's music, movies and pop culture obsessions.

Look at public policy decisions. Twenty years, America would have never invaded Iraq.

Indeed, intelligence has gone down.

Just under twenty years ago, America did invade Iraq. About fifty years ago, America invaded Vietnam. Pop culture isn't much worse than it ever has been, it's just more visible now because of mass media. Measured intelligence has been steadily increasing (Flynn effect).

Actually about 10 years ago or so I read an article that IQ-s go up, and that was explained by the popularity of video games that train performance IQ. However, it was also noticed that verbal component of IQ goes down, and that is because school and reading gets out of favor. Nevertheless, the performance IQ outweighs the verbal, so the total IQ goes up and they have to constantly readjust the scaling in order to keep 100 the average.

However, IQ is not everything. As far as actual education system, I agree that it gets worse as far as USA is concerned, although I don't know about other countries. I heard many possible reasons why it happens. One such reason is that they are trying to accomodate black students more and more. The other reason is that, as I mentioned, ppl get more and more preoccupied with TV and video games so they don't have time to study properly; and then schools try to lower the education in order not to fail too many students.

I am not sure about countries other than USA though. In Russia education became better rather than worse, as now they are studying calculus in high school over there, while back in 1960-s when my father was in school calculus used to be a college subject. But again, since calculus has been high school subject in Russia for at least two decades, it is not an evidence for any RECENT improvement, so it is conceivable that, for instance, while they still teach calculus in high school, perhaps they don't go as deep as they went two decades ago. But again I don't have evidence for that either, thats pure speculation.

Last edited by Roman on 26 Sep 2009, 12:36 pm, edited 2 times in total.

If you trust IQ tests as a measure of intelligence, the average intelligence has actually gone up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect

yay wikipedia!

But seriously, I think we're just better at solving puzzles than we used to be. A modern technological world requires that more than a world where you had to have more physical and visual-spatial skills, such as sewing a dress or quickly identifying weeds in a garden. Populations naturally shift towards traits that are useful for them.

What does accommodating black students have to do with it? My black classmates are just the same threat to the curve that the white ones are; and they're the second or third generation to get decent schooling so you can't really argue that having to teach people whose parents aren't well-educated is more difficult. Maybe it dragged down averages when we were first integrating schools and people who'd had crappy educations beforehand had to catch up, but there's no way that effect lasted past the point at which they'd been getting a proper education for a couple of years.

I read that at least since the mid 90s, IQ in Germany has dropped steadily, but it's not clear why...

I also observe that the students at university score lower and lower each year, despite the lectures and the questions really never changing much.. in fact, we have to make the tests easier in order to at least give them a chance to pass...

I also heard from some teachers that young children who are doing their introduction tests to elementary school often can't handle the easiest tests (like recognizing what shapes of bricks would fit into certain openings in some typical children toy). Some of them can't even use the toilet alone at the age of 6... my mom also tells me that they now regularly have 1 or 2 children that are so uncontrollable that they have to call the police or other help in order to be able to deal with them (that also never happened in the past).

I heard about the Flynn effect, but I think that is only true as long as health standards (especially nutrition!) improves... in a modern western country, IQ won't improve much more, given that nutrition is already as good as it gets, it might even get worse...

My dear husband is a math teacher.

I took Math 11 in the mid 1990's at the age of 24 (as I had done so dismally in math during my teens in high school and just scraped by with a "pass" in Math 11). After taking it in night school with a wonderful teacher - I got an A + and was in the top three of the class!! !!

My dear husband, who I met about 12 years later, told me that the new curriculum is harder now and that (even if I remembered what I learned 12 years ago) I would actually have trouble with the course now.

Also, the kindergarten children have a much higher level of skills and knowledge than 25 years ago. They enter kindergarten already knowing their numbers to 20, their colours often even read (I learned to read in first grade and was on par with my peers in this respect).

As for music, pop culture and wars and such. Crikey, explain Vietnam (1960's/1970's), explain Tiny Tim (not the Dickens character - the "tip toe thru the tulips" guy (again, the 1960's), explain Vanilla Ice (1980's rapper), what were people thinking with their pet rocks a few decades ago???

As for obsessions today - let's see - I am involved with a big obsession - Community Gardens - people using public and unused private space to create a garden growing vegetables for the community. We have movies such as The English Patient, Stranger Than Fiction, Perfume, and (although using low -brow humor - the very good "I Love You Man!". In the past - we have had such winners as "Bedtime for Bonzo" and the whole "Friday the 13th" series of awful films (the 1970's)

The thing is - every generation has had challenges. Every generation has had people in charge making bone-headed decisions. Every generation has had silliness. Every generation has had something profound. Every generation has thought that the emerging generation was "going downhill".

If anything - just based on knowlege of facts - the kids might be smarter today.

As for how they use these smarts - People are just people The next generation will take this knowledge and then incorporate it into something that is individual to themselves and the next generation will do the same thing.

Peace.

I think now that we're including and accommodating disabled children, there are naturally going to be more of them at school. Additionally, children who have congenital health problems are now surviving longer and staying healthier; so there are more disabled kids, period, thanks to better health care. I'm guessing that the combination of kids surviving to school age, and being allowed in schools, probably explains the phenomenon of there being more of them there.

I doubt it. Literacy rates are higher now than at any point in human history.


At my public high school in the US, I was able to complete two years worth of college material by the time I graduated (through AP classes), thus entering university with junior standing. That's certainly a much better education than was available to my parents or grandparents.

Calculus is a high school subject for the advanced students, a college subject for the slower ones. I don't think that has changed much.

Tiptoe Through the Tulips was a cover of a song from the 1920s Stage Show Gold Diggers of Broadway - Tiny Tim's falsetto, though it sounded ridiculous coming from a man, was actually his attempt to recreate the sound of the version recorded by Annette Hanshaw in 1929. As you might imagine, Annette's was much easier on the ears.

That's all!

Okay, that's not all...

I don't think the average level of intelligence has 'went' down (although the level of grammar may have) - I think humans have as much native intelligence as ever, if not more.

The level of intellectual LAZINESS has risen dramatically. I do think constant immersion in the mindlessness of 24/7 pop culture media has lulled a huge portion of the planet's population into simply not bothering to think, read, question or to spend any amount of meditative time analyzing the world around them.

So, ironically, the base IQ level may actually be higher, but there ARE a great many more STUPID PEOPLE in the world than ever before.

Hmmm...I've never liked it when people talk like this for some reason. I find it very judgmental. By stating 'average' I can assume you put yourself above? Well, for one, the topic header should have been "has the average level of intelligence gone down" not "went down" and in your short paragraph you are missing the word "ago" from the sentence "Twenty years, America...". That's just basic English, sorry but people who live in glass houses as they say...

I think people are better educated than in the past simply for more opportunities to become educated and by bringing up Iraq, it is like you are forgetting all those other stupid wars we got ourselves into. There were also other atrocities committed in the past, lots. Also, in the past, women weren't taught to read, how can you educate yourself if you can't read? Now women have overtaken men in law and medical schools all across the country. Yes, things have changed, for the better. At least I can vote and get an education.

I don't understand this one. there are cultural reasons why kids would need accommodations, but skin color is not one I've heard about. I've read that 1st generation American kids have issues in school when their parents come from cultures that don't emphasize early learning and kids arrive in kindergarten not knowing how to count or even not having been read to as preschoolers. there's a disparity between the population that emphasizes participation with their kids' eduction in the home and the one who leaves it up to the education system, and IMO that disparity will continue. that's not a color issue, it's a cultural issue that effects white kids, too.

also, attention span seems shorter to me in general. TV is training kids not to think or analyze, but to be entertained with fast-moving, shallow stories.

Exactly. People often confuse intellectual capacity with intellectual knowledge. One is stupidity, the other is ignorance.

Read the book "The Bell Curve". It shows that those with the lowest IQs tend to marry earlier and have more kids and have each new generation sooner than the most highly educated who do not have children for the main part.

The book goes on to suggest this will cause us to experience an explosion of crime (usually committed by the dumbest in each society (autistics excepted), - for proof just ask the law enforcement officials who administer tests or read their statements on the subject) which will necessitate a new "great white father" or Big Brother that tells people what to do as people are generally getting too stupid to fend for themselves or act ethically; of course the "benevolent" uber-class mensa couple richies from Harvard will be in control as usual.

I fear that it is in the main a true projection of the future.

TV can be useful. I personally find it too slow for my ADD tastes; but people who are visual learners can really benefit from the medium. Too bad it's used for inane entertainment--there's something to be said for relaxing for an hour without thinking much, but it's kind of sad that they'd use something with so much potential mainly for things like soap operas, reality shows, and slapstick. Not that there's anything wrong with those; like I said, relaxation is good; but they've completely taken over!

Just once I'd like to see a decent educational program that goes beyond the sixth-grade level. They could do so much with TV that they aren't doing. Imagine using only words to explain what a derivative is, or how a cell copies its genetic material, or how radiocarbon dating works; now imagine using a moving picture, plus those words. Lots clearer, lots more efficient, am I right? But it seems the extent of educational TV nowadays is limited to lion-eats-gazelle nature programs and the at least not-entirely-worthless "look at this cool new technology" special.

I don't believe human evolution is on reverse mode.