Ethnicity And Intelligence: Are They Connected?

Most scientists agree that genes have some influence over general intelligence and special aptitudes in such activities as athletics, mathematics, music, and science. But genes are not the only factor involved in producing these characteristics.

Additionally, there is a substantial lack of real evidence that the divisions between groups that we often specify as “races” actually have specific genetic identities. The extreme presence of ambiguity central to races, and the plentiful variations within these races point towards evidence that even two randomly selected citizens of European descent could be more genetically related to a person of Asian descent than they are to each other.

The idea of race in society is truly that; an idea. However, one of the first things one notices about another human is their perceived race. Often, incorrect assumptions are made about a person, based on his race. In addition, many believe race can be determined by biological factors. However, there is no biological basis to race. Without a doubt, genes play a role in our skin, hair, and eye color; however, there are not certain genes present in an entire race and not another. Race is not clear cut; if one were to travel from either pole to the equator, a specific location could not be identified to separate any two races.

In his article, “Struggle For Smarts? How Eastern And Western Cultures Tackle Learning,” Alix Spiegel presents many interesting points. He links the difference in educational style and success to a much larger cultural difference that separates the two groups. While I may agree with him on some fronts, there are many flaws in his argument. From his presentation of information and evidence to his use of an outdated study, Alix Spiegel leaves many holes in what could be an extraordinarily insightful piece.

For that reason, professor Cohen also states that race does not control behavior like people say it does. He explains that race does not correlate to genes or skin color that control differences in “behavior of intelligence among human groups.” He then talks about culture and the way it works. In the article, it mentions that culture structures “our behavior, thoughts, perceptions, values, goals and cognitive processes.” Professor Cohen also says that students should be taught about significance of culture and revive the anthropological concept of “cultural relativism.” He claims that relativism means that people must look at what other people are doing and try to comprehend their behavior towards it before we judge it. The article concludes that teaching race in the form of “biological variation” results in the promotion of racism than when you teach it in the “cultural relativism” form.

I’m definitely more of a proponent of the theory of modular intelligence. I think that intelligence should be about more than just mathematical and verbal skills. General intelligence theories assume that one already knows how to read, write, and do computations, but these are not universal abilities across cultures. They are just abilities that our culture happens to value. If verbal and mathematical skills results are positively correlated, this is probably due to education: if you got what we consider to be a “good” education, you probably learned both of these subjects well, even if you struggled with one or the other at first. Therefore, you would do well in both categories.

Furthermore, it could be argued that other skills such as the ability to work as part of a team, or the ability to show empathy correspond to more “real life” sources of intelligence that determine a person’s ability to achieve in life. Such cognition is arguably more complex which leads to the suggestion that other sources of variance such as cultural, environmental and other non-cognitive factors effect and shape a person’s ability to understand and evaluate the world. The idea that IQ differences reflect cultural “distance” rather than a cognitive “strength” is simply recognising these factors and implementing contextual testing of a person’s ability through more than one testing basis.

For cultural factors, biased IQ test would be interconnected to substandard schools. These tests measure a student's school achievement. And if there are substandard schools, the students who are placed into the higher groups, the will do better than those who are placed in a lower group. And thus these IQ tests would lead to the deficiency theory, which suggests that 'the poor are

According to Hannah Richardson, intelligence tests measure the ways people respond to their environment but they do not measure genetic predispositions.

There was a cartoon showing different animals, including an elephant, fish, seal, and monkey, lined up by a tree in front of a man behind a desk. The man said he was going to make a fair selection by giving them all the same test. The test was that they all had to climb the tree. In this case, the monkey probably was the only one that thought the test was fair. Welcome to the controversy over IQ (Intelligent Quotient) tests and cultural diversity.

There is a relationship between intelligence and culture because intelligence is culturally shaped and defined and some cultures support and identify it as very vital in the context of social and ecological aspects. In the early years, there was a bias towards intelligence tests because they used English language and culture. The formation of Wesler Adult Intelligence Scale, Fourth Addition (WAIS,IV) in 2008 by David Wesler was meant to minimise the bias. According to Westen, Burton and Kowalski (2006), intelligence assists human beings to take control of their lives and it varies cross culturally because the power dynamics differ in each society and this leads to differences in behaviour and line of thinking. These authors describe intelligence as multifaceted, functional and can be defined by culture because it is universal and studying intelligence using different culture as a sample that can be used to question Western ideas about intelligence with some emphasis on the assessment of skills and abilities using culturally appropriate methods (Benson, 2003)

Is it possible that the way society sees a group can influence how that group performs on tests of intelligence? According to the Stereotype Threat Theory, it can. Stereotype Threat Theory “refers to the conscious or unconscious belief that one belongs to a group stereotypically known for specific performance deficits. The hypothesis is that these beliefs lead to suboptimal performance on tasks specific to the stereotype” (Stoet 94). Stereotype threat leads to a large gap between privileged, un-stereotyped groups and affected groups in society with regards to jobs, education, and social interactions. This gap comes from stereotyped groups feeling they need to act in the way society tells them to, creating societal “chains” on these groups, essentially an unstated law telling them what they can and cannot do. This is because stereotype threat causes groups to identify with what society provides their status to be Experiments show commonly stereotyped groups perform worse on intellectual tests they are told their group generally does bad on. Therefore, commonly stereotyped groups suffer from the stereotype threat on intellectual tests.

Once a person has an idea of what intelligence is and what it means, a final thought one might consider is what influences are responsible for the different types of intellect. Two possible influences are genetics and the environment in which one lives, with genetics being the strongest influence (Santrock, 2009, pg. 302). Most researchers agree that a person’s genetics and environment interact with one another to influence the outcome of that person’s intelligence (Santrock, 2009, pg. 302). Genetic influences should be pretty obvious, so there should be no need to explain it; a person’s environment on the other hand, can involve several factors. An environment can consist of elements such as a person’s school, home, friendships, family relationships, and workplaces. All of these components factor in to influence a person’s intelligence.

One of the most interesting and controversial areas in behavioral genetics, human intelligence is currently assumed to be subject to both genetic and environmental influences.

Intelligence is used by everyone to help them in everyday life. Where people get their intelligence, however, is debatable. A person is born with an amount of inherited intelligence; this intelligence is considered nature, genetic, or heredity. Then there is intelligence that comes from the ability to learn from experience; this intelligence is impacted by nurture or the environment. It is known that both genetic and environmental factors determine intelligence, but the subject is controversial among professionals. Does nature or nurture have a bigger impact on intelligence? Is it true that some people are born with high intelligence, but are limited by their environment? Given the proper tools, can a person increase their intelligence? How accurate are IQ tests?