IQ Tests Fail to Prove Trump (or Anyone Else) Has a Very Good Brain
In recent days, our secretary of state has called the president a “fucking asshole.” The President objected that he believed he had a higher IQ . But both are hiding behind faulty intelligence measures instead of telling how they really feel.
First, a not-so-fun fact about morons: this term, along with idiot and imbecile , was once a technical term for people with cognitive impairments. For example, in the early 1900s, anyone with an IQ below 30 was considered an idiot. If you had Down syndrome, you were (I am not making it up) a ” Mongolian idiot .” Psychologist Henry Goddard coined the term ” moron” to more accurately describe people with Forrest Gump’s IQ range.
All of these words are now outdated as medical terms and should probably be removed as an insult.
But what if we just stick to IQ scores? Is it fair to prove your intelligence in a duel with pencils and paper?
Yes, if you are only interested in intelligence in defining it as “what intelligence tests measure.” But even though these tests should reveal some innate intelligence, they do not reveal the absolute truth about your inner self. “Your” IQ can change over time and with education . IQ tests can also have racial and class biases, which means that some test takers get lower grades than others because the test was written for a specific type of person. The makers of intelligence tests are constantly trying to make their tests better and more honest , but there is a serious problem: no matter how the test works, it tries to reduce all “intelligence” to one number.
A high IQ does not mean you will make better decisions, learn faster, or do better in school or in life. So in that sense it doesn’t matter what your IQ “really” is.
Well, sometimes it happens. Here’s one chilling explanation I found on Quora from psychologist Julie Gurner:
As a person who has passed [intelligence tests], they are not (as you say) bullshit. That’s why:
1. They often determine when a child / adult is eligible for disability benefits or assistance. (Down syndrome and other cognitive impairments)
2. They can identify learning disabilities to help children / adults get the help they need to function more effectively.
3. They determine who can be executed (in America).
4. They can help people with brain injuries identify where their weak points are and what was affected – especially if we have a baseline … so that it can help identify specific areas of rehabilitation.
But I’m talking about Wechsler’s actual IQ tests … not the crap you find on the Internet.
These are very real results based on how we interpret the possibly fake IQ quality. Here is another example of psychologist W. Joel Schneider, who told Scientific American :
IQ is an imperfect predictor of many outcomes. A person who scored very low on a well-conducted IQ test may face difficulties in many areas. However, many people’s IQ scores fall short in both directions.
Is it worth getting angry with an IQ test if it doesn’t meet the requirements? No. All psychological measures are rubber rulers. It’s their nature to miss the mark from time to time. If the score was wrong due to incompetence, we should be angry with incompetent test administrators. We should be angry with institutions that use IQ tests to justify harassment. However, if a grossly incorrect test result was obtained by a competent, caring and conscientious clinician, we must admit that there are limits to what we can know. Competent, caring and conscientious physicians understand these limitations and take their uncertainties into account in their interpretations and any decisions based on those interpretations. If an institution uses test results to make important decisions, it should have mechanisms to identify its mistakes (for example, periodic re-assessments).
Heard what? Perhaps we shouldn’t blindly trust IQs to make important decisions. For example, to decide who is the best to lead us out of a nuclear war.