upnorthkyosa said:
Most of this work is based on the concept of "g" which is more then IQ. What do you know about this?
Well, John, that's a tricky one....
"G" stands for "general intelligence" and is thought to be a general cognitive quality that crosses across virtually all intellectual domains. This notion dates back to Charles Spearman in the early 1900's. Concomitant with this position is the concept of "s", which stands for specific abilities that individuals exhibit within individual tasks.
My problems with this notion are three-fold.
Firstly, there seems to be a rather weak distinction between "g" and "s" in the first place, between general cognitive ability and domain-specific competencies. From where I'm standing, it seems that both "g" and "IQ" tend to favor a type of logico-mathematical competence, qualities that are highly valued in Western society (this is also what Piaget seemed mostly interested in testing). This is where the criticism of ethnic and cultural bias has its origin.
I find myself in agreement with Howard Gardner on this:
"I do not believe that there is a single general talent, whether it be called intelligence, creativity or 'g'. I do not locate talents completely within the human skull, preferring to construe all accomplishments as an interaction between cognitive potentials on the one hand, and the resources and opportunities provided by the surrounding culture on the other....All intellectual and creative work takes place within some kind of social discipline, craft, or organized activity, termed a domain. Accordingly, there is no sense in which one can speak about a person as being intelligent, or creative, in general."
Secondly, as Dr. Gardner mentioned in the above quoted excerpt, all intellectual competencies take place within the domain of a given sociocultural paradigm. Ergo, this attempt to attribute intelligence and cognitive ability solely from internal qualities is, in my opinion, extremely short-sighted. Rather, we must value the importance that culture and social upbringing has on what particular domain-specific tasks.
For example, in the spirit of this thread topic, one may question whether traditional African and Hispanic cultures value logico-mathematical ability to the same degree that Cacausian and Asian cultures do. Based on my understanding of these things, I do not see the same degree of intellectual value in the former cultures as I see in the latter. Likewise, there are certain competencies that are more highly valued in African and Hispanic cultures that may be overlooked in Asian and Caucaisn socities.
Thirdly, there seems to be a poor understanding of the hierarchical nature of cognitive development across domains. Intelligence is less like a thermometer, where one simply notes superiority on a simple numerical scale, with no significant qualitative differences from number to number. Rather, intelligence within any given domain seems to be more akin to biology's taxonomical scale, where there are qualitative differences from one "level" to another "level", not just numerical differences on the same scale. This is where the research of individuals like James Mark Baldwin, Jean Piaget, and Jane Loevinger is of use to us. From their studies, we realize that development occurs across the span of qualitative "stages" --- Piaget's sensorimotor, preop, conop, and formop being the most familiar.
So, in summation, my major contentions with "g" are as follows:
1) It does not strongly delineate between itself and domain-specific competencies.
2) It ignores the role that sociocultural upbringing and training has on development, with the accompanying biases that we should expect from an overemphasis on Western individualism.
3) It does not take into account the existence of different levels of cognitive ability within the same domain.
That being said, I would argue that "g" is not necessarily wrong as opposed to merely being a partial view of the subject. I also feel that "intelligence" is much more complex than many researchers would like to acknowledge. It is easier to fit everything under one easy variable, but easier does not mean more accurate.
However, you are correct in that there is only a partial correlation between IQ and g scores.
Laterz.
