Psychology 110 Lecture 6 Intelligence & Psychological Testing 1-24-02

  1. Testing is BIG business, how its done has HUGE impact
    1. Admissions testing
    2. School Achievement testing
    3. Intelligence testing
    4. Personality testing
  2. Goals of testing differ
    1. Intelligence testing
    2. General mental ability
    3. Aptitude testing
    4. Specific mental testing
    5. Psychological / Personality tests
      1. Motives, interests, values, attitudes, pathology
  3. Statistical mechanics of testing
    1. Standardization
    2. Uniform content, admin and scoring
    3. Test norms, interpret meaning
      1. t-scores, percentiles
    4. Reliability
      1. Measurement consistency (repeat, different tests)
      2. Correlation measure of consistency, -1, 0, +1
      3. Split half reliability
    5. Validity
      1. Ability of a test to measure what it was designed to measure
      2. Content - representative of the domain it represents
      3. Criterion-related - correlating test scores with another measure of trait tested
      4. Construct - evidence related to hypothetical or theoretical constructs
  4. History Intelligence testing - nature vs nurture
    1. Galton & heredity in intelligence 1869
      1. Represents English class system
      2. Invented correlation and percentile test scores
      3. May have cooked his data
        1. Ignores nurture
    2. Binet - mental age 1905
      1. Relates mental age to chronological age
      2. Tests reasoning ability
      3. Easily administered standardized testing
    3. Terman & stanford-binet
      1. IQ = (mental age/chronological age) x 100
      2. Refines testing procedure, used currently
    4. Wechsler
      1. Specific adult test
      2. Adds non-verbal scale
      3. Normal distribution based 100/10
    5. Today
      1. Controlled administration
      2. Specialized diagnostics
      3. Group tests
  5. Intelligence Test Issues
    1. Separate scales for specific skills (see Wechsler WAIS)
    2. IQ is now based on normal distribution
      1. Mean 100, sd 15
            1. Potential or knowledge
      2. Both
    3. Reliability
      1. Tester effects
      2. Anxiety
    4. Validity
      1. Measure what they intend to, but is it the right thing?
      2. Correlation with performance not perfect
      3. Verbal, practical, social
      4. Predict Success
  6. Skill tests measure valuable in world
    1. Correlation mixed with performance
    2. Other cultures
      1. Cultural effects significant
    3. Mixed acceptance in non-western cultures

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