1 Psychological Tests Mental ability test class o Achievement designed to measure achievement what you know learn in o Aptitude measure what your aptitude potential is ex SATs measure ability to do college level work Personality test o Hypothetical constructs most commonly used w in field of psych measure a characteristic a person might have an attribute that is hypothesized to exist and we try to get evidence that it does exist from people s bvr intelligence is a HC Standardization test takes place under the same circumstances so results are mean ingful Norms score is interpreted in terms of the performance of the group of people who took the same test o SATs are norm tests your raw score does not mean anything its how you did in comparison to everyone else who took the test o IQ Tests compare scores across diff age groups o Percentile score is meaningful as opposed to the raw score Reliability if you give someone a test and you give someone the same test again are you going to get roughly the same measure of the level of performance o Measuring weight scales not reliable if you get a radically different weight over the course of a few min o IQ is stable across lifespan should not radically change Most important in psych is of validity o Does the test provide a good measure of what we are measuring o Achievement test needs to be high in content validity measure what you learned o Aptitude test high in criterion validity do a good job of predicting who is go ing to do well in the domain they are designed for SATs pick out who will do well in college level work o Construct validity how well does the test measure the hypothetical construct that we designed it to measure Does IQ accurately measure intelligence Are there attributes that are part of general intelligence that the IQ test is weakly sen sitive to o Major area of concern whether the HC tests have construct validity o Measure of intelligence developed in 2nd half of 1800s to determine who will benefit the most from education Intelligence IQ intelligence quotient Modern IQ Test Ethnic Difference in IQ Is intelligence genetic Nature vs nurture Early 1900s eugenics movement idea that we genetically differed in qualities that deter mine what level of human being we are Privileged people were not procreating at the same rate as the underprivileged people concerned gene pool would be swamped by underprivileged genes various bvrs indicated inferior breeds that were genetically linked criminal bvr mentally retarded homosexual ity 8 To prevent these inferior people from breeding forcible sterilization 1900s 1940s Twins Studies Ideal way to examine issue to explain differences among individuals allow us to inde pendently manipulate genes in environment Identical twins exact same genes o Reared together same genes environment o Reared apart same G diff E Fraternal twins share same amt f genes any sibling shares o Reared together diff G same E o Reared apart diff G diff E British School System 2 tiered educational route professions and service work Cyril Burt pioneer in twin studies significant factor in 1950s about structure of British school education system Evidence that IQ is genetically determined correlations bw IQ scores of identical twins much higher than IQ scores of fraternal twins Info found fraudulent the twins didn t even exist Effect of the Environment IQ score is measured relative to an age group If environment is a factor we should see a gap in IQ scores due to environemtnal factors increase as the child ages Children in deprived environments have lower IQs so the environment is a factor that contributes to IQ Current thinking about IQ o If you put them in an enriched environment their score improves Our basic level of IQ is set by genetics and theres a range around that level set by envi ronment 20 pt range avg IQ level is 100 20 pts below is fairly disadvantaged 20 pts above higher level of in telligence issue in modern society is there a racial difference in IQ Over massive data sets Black IQ scores 8 12 points on average below white people s scores Important since 1800s age of imperialism technological advances allowed them to ex pand all over world Europe was powerful in terms of communication transportation etc diff breeds of hu man they measured every aspect of human anatomy that they could possibly measure intelligence rooted in the brain brain size indicator skull size measured volume of skull and thought Northern European males were more intelligent Africans had smallest heads Cultural bias factor that might be a reason for the result that average IQ score of blacks os lower than whites Cultural disadvantage average living situation makes blacks socio economically disad vantaged Bell Curve flawed general idea people had about book genetically determined IQ genetically determined IQ book people thought book was fundamentally When looking at the issues having to do with genetics IQ are races genetically distinct subgroups of humans Human have less variance than any other species in the gene pool 1 Other species have much more variance in gene pools so they have more potential to be diff from each other If blacks and white are diff genetic groups we might expect to find diff geographic areas where those groups hold true Gene sharing cant go on when subspecies are isolated from one another Conclusion geneticists tell us that theres no evidence between race and IQ because you can point to the genes that drive skin color None of those genes are associated enough with anything else of importance to justify the conclusion that races exist as biological fundamental entities Race is not real It doesn t exist MENTAL ILLNESS What is abnormal o People diagnosed mentally ill when considered abnormal o Different cultures consider diff things as normal abnormal o Ex Schizophrenia People who hear voices certain tribes consider this good Transvestites neg word in our culture but its ok for women to wear men s clothes Determine this by social norms religion law time place Criteria o Content Bvr that is maladaptive impairs persons abiity to personally groom themselves have a relationship etc Impairs persons ability to fx adequately in normal social situa tion Bvr that is bizarre or irrational bvr that is unpredictable uncontrollable Personal distress bvr which gives the individual great personal dis tress actor does not want to be behaving this way Deviance bcr inconsistent w social norms Misconceptions o Personal weakness
View Full Document
Unlocking...