Yes, I saw this when @anon71262119 posted it. It’s by far the highest claim I have seen. Most of the other evidence is in the 50-75 range. I posted a bunch earlier in the thread and in past threads.
The lower ends which can be seen in the studies you posted are low values in early childhood they are well above 50% as you get older.
I think 75% is a good number, and is backed up by a lot of studies.
@ Heritability.
Right. It’s complicated. And just because something is heritable, does not mean it can’t change.
Remember, they are talking about how much of the variation is genetic (can be attributed to genes). They are not talking about the proportion of a trait that is caused by genes. If everyone had the exact same environment, then heritability would be 100%.
Using height as an example. If I’m raised in the exact same environment (nutrition, sleep, healthcare, everything that might effect height) with an adopted sibling, then any differences you’d see in our heights could be attributed to our genes.
This is a SUPER nice article for people who want to understand the research better.
Also, look at Wikipedia under Heritability of IQ for a better explanation of how the math works. Much of this research has been done with twin studies, and adoption studies.
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Only when environmental factors remain consistent do you reach the high end of heritability from what I’ve read.
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IQ having fluidity would only make me question the 80/20 number that much more, as it would require another metric (age, gender, etc) that is causing the fluidity and making it even harder to quantify.
Quoting cuz good paragraph
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Also, if IQ is highly heritable than why does average IQ increase over time (The Flynn Effect)?
*Honestly asking because my tiny brain does not get that at all.
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@ Heritability.
Kind of a tangent on the math, but this is a cool example for understanding variation in a population, vs proportion.
“It is, for example, all very well to say that genetic variation is responsible for 76 percent of the observed variation in adult height among American women while the remaining 24 percent is a consequence of differences in nutrition. The implication is that if all variation in nutrition were abolished then 24 percent of the observed height variation among individuals in the population in the next generation would disappear. To say, however, that 76 percent of Evelyn Fox Keller’s height was caused by her genes and 24 percent by her nutrition does not make sense. The nonsensical implication of trying to partition the causes of her individual height would be that if she never ate anything she would still be three quarters as tall as she is.” - an excerpt from a book review of a Fox Keller book.
BTW, Evelyn Fox Keller is an MIT professor who is well known for talking about the false dichotomy between nature vs nurture. @pat, you’ll remember this came up in another thread recently. Something I’m a little fascinated with. Another way to say this. We have genetic potential, environmental factors, and we have a third factor, the interaction between them.
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@ fluidity of IQ.
Another way to think of this.
Let’s say Kate’s genetic potential for IQ is 130. That’s very bright, two standard deviations above the mean of 100. Let’s say that if all environmental factors are perfect with her (nutrition, health, stimulating environment, education) then she should reach her potential of an IQ of 130. She’s not going to hit 145, because that’s not her genetic potential.
Let’s say that Mike has a genetic potential of 115, but he has a deprived environment. Mike has poor nutrition, a chaotic home, no good language models, etc, a terrible school, etc.). He may only realize an IQ of 100, even though his potential was 115. BUT, even if he had Kate’s super awesome environment, he still would only reach his potential of 115, not somehow be equal to Kate’s IQ of 130.
We all continue to experience environmental factors over the course of our lifetimes that can effect this kind of thing.
To my mind, even these examples are really simplistic because there is interaction between genes and environment. The kid who is WAY motivated and reads all the time can literally increase gray matter density over the kid who sits around and watches Sponge Bob, so much that we can see it in imaging studies, before and after. You could say he’s reaching his potential, but it’s amazing to see that his experiences result in very real anatomical changes.
I don’t have the study in front of me right now, but kids with dyslexia who receive high quality, intense reading instruction for several hours per day over a period of months actually build more gray matter density in areas important for reading.
He flew with Doug Masters
Improved nutrition more stimulating environment. It’s not that environment does not matter for IQ but, malnutrion and a non stimulating environment can have a big impact.
In the USA and other developed nations the Flynn effect has petered out after 1-2 decades.
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I get the concept at its core. But to me, this provides a very distinct problem with any and every practical use of an IQ score. You’ve just demonstrated a scenario where 2 people have IQs that can top out at 130 & 115. All cool. Not only is the potential IQ impossible to quantify, but its existence is a demonstration of how utterly reliant we are on our environment.
Either child could be neglected and malnourished enough to tank them into the low 70s (or obv lower, but lets be realistic about how much the system can do for you). You’re not magically born with a minimum, so now you’ve got a girl with a range of 70-130 (dependent on environment) and a guy with a range of 70-115.
So you’ve now done decades worth of testing (minimum) across probably 40+ unique breakdowns of genetics, millions of dollars, political ideologies tainting every step, and your output is what? Being able to generically know what someone’s IQ range ‘probably’ is?
As someone that works in the staffing industry, I can think of a dozen different ways to qualify/quantify people based on their IQs and make generic decisions if the population is enough. In China. Maybe the ME. In places that are absolutely not here, nor ever would be.
I just struggle so damn much to think of a practical application for knowing how IQ variations that justify arming the Raj’s and HerpDerps of the world into thinking they’re the master race from their mom’s basement (while ignoring they should be serving their East Asian overlords). I can think of dozens and dozens of ways to abuse IQ knowledge, regardless of what the results even are. I can’t begin to think of the dozens of ways your average everyday dumbass would interpret said results and come up with even more ways to abuse said knowledge.
Powerpuff, if you would please.
When I was 16, before ever smoking my first joint or dropping my first purple mic, I was sent to a PHD in psychology who came up with 140. I felt very superior at the time, but the way my life went I coasted through the second half of high school, and wrote off ever getting a university education. My nutrition knowledge was, well, go to the grocery store and buy a bunch of stuff. I had times in my early adulthood I barely ate properly.
I eventually did some renovations and in my mid 20s came up with a community college level certificate. A small scale one, I didn’t want to be too tied to school. Transitioned into office work for a few years, now I don’t do as much look at something and figure it out. The last few years my reading is news stories and message boards, such as this.
So what I am asking is, might my IQ have dropped to 130, or Satan forebid, 125, but still have the potential to rise again? My memory these last few years has been alarmingly poor.
Also. Ugh. BRB throwing away firestick and buying more books
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Can’t speak for everybody, but I did something similar with partying and whatnot. Then when the party was over and it was time to grow up I went to the local CC. I was worried that something was broken or had been lost, but ramped right up to any challenges.
I still like to tune up a little with some equations, and mechanical work like brakes on the car or other things. Its like a big 3D puzzle.
My understanding of it is that you have to get those dendrites active and stimulated every so often by jogging them through the connections. Once they “wake up” and start making those connections again, the parts of your brain that have been stimulated become and remain more active and its easier to think better.
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Hi there DeadKong.
If you like picking up heavy things and putting them down… You’re probably not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so I wouldn’t worry too much.
KIDDING!!!
This is a simple spot check to look at your current IQ with just one question.
How many episodes of The Kardasians have you seen? Do you need to be a little bit stoned to think it’s a good show, or do you like it even when completely sober?
KIDDING!!!
Serious answer.
What @SkyzykS said is a great comment. We can create new dendritic branching, and we can prune back what we don’t use. @SkyzykS, I can picture you really enjoying a major like Mechanical or Electrical Engineering as a young 18-year-old, had you started down that path then.
@DeadKong I doubt that you’ve permanently dumbed yourself down. It’s pretty common to see what you described. Young person, bright but not particularly motivated, nothing that really made you really try to apply yourself. Other interests. Maybe took awhile to figure out what career path would really interest you. Finally finds way and gets serious, or not.
@ An IQ of 140.
Anyway you look at that, you tested in the top 2% at age 16. The score itself is less meaningful, than knowing where you stood in relation to your peers. For example, people in higher IQ ranges often have higher scores if they took a Stanford Binet. The Wechsler Scales were designed for IQs up to 130, so the Wechsler Scales have very few questions that attempt to tease out higher IQs once you’ve already hit the top 2%.
That means that some very bright people could take a Wechsler test and hit 130, but they might hit 145 on a Stanford Binet. Also, the standard error of measurement (band of error where your true score lies), is more broad in the higher IQ ranges. This is why it’s always a little doubtful that people claiming an IQ of 160 are really all that different from someone with an IQ of 145, even on a Stanford Binet. Of course there are other tests, but you get the idea.
If you scroll back up and read this article from a few posts back, I think you’ll be able to answer some of your questions. There are a lot of misperceptions about what IQ scores are, and aren’t. Thanks for that, @pat. That was a great article. If you didn’t read it, DeadKong, you may want to go back and check it out.
This is a bit of a scare tactic, but it’s also true.
I tell my gifted middle school and high school students that if they don’t continue to do challenging things, they can certainly become less intelligent over time when compared to people like them who apply themselves.
Sky mentioned trouble shooting a mechanical problem or solving equations. Also anything that is challenging. Learning a language, puzzles, reading challenging material, attending an academic talk, playing an instrument, using analytical skills. You get the idea.
I don’t know how old you are, but it’s not too late to try to make the most of your potential now. And yeah, the brain is much like a muscle that needs to be exercised.
About smoking pot. I don’t have the research in front of me, but I want to say that memory loss, particularly in an immature brain is a concern. Some of the rest of you likely know more about any negative effects from pot.
Yes, but a deprived environment matters more. Real starvation, or an orphan left alone in a crib in Romania or something like that.
That’s so extreme, it could only happen in extreme situations like I mentioned above. You’d have to do something really, really terrible to drop a person with a potential of 115 down below the mean.
LOL. Yeah, I hear ya. BUT, I think it’s possible that we continue to find neurological differences that translate into differences in ability. I put up an article about hyperpolyglots in the Languages thread in Off topic.
I don’t think any of us would be surprised if we found that someone like @loppar, who has a memory for history, languages, and technical abilities like math and engineering has a brain that looks different from mine, maybe in metabolism, speed of transmission, increased density in areas important for language and memory.
It’s not a huge stretch to find that his Russian/Jewish ancestry has more people with those characteristics, than people with my Irish ancestry. It still comes down to individuals, of course. Always. You’re going to find a full range of abilities within every ethnic group.
Yeah, I hear what you’re saying though. Humans are very good at getting really caught up in trying to simplify or categorize in ways that make no sense, or in NOT taking into account environmental differences.
It’s another topic, but the part of this that blows my mind is the idea that what I do in my lifetime, my life experiences and environment, could change my DNA in ways that could be passed to my children. We’re only beginning to understand some of that, and it’s a little mind blowing to think about.
thanks to both of you above.
Oh God! Ain’t it acause I’ze don watch the Kardashians on the telly, does that mean I’ze the duncest?
I got rid of my television years ago, and just watch a few videos here and there on the internet.
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At 18 I was enlisted in the delayed entry program for the navy to go into their intelligence and buds/divefare programs. I wasn’t particularly interested in Intel, but after they poked my numbers into the machine that’s what popped out!(that all got derailed, badly) I really just wanted to go kill bad guys.
It wasn’t until 30 that I enrolled in a mechanical engineering program during the winters. Then a few years later into the welding program. All told, I’m a few credits shy of an AAS in weld technologies. My dad was an electrical engineer. I used to go to work with him when I was younger. He was stunningly sharp with math, troubleshooting, and circuit design. Some of that stuff helped a lot when I stumbled into automated/robotic welding systems repair.
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Such as? Serious question. Because 115 is only 1 STD away from the mean. If it really would be that hard to drop a 115 potential to 100, the only avenue left is to believe we inherently have ‘minimum IQs’ based on our genetics. Which just leads me back to the methodology of quantifying it.
Which would be interesting to know ‘just cuz,’ but I can’t think of a meaningful way to use any of that knowing that the population is going to be distributed, so best case you’re just quantifying a maybe range
It can be useful for individual development. I’m pretty sure that my kiddo is precocious or on the high side of the scale. It would behove me to make the best of that until such time that he can make that decision himself. He’s already made connections and grasped concepts that some adults can’t or aren’t quite able to, and it would be kind of a shame to waste a lot of time and learning potential once it is known that the ability is there.
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