Individual differences in general intelligence and in 8 different special aptitudes or skills were hypothesized to be independent of family size and birth order indices. Evidence to the contrary, in the form of linear correlations, was predicted to be due to the confounding influence of socio-economic factors. Among the more familiar demographic…

Two experiments examined whether correlations between IQ and probed serial running memory depend on IQ-related individual differences in the retention of order information in short-term memory. Children's IQ correlated with memory, regardless of whether instructions emphasized serial or free recall; and with recent item but not recent order…

The relationship between psychometric intelligence and rapid acoustic information processing was explored in two experiments using college students. Group differences occurred in threshold interstimulus intervals required for recognition and in speed. Results were interpreted as indicating better information processing efficiency (higher…

Developmental differences in reasoning ability and item processing demands are analyzed in a study of cognitive determinants of number analogy performance in two IQ levels of elementary school children and college students. The amount of solution-related information in working memory was the crucial processing demand. Process differentiations of…

"The Bell Curve" claims that most human differences and almost all social injustices can be traced to intelligence, and that distribution of intelligence should influence distribution of educational resources to allow students to find their proper and inevitable place in society. Applied to educational policy, this vision of the world…

This report collects together three presentations given by the author at scientific and professional meetings during the Spring of 1977. The first discusses present views of the variety and complexity of individual differences among human beings in the context of current research on cognitive processing in learning and instruction. The second…

Recent studies are examined for methodological adequacy in establishing dimensions of individual differences in information-processing abilities, and the theoretical problems involved in inferring psychological processes from individual difference dimensions. Methodological inadequacies include use of small samples, questionable procedures in…

The relative influence of scholastic achievement, intelligence, athletic ability, and ethnic origin on the formation of friendships among pupils in two Israel elementary schools was explored. The most important factor was found to be similar academic achievement, followed by intelligence and athletic achievement. (Authors/PP)

An approach to intelligence which emphasizes domain-specific constraints on knowledge structures is compared to information processing approaches. The evaluation of any cognitive ability as being intelligent crucially depends on prior specification of the formal constraints on the domains of knowledge from which that ability originates. (Author/RD)

A chronicle of controversies over testing (heredity-environment, experimenter bias, social class bias, tests as sorters for schools and society) and the difficulties that ensue when the scholar enters the arena of public policy. The thesis is offered that the hearing given to social evidence and issues depends on the times and the audience, with…

A model of the sources of differences in the learning potentials of students is presented, including group differences in learning potentials between gifted and nongifted students; interindividual differences between gifted students; intraindividual differences within one gifted student; and independent and interactive contributions of…

Responds to "The Bell Curve" by arguing that IQ is merely a statistical fiction, an artificial construct not corresponding to any real entity. Discusses the "seductive statistical trap of factor analysis" as it relates to IQ tests, multiple intelligences, content and bias of IQ tests, lack of validity of IQ tests for individual…

In studies of the relationship between masculinity-femininity and intelligence, data should be analyzed using correlational analysis for the complete distribution, rather than analysis of variance of extreme groups. The earlier work of Baucom and Welsh (EJ 171 822) was used as illustration. (BW)

Humphreys' criticisms (TM 503 269) of the work of Welsh and Baucom (EJ 171 822) are inappropriate since his findings are based upon a different measure of masculinity-femininity and a population which is somewhat different. Also, his insistence on correlational analysis to the exclusion of extreme group design is viewed as inappropriately…