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The issue is that the standardized tests correlate with IQ, and IQ has been determined to be have racial and other biases. I went to a shitty rural high school

The issue is that the standardized tests correlate with IQ, and IQ has been determined to be have racial and other biases. I went to a shitty rural high school - high scores on my ACT made a huge difference as anyone who could read got out of that school with a 3.7.

yellow_lead 4y ago
IQ and race have a confounding variable - poverty. Malnourishment, abuse, lack of healthcare, etc can all be detrimental to a child's development.
- realjhol 4y ago
  Poverty correlates with high time preference. High IQ correlates with low time preference.
civilized 4y ago
What do you mean by bias?
- Spooky23 4y ago
  Different populations perform differently on average. There’s also a historical association with IQ assessment and eugenics.
  - civilized 4y ago
    > Different populations perform differently on average Does this mean that today's IQ tests have racial bias? > There’s also a historical association with IQ assessment and eugenics. Does this mean that today's IQ tests have racial bias?
    - tptacek 4y ago
      Yes, structurally if not deliberately (it is unlikely that mainstream IQ tests are anything but diligently designed to avoid overt bias, unlike those of the middle 20th century). If you measure something that has a large SES causative component, and SES is for whatever reason itself highly correlated with race, then your measurements will encode a racial bias. The big debate in academic psychology is the extent to which factors like SES (and factors downstream of SES, like general health) confound the measurement of some kind of general intelligence. The evidence we have right now pretty clearly points to an effect, so it's down to what the size of that effect is.
      - hijghula 4y ago
        Your second statement is incorrect. Having a racial bias would mean that IQ tests are incorrect (having significantly different errors) for certain samples/groups. But no one is saying that. Imagine a test to measure the resistance of various materials. Is the test biased because it shows that concrete is stronger than rotten wood? No, it just measures the resistance of different materials. If the measurement error (not the measurement itself) was significantly different for different materials then yes you could say the test is biased. You are just saying that SES affects intelligence, which is most likely true and immediately prompts the question of what affects SES.
        civilized 4y ago
        A large percentage of the population seems to believe that IQ and similar cognitive ability tests are something like a credit score, having no purpose but to direct society to the high scorers so that they can be showered with opportunity, while denying the same to low scorers. And it's true that tests like the SAT can have a big impact on the opportunities we get in life. But they can also be used in a more win-win way, to match people to opportunities they're ready for. And for that, you need an honest assessment of where the person is actually at, separate from how they got there. A poor kid may score worse than they would have scored if they weren't poor, but if we want to know whether they're ready for MIT or a course above their grade level, it might do them a disservice to confound our perceptions of their actual current level with our personal indignation over socioeconomic inequalities and our hopes in the potential they'd realize if those inequalities were eliminated.
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  One thing that amuses me is that I occasionally see press releases about some Hollywood star (say Alyssa Milano) who took an IQ test and got a 145 score which is suspiciously the top score for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven%27s_Progressive_Matrices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven%27s_Progressive_Matrices and given that standard variants of the test have 60 items anybody who is capable of learning a script could memorize them and get a perfect score. I imagine there is one psychologist who coaches you then you go see another psychologist across the street who administers the test.
  - rayiner 4y ago
    Why would that be surprising? Gifted people tend to be that way in multiple areas. I wouldn't be surprised if the average IQ in Hollywood is quite above the overall average.
tekla 4y ago
> standardized tests correlate with IQ > IQ has been determined to be have racial and other biases. Citation needed
bradleyjg 4y ago
What I’m saying is that isn’t “the issue,” it’s just pretext. Schools can do affirmative action for African Americans without making standardized testing optional, they have been for decades. What’s harder for them to do without getting rid of such tests is discriminating against Asians (and middle class whites) in favor of rich whites. It’s no coincidence that this is happening in the wake of the Harvard lawsuit. What these schools want is a class made up entirely of diversity, athlete, and development admits. The first generation Asian-American kid isn’t taking a seat away from a black kid, he’s taking it from the son of the CFO of a Fortune 500 company.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  Affirmative action is a big bugaboo that will probably be subject of a Supreme Court action. I think these are complex issues and there’s no scenario where everyone is happy. As a society we’d be better off to tone down the fawning over Ivy League schools.

yellow_lead 4y ago

IQ and race have a confounding variable - poverty. Malnourishment, abuse, lack of healthcare, etc can all be detrimental to a child's development.

realjhol 4y ago
Poverty correlates with high time preference. High IQ correlates with low time preference.

civilized 4y ago

What do you mean by bias?

Spooky23 4y ago
Different populations perform differently on average. There’s also a historical association with IQ assessment and eugenics.
- civilized 4y ago
  > Different populations perform differently on average Does this mean that today's IQ tests have racial bias? > There’s also a historical association with IQ assessment and eugenics. Does this mean that today's IQ tests have racial bias?
  - tptacek 4y ago
    Yes, structurally if not deliberately (it is unlikely that mainstream IQ tests are anything but diligently designed to avoid overt bias, unlike those of the middle 20th century). If you measure something that has a large SES causative component, and SES is for whatever reason itself highly correlated with race, then your measurements will encode a racial bias. The big debate in academic psychology is the extent to which factors like SES (and factors downstream of SES, like general health) confound the measurement of some kind of general intelligence. The evidence we have right now pretty clearly points to an effect, so it's down to what the size of that effect is.
    - hijghula 4y ago
      Your second statement is incorrect. Having a racial bias would mean that IQ tests are incorrect (having significantly different errors) for certain samples/groups. But no one is saying that. Imagine a test to measure the resistance of various materials. Is the test biased because it shows that concrete is stronger than rotten wood? No, it just measures the resistance of different materials. If the measurement error (not the measurement itself) was significantly different for different materials then yes you could say the test is biased. You are just saying that SES affects intelligence, which is most likely true and immediately prompts the question of what affects SES.
      - civilized 4y ago
        A large percentage of the population seems to believe that IQ and similar cognitive ability tests are something like a credit score, having no purpose but to direct society to the high scorers so that they can be showered with opportunity, while denying the same to low scorers. And it's true that tests like the SAT can have a big impact on the opportunities we get in life. But they can also be used in a more win-win way, to match people to opportunities they're ready for. And for that, you need an honest assessment of where the person is actually at, separate from how they got there. A poor kid may score worse than they would have scored if they weren't poor, but if we want to know whether they're ready for MIT or a course above their grade level, it might do them a disservice to confound our perceptions of their actual current level with our personal indignation over socioeconomic inequalities and our hopes in the potential they'd realize if those inequalities were eliminated.
PaulHoule 4y ago
One thing that amuses me is that I occasionally see press releases about some Hollywood star (say Alyssa Milano) who took an IQ test and got a 145 score which is suspiciously the top score for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven%27s_Progressive_Matrices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven%27s_Progressive_Matrices and given that standard variants of the test have 60 items anybody who is capable of learning a script could memorize them and get a perfect score. I imagine there is one psychologist who coaches you then you go see another psychologist across the street who administers the test.
- rayiner 4y ago
  Why would that be surprising? Gifted people tend to be that way in multiple areas. I wouldn't be surprised if the average IQ in Hollywood is quite above the overall average.

tekla 4y ago

> standardized tests correlate with IQ > IQ has been determined to be have racial and other biases. Citation needed

bradleyjg 4y ago

What I’m saying is that isn’t “the issue,” it’s just pretext. Schools can do affirmative action for African Americans without making standardized testing optional, they have been for decades. What’s harder for them to do without getting rid of such tests is discriminating against Asians (and middle class whites) in favor of rich whites. It’s no coincidence that this is happening in the wake of the Harvard lawsuit. What these schools want is a class made up entirely of diversity, athlete, and development admits. The first generation Asian-American kid isn’t taking a seat away from a black kid, he’s taking it from the son of the CFO of a Fortune 500 company.

Spooky23 4y ago
Affirmative action is a big bugaboo that will probably be subject of a Supreme Court action. I think these are complex issues and there’s no scenario where everyone is happy. As a society we’d be better off to tone down the fawning over Ivy League schools.