Discussion board
Group Discussion: The Bell Curve Controversy
Discussion: The Bell Curve Controversy
Due Wednesday by 11:59 pm
Post Discussion: The Bell Curve Controversy
- Watch the videos in the required materials section then post a response that outlines your reaction to the Bell Curve, demonstrates understanding of what the book is depicting, demonstrates understanding of the counter-arguments
Videos link
This are some examples that other student already post it.
Post 1. The white men who wrote the Bell Curve claim they wrote it because they were fascinated with the topic and that it did not perpetuate any kind of political or social agenda. The Bell Curve claims a gap in IQ scores between African Americans and Caucasian Americans can be explained by nature. The Bell Curve functions on four assumptions. First there must be a meaningful single number given to intelligence. Second people must be ranked linear upon it and the order must correlate with social attributes. Third the number must be highly heritable. Fourth this must be unchangeable. If one of these is wrong, then the whole theory falls apart. All four of these assumptions in the Bell Curve are incorrect therefore nature is not the reason for the gap in IQ scores. The Bell Curve takes a gap made by social issues and tries to claim it is biological or hereditary. This is wrong and outrageous. These men are intentionally or unintentionally perpetuating racism and racist culture. These claims of the Bell Curve have been countered many times. They wrongly use IQ tests. In the past IQ tests could have been and were probably used to oppress and hold people of color back. This goes against what Binet designed IQ tests for. Binet wanted to test children with the intention to send them to get more help if they need it. Binet wanted to use the numbers as an aid to get children the level of assistance they need. Noam Chomsky is a critic of the Bell Curve. He believes a correlation between race and IQ is meaningless to the individual. There is no justification for researching this relationship unless the intentions are to provide justification for racial discrimination. He says in a non-racist society, race would be of no greater significance than height. Another counter argument to the Bell Curve is how the gap has progressed over time. Now the gap has decreased and is not one standard deviation, so it is not considered significant. There has been more integration. As a result, education has become more available to everyone. As a result, social culture has become more inclusive and welcoming. As we develop, become more of a melting pot, and make social changes we will be able to close the gap even more and become more similar and move closer to being equals.
Post 2. This another post from another student.
There are four assumptions of the Bell Curve:
- There has to be a meaningful single number that can be given to intelligence.
- You are able to rank people in a singular linear order.
- It has to be highly heritable.
- It has to be unchangeable.
All four of the assumptions must be correct for the theory to work, which is not the case at all here.
The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life was released in 1994 by political scientist Charles Murray and psychologist Richard J. Herrnstein. The book eventually sparked substantial controversy among the general public, as well as an effort on the part of academic scholars to refute what they saw to be misinformation. Human IQ variation, like that of many other psychometric variables, may be represented by a standard normal distribution, namely the bell curve. When tested, the majority of people (68.2 percent) will fall within one standard deviation (15 IQ points) of the mean, which is a score of 100 in the case of IQ. Fewer (14.9 percent) fall within two standard deviations, and even fewer score at the extremes. Although IQ tests are standardized, various groups have different means and distributions. The Bell Curve made an attempt to explain and comprehend this variation. According to the book, while intelligence is influenced by both nature and nurture, high intellect appears to be a better predictor of life outcomes, such as a decreased likelihood of crime, divorce, poverty, unemployment, or dropping out of school. The authors asserted that because higher cognitive ability indicated more socially desirable behavior, and because IQ includes a heritable component, an intellectual “elite” may ultimately emerge, with far-reaching ramifications for social organization. Murray and Herrnstein proposed that lower standardized IQ test scores for some racial groups are caused by the backgrounds themselves causing lower intelligence. Furthermore, they asserted that IQ testing is not culturally biased and that any difference between groups indicates a real difference. Yet just like we learned throughout this semester that tests can be biased. Although, the IQ test measures an individual’s intellectual ability, and the test was widely used to predict an individual’s success in the culture. However, it was developed on white upper-class Americans. So, in reality, the IQ test was basically a cultural test instead of measuring pure intellectual ability. Which debunks the authors’ accusation that the bell curve is not culturally biased. Though the book goes to great lengths to clarify that no one should be treated unfairly because of their IQ, it also suggests that greater birth rates among individuals with lower IQs, as well as immigration, may gradually reduce the national IQ mean over time. A “cognitive elite” may acquire wealth and become isolated from the rest of society. These unsettling conclusions regarding the root causes of many of the modern world’s social problems lead the authors to forecast a grim future for America, in which the quality of life for lower IQ groups deteriorates progressively. Understandably, the book received both strong criticism and strong support. Many rushed to challenge the authors’ basic assumptions of the Bell Curve (that IQ is reducible to one number, unchangeable, genetically determined, linear, and so on), while others challenged the statistical methods and interpretations, or the IQ tests used to create that data. Others supported the authors, pointing out that researchers have the right and obligation to evaluate and report on their findings, regardless of the political repercussions.