Intelligence

1)How should intelligence be defined?
There are many ways of defining intelligence. In general intelligence can be defined as the ability to learn from experiences, solve problems and use the knowledge to adapt in to new situations. According to Binet, intelligence is an individual‘s metal aptitudes. According to Gardner, intelligence is not one’s specific ability, but rather the abilities to do certain things in different areas which are called “General Intelligence”. There are different types of intelligences such as linguistic, musical, logical, physical, spatial, social, interpersonal, and intrapersonal intelligence.

2)What are the elements of intelligence?
There are two elements that build up intelligence which are environment and genetics. We could compare intelligence as the growth of plants. If the genetic outcome of the seed is tall, with good care the plant will grow tall. If we do not supply the plant with enough nutrients, the plant will not grow tall even though it contains the tall genes. This is the same as human, if we are not properly educated, no matter what good genes our parents give us; we will not have much intelligence.

3)Is intelligence testing valid? Reliable? Ethical?
The test is reliable only if the test yields consistent results from multiples trials of taking the alternate form of the test. A reliable test should produce a bell curve that have a variety of score producing a range of results. The intelligence test claims itself as a reliable test, but from my point of view I think it is not reliable. The intelligence could yield difference results if we have more practice on it; therefore I think intelligence is not reliable.

The test is valid only if the test predicts or measures what it is suppose to. There have been companies that use intelligence test to measure if a person is capable to do a task, and claims that it is valid. I think intelligence is not valid because the purpose of intelligence tests is to measure “the ability to learn from experiences, solve problems and use the knowledge to adapt in to new situations”, but they only measure part of them but not all.

Lastly, I think intelligence test is not ethical at all, in fact I think intelligence is just an unreliable and a non valid test. Scores from the intelligence could not judge how “SMART” you are, you might get a 60 on the IQ test but you are talented at other fields such as music or art (Savant syndrome). A score on the intelligence could not determine if you have the ability of performing certain task or the ability to do certain things. In fact a person with a high IQ score might not be able to cope with the environment because he is lack of EQ. The community now a day has a misconception that people with high IQ score are smart, and in contrary people with low IQ score are dumb. IQ test has caused people believe in this misconception and form a discrimination to those who have obtained a Low IQ score.

4)How can variations in intelligence be explained?

Variations in intelligence can be explained by the elements that build up intelligence which are environment and genetics. Intelligence is built up 50% by genetics and 50% by environment. This figure does not mean that genetics and environment is exactly a one to one ratio to every particular person. It means that the difference in genetic and environmental factor of a particular group varies one to one intelligence vs. genetics ratio.

cognitive development experiment

The experiment that we did yesterday was on cognitive development of children aging from 5 to 7. We did 2 major parts of experiment; Egocentrism, Conservation.
One of the experiments was the test of egocentrism, we ask them many questions on egocentrism, such as why is the sun shine, why is there snow and etc. Most of the children did not answer it correctly. Most of the children gave answers such as because green is my favorite color. But there were some exceptions, some children developed faster than other, they said the grass was green because it is like that. We could see that some children develop faster than other children, but they were about the same stage, since none of them answered the brother and sister question correctly.
Another experiment we conducted was about conservation of matter, they were given two identical flasks with the same amount of fluid. We later pour the content of one glass into a different shaped container, and ask them which one has more. Some of the children said they were the same amount since it has the same amount of fluid in the beginning, other children said the one in the graduated cylinder was more because it is higher. Again we could see that they are develop at different speed, this is mostly because of genetic, diet, and the environment. There were one strange thing about this experiment; the child who answered the conservation of fluid correctly did not answer the clay question correctly. I think this is because of the language problem; he was able to understand what was asked in the first experiment but not the second.
From these experiments, we could state that Piaget was correct about the stages of cognitive development. Most of the children did not fully develop their cognitive ability. However Piaget was wrong on the time periods of the stages, every child develops at different speed.

EQ test

My Emotional IQ is 121, it is higher than average. I was able to control and express my own feeling clearly in an appropriate way. I think positively and are optimistic in doing thing. I can deal efficiently with stress and I know what my weakness is. I sometime need people to motivate my selves but most of all I was able to control my laziness.

emotion and motivation

The short article found in the booklet unit 8 talked about a group of people who tried to survive in the peak of the Andes. There were many people who tried to survive through their instincts. There were some people whose survival instinct is not strong enough cause them not to make it to the last. The first thing that they though of was the need of shelter.

“ The subzero cold of Andes quickly made the survivors realize that their first task must be to clear an area inside the wreak for shelter.”

The second thing that they though of was their physiological needs; food and water.

“The morning also brought another problem; many of the survivors began to complain of thirst.”

Many of the survivors decided that they could not survive without eating anything, so they started to eat human flesh which is well preserved in the snow. The motivation of eating human flesh was their last choice and a human instinct of survival.

“One of the medical students walked to a body that was sticking through the snow and cut a number of slices of frozen flesh.”

After 59 days, they found a peasant tending his cattle; the 19 survivors were finally saved. Without their human instinct and the motivation to survive none of them could have survived after 59 days.

Style delineator - A self assessment instrument for adults

Today we did a self test by Anthony F. Gregorc, Ph.D. to analysis our personality. There are four types of personalities which includes, concrete sequential, abstract sequential, abstract random, concrete random. After doing the self test, I was grouped in to the Abstract Sequential.

The abstract sequential people who live in an abstract world of intellect based. We often think that our past would affect our future. But we tend to think what is best for our selves, we think intellectually, logically, and are very analytical. We focus more on knowledge, facts, idea, and rather then emotions to determine what we should do. The negative sides of abstract sequential people are being very sarcastic and aloof.

Lastly, I believe that most of the things said above apply to me, in the Abstract sequential group we do not talk really much. We are quite people but are all “intelligent” (hahaha). During the group discussion we concluded that we are not the “loud” people, we just sit in the class observing people talking.

Extending Reading: "It's Magical it's malleable, it's memory."

Extending Reading: "It's Magical it's malleable, it's memory."
What is the relationship between memory and selfhood?
Our memories are mostly reconstructed, and these constructed memories affect our selfhood. We tend to believe that our self hood (who I am) is based on our experiences, but Lotus state that our memory not a bedrock, it is a like shifting sands. We tend to create false memories, and it could affect our self hood. For example in this article, Lotus believed that she did not see her mother’s dead body. After hearing the false insist from her uncle, “The memories began to drift back” She became to remember images and scene of the night that his mother was drown. She started to remember her mother’s face and polices cars. Her self hood started to change because new memories are constructed. After a few days her brother called him and said it was a mistake, she finally knew that her memory was made up. Her selfhood changed back since she knew that her new memories were constructed.

What new discovery about memory do you find most interesting?
First I believe that our selfhood could be affected by past events, I was wrong. After reading this article on memory, I realized that our complex memories are mostly reconstructed, and they are not a 100% record of the past events. If memories are like “quick sand” and could be easily constructed, this means that our selfhood could also be easily constructed. I am also surprised what our brain can do, our brain can encode different false memories ranging from person to person and we would not even realize that memories are reconstructed. We would tend to believe that the reconstructed memory is what we have been through. If our memories could be easily reconstructed and they are false memories, then should we really believe in our own memories and who we really are?

What is the homunculus crisis?
We have understood where memories are stored and what happens when memory is recalled, but we don’t know what stimulate it. Not knowing what activates us to retrieve memories is called the “homunculus crisis”. Memory is like a network of neurons that “activated when an event occurs and each time that network is stimulated the memory is strengthened or consolidated.” “Even the simplest memory stimulates complex neural networks at several different sites in the brain. The content (what happened) and meaning (how it felt) of an event are laid down in separate parts of the brain.”

Which theory of dreams finds support in the experiments by Lynch?
“In Canada, students who slept after cramming for an exam retained more information than those who pulled an all-nighter.” The experiment conducted by Lynch is a cognitive theory. Winson’s cognitive theory states that our dreams are a replay of daily experiences and it helps us learn and consolidate information. Students who slept after cramming for an exam are able to organize information during their sleep but the students who did not sleep for the entire night could not consolidate their learn information.

How can some memories become indelible?
Indelible memories are described as “carve its canyons and basins of memory into the living brain.” Memories that become indelible are often involved with “emotional arousing experiences”, when we are involved with traumatic experiences two powerful stress hormones will be released called adrenaline and noradealine. These stress hormones are so powerful that they could regulate the strength of storing memories and stimulates the heart to beat faster and muscles to be tense. These hormones could also stimulate the amygdale and produce an unconscious fear response.

How can amnesia and repression be explained?
Repression is when lost memories are later retrieved. Amnesia is when we could not recall a “horrendous event” because it was not initially encoded in to our brain. Amnesia often occurs on victim after injury; repressed memories are believed to be involved in any traumatic experience. Both amnesia and repression may be caused by the malfunction of the hippocampus. The hippocampus processes the memories, depicting words and pictures in to our explicit memory. However “Siegel thinks that some individuals remove conscious attention during repeated trauma.” But there is no direct evidence to prove how memories are impaired.

Explain the following statement: "Memory is more reconstructive than reproductive."
As demonstrated by psychologist John Neisser and John Dean, Richard Nixon could only give a general sense of what was going on in the meeting but failed to provide valid details in the meeting. This shows that human’s memories are incredibly accurate in the overall sense and hugely inaccurate in detail parts. Our memory does not encode all the aspects of an event, it choose to remember the outstanding events and often tends to forget all the detail. We tend to reconstruct the memories of forgotten details according to our preference or our emotions. The strength of the reconstructed memory depends on how many times we convince ourselves that a memory is true.

What new paradigm of memory is now emerging?
"Where memories are understood as creative blending of fact and fiction, where images are alchemized by experience and emotion into memories." When we retrieve memories, we first encode them in to our short term memory then to our long term memory. During the process of encoding, some of the actual details have been lost when it reaches to our long term memory. These forgotten memories are reconstructed in to the way that it makes meaning to us, “and the meaning-making process is shaped by who we are as self.”

After reading this article, what conclusions can you make about memory?
After reading this article, I have concluded that our selfhood keeps on changing due to the influence of our experiences and the reconstruction of our memory. From reading this article I have noticed that our memory is reconstructed according to our selfhood, and our selfhood is also related to our memories. I have also concluded that our memory is really powerful but it could not be trusted to a certain extant. Memory could bring a huge effect on a person’s life, since it is described as the foundation of a person.

Memory is often a reconstruction

In this experiment, we were presented 8 different pictures, one at a time for a second each. Then we drew what we remembered in our short term memory (while giving hints beside). The results turn out astonishing:
1: We create our own memory and these memories are an accurate reflection of past experience.
2: Some parts of the picture appeared to be similar but some parts are drawn differently due to our past experiences toward the verbal stimuli (hints given on the paper).