The Bell Curve
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Author | Richard J. Herrnstein, Charles Murray |
---|---|
Publisher | Free Press |
Publication date | September 1994 |
Media type | Hardcover |
Pages | 845 |
ISBN | ISBN 0-02-914673-9 Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character |
OCLC | 30913157 |
305.9/082 20 | |
LC Class | BF431 .H398 1994 |
The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life is a 1994 book by American psychologist Richard J. Herrnstein (who died before the book was released) and American political scientist Charles Murray. Its central argument is that human intelligence is substantially influenced by both inherited and environmental factors and is a better predictor of many personal dynamics, including financial income, job performance, chance of unwanted pregnancy, and involvement in crime than are an individual's parental socioeconomic status, or education level. The book also argues that those with high intelligence, the "cognitive elite", are becoming separated from those of average and below-average intelligence, and that this is a dangerous social trend with the United States moving toward a more divided society similar to that in Latin America.
The book was controversial, especially where the authors wrote about racial differences in intelligence and discussed the implications of those differences. The authors were reported throughout the popular press as arguing that these IQ differences are genetic. They wrote in chapter 13: "It seems highly likely to us that both genes and the environment have something to do with racial differences." The introduction to the chapter more cautiously states, "The debate about whether and how much genes and environment have to do with ethnic differences remains unresolved."
The book's title comes from the bell-shaped normal distribution of intelligence quotient (IQ) scores in a population.
Shortly after publication, many people rallied both in criticism and defense of the book. A number of critical texts were written in response to the book.
Content
The Bell Curve, published in 1994, was written by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray as a work designed to explain, using empirical statistical analysis, the variations in intelligence in American society, raise some warnings regarding the consequences of this intelligence gap, and propose national social policy with the goal of mitigating the worst of the consequences attributed to this intelligence gap. Many of the assertions put forth and conclusions reached by the authors are very controversial, ranging from the relationships between low measured intelligence and anti-social behavior, to the observed relationship between low African-American test scores (compared to whites and East Asians) and genetic factors in intelligence abilities. The book was released and received with a large public response. In the first several months of its release, 400,000 copies of the book were sold around the world. Several thousand reviews and commentaries have been written in the short time since the book's publication. The Bell Curve argues that:
- Intelligence exists and is accurately measurable across racial, language, and national boundaries.
- Intelligence is one of, if not the most, important factors correlated to economic, social, and overall success in the United States, and its importance is increasing.
- Intelligence is largely (40% to 80%) heritable.
- No one has so far been able to manipulate IQ to a significant degree through changes in environmental factors—except for child adoption and that they conclude is not large in the long term—and in light of these failures, such approaches are becoming less promising.
- The United States has been in denial of these facts. A better public understanding of the nature of intelligence and its social correlates is necessary to guide future policy decisions.
Their evidence comes from an analysis of data compiled in the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (NLSY), a study conducted by the United States Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics tracking thousands of Americans starting in the 1980s. All participants in the NLSY took the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB), a battery of ten tests taken by all who apply for entry into the armed services. (Some had taken an IQ test in high school, and the median correlation of the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) scores and those IQ test scores was .81.) Participants were later evaluated for social and economic outcomes. In general, IQ/AFQT scores were a better predictor of life outcomes than social class background. Similarly, after statistically controlling for differences in IQ, many outcome differences between racial-ethnic groups disappeared.
IQ | <75 | 75-90 | 90-110 | 110-125 | >125 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
US population distribution | 5 | 20 | 50 | 20 | 5 |
Married by age 30 | 72 | 81 | 81 | 72 | 67 |
Out of labor force more than 1-month out of year (men) | 22 | 19 | 15 | 14 | 10 |
Unemployed more than 1-month out of year (men) | 12 | 10 | 7 | 7 | 2 |
Divorced in 5 years | 21 | 22 | 23 | 15 | 9 |
% of children w/ IQ in bottom decile (mothers) | 39 | 17 | 6 | 7 | - |
Had an illegitimate baby (mothers) | 32 | 17 | 8 | 4 | 2 |
Lives in poverty | 30 | 16 | 6 | 3 | 2 |
Ever incarcerated (men) | 7 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 0 |
Chronic welfare recipient (mothers) | 31 | 17 | 8 | 2 | 0 |
High school dropout | 55 | 35 | 6 | 0.4 | 0 |
Values are the percentage of each IQ sub-population, among non-Hispanic whites only, fitting each descriptor. Herrnstein & Murray (1994) pp. 171, 158, 163, 174, 230, 180, 132, 194, 247-248, 194, 146 respectively. |
They also stated that the average IQ of African Americans is 85; Latinos 89; Whites 103; Asians 106.
Policy recommendations
The book argued the average genetic IQ of the United States is declining due to the tendency of the more intelligent to have fewer children than the less intelligent, for the generation length to be shorter for the less intelligent, and through the large-scale immigration to the United States of those with low intelligence. The United States will become increasingly like Latin America, with high-IQ whites and Asians living in fortified enclaves protected by high fences and armed guards from "the menace of the slums" below.
In a discussion of the future political outcomes of an intellectually stratified society, they stated that they "fear that a new kind of conservatism is becoming the dominant ideology of the affluent – not in the social tradition of an Edmund Burke or in the economic tradition of an Adam Smith but 'conservatism' along Latin American lines, where to be conservative has often meant doing whatever is necessary to preserve the mansions on the hills from the menace of the slums below."[1] Moreover, they fear that increasing welfare will create a "custodial state" in "a high-tech and more lavish version of the Indian reservation for some substantial minority of the nation's population." They also predict increasing totalitarianism: "It is difficult to imagine the United States preserving its heritage of individualism, equal rights before the law, free people running their own lives, once it is accepted that a significant part of the population must be made permanent wards of the states."[2]
Herrnstein and Murray recommended the elimination of welfare policies that encourage poor women to have babies:
We can imagine no recommendation for using the government to manipulate fertility that does not have dangers. But this highlights the problem: The United States already has policies that inadvertently social-engineer who has babies, and it is encouraging the wrong women. "If the United States did as much to encourage high-IQ women to have babies as it now does to encourage low-IQ women, it would rightly be described as engaging in aggressive manipulation of fertility." The technically precise description of America's fertility policy is that it subsidizes births among poor women, who are also disproportionately at the low end of the intelligence distribution. We urge generally that these policies, represented by the extensive network of cash and services for low-income women who have babies, be ended. The government should stop subsidizing births to anyone rich or poor. The other generic recommendation, as close to harmless as any government program we can imagine, is to make it easy for women to make good on their prior decision not to get pregnant by making available birth control mechanisms that are increasingly flexible, foolproof, inexpensive, and safe.[3]
The book also argued for reducing immigration into the U.S. which was argued to lower the average national IQ. It also recommended against policies of affirmative action.
Responses
Media response
A 1995 article by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting writer Jim Naureckas analyzed the media response. The Bell Curve received a great deal of media attention. He wrote "While many of these discussions included sharp criticisms of the book, media accounts showed a disturbing tendency to accept Murray and Herrnstein's premises and evidence even while debating their conclusions" and "their critics were sometimes identified with censorious political correctness". Naureckas criticized these assumptions. He also argued that the book was part of a campaign to justify racism and against welfare and immigration.[4]
Peer review
An early criticism was that Herrnstein and Murray did not submit their work to peer review before publication.[5] Many scholarly reviews of the book arrived later as discussed below. Richard Lynn (1999) wrote that "The book has been the subject of several hundred critical reviews, a number of which have been collected in edited volumes".[6]
"Mainstream Science on Intelligence"
Fifty-two professors, most of them researchers in intelligence and related fields, signed an opinion statement titled "Mainstream Science on Intelligence"[7] endorsing a number of the views presented in The Bell Curve. The statement was written by psychologist Linda Gottfredson and published in The Wall Street Journal in 1994 and subsequently reprinted in Intelligence, an academic journal. Of the 131 who were invited by mail to sign the document, 100 responded, with 52 agreeing to sign and 48 declining. Eleven of the 48 dissenters claimed that the statement or some part thereof did not represent the mainstream view of intelligence.[8]
APA task force report
In response to the growing controversy surrounding The Bell Curve, the American Psychological Association's Board of Scientific Affairs established a special task force to publish an investigative report on the research presented in the book.[9] The final report, titled Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns, is available at an academic website.[10] Some of the task force's findings supported or were consistent with statements from The Bell Curve. They agreed that:
- IQ scores have high predictive validity for individual differences in school achievement.
- IQ scores have predictive validity for adult occupational status, even when variables such as education and family background have been statistically controlled.
- There is little evidence to show that childhood diet influences intelligence except in cases of severe malnutrition.
Regarding Murray and Herrnstein's claims about racial differences and genetics, the APA task force stated:
There is certainly no such support for a genetic interpretation... . It is sometimes suggested that the Black/ White differential in psychometric intelligence is partly due to genetic differences (Jensen, 1972). There is not much direct evidence on this point, but what little there is fails to support the genetic hypothesis.
Regarding statements about other explanations for racial differences, the APA task force stated [emphasis added]:
The differential between the mean intelligence test scores of Blacks and Whites (about one standard deviation, although it may be diminishing) does not result from any obvious biases in test construction and administration, nor does it simply reflect differences in socio-economic status. Explanations based on factors of caste and culture may be appropriate, but so far have little direct empirical support. There is certainly no such support for a genetic interpretation. At present, no one knows what causes this differential.
The APA journal that published the statement, American Psychologist, subsequently published eleven critical responses in January 1997.
Criticisms
The validity of IQ and general intelligence, g
One part of the criticism of The Bell Curve focused on the validity of IQ and g. William J. Matthews and Stephen Jay Gould (1994) listed four basic assumptions of The Bell Curve. According to Gould, if any of these premises are false, then their entire argument disintegrates (Gould, 1994).[11]
- Intelligence must be reducible to a single number.
- Intelligence must be capable of rank ordering people in a linear order.
- Intelligence must be primarily genetically based.
- Intelligence must be essentially immutable.
Similarly, anthropologist C. Loring Brace in a review wrote that The Bell Curve made six basic assumptions at the beginning of the book. He argued that there are faults in every one of these assumptions.[12]
- Human Cognitive ability is a single general entity, depictable as a single number.
- Cognitive ability has a heritability of between 40 and 80 percent and is therefore primarily genetically based.
- IQ is essentially immutable, fixed over the course of a life span.
- IQ tests measure how "smart" or "intelligent" people are and are capable of rank ordering people in a linear order.
- IQ tests can measure this accurately.
- IQ tests are not biased with regard to race, ethnic group or socioeconomic status.
Relationship between IQ and outcomes
The Nobel Memorial Prize winning economist James Heckman writes that two assumptions made in the book are questionable: that g accounts for correlation across test scores and performance in society, and that g cannot be manipulated. Heckman writes that a reanalysis of the evidence used in The Bell Curve contradicts this story. The factors that explain wages receive different weights than the factors that explain test scores. More than g is required to explain either. Other factors besides g contribute to social performance, and they can be manipulated.[13] Murray argued that this was a straw man and that the book does not argue that g or IQ are totally immutable or the only factors affecting outcomes.[14]
In a 2005 interview, Heckman praised The Bell Curve for breaking "a taboo by showing that differences in ability existed and predicted a variety of socioeconomic outcomes" and for playing "a very important role in raising the issue of differences in ability and their importance." However, he also maintained that Herrnstein and Murray overestimated the role of heredity in determining intelligence differences, while admitting to being "a bigger fan of [The Bell Curve] than you might think."[15]
Michael Hout of the University of California, Berkeley, along with five colleagues, recalculated the effect of socioeconomic status, using the same variables as The Bell Curve, but weighting them differently. They found that if IQ scores are corrected, as Herrnstein and Murray did, to eliminate the effect of education, the ability of IQ to predict poverty can be made to look dramatically overstated, by as much as 61 percent for whites and 74 percent for blacks. In other words, according to Hout et al., Herrnstein and Murray's finding, that IQ predicts poverty much better than socioeconomic status does, is substantially a result of the way they handled the statistics.[16]
In August 1995, at the National Bureau of Economic Research economist Sanders Korenman and Harvard University sociologist Christopher Winship found certain errors in Herrnstein's methodology. Korenman and Winship concluded:"... there is evidence of substantial bias due to measurement error in their estimates of the effects of parents' socioeconomic status. In addition, Herrnstein and Murray's measure of parental socioeconomic status (SES) fails to capture the effects of important elements of family background (such as single-parent family structure at age 14). As a result, their analysis gives an exaggerated impression of the importance of IQ relative to parents' SES, and relative to family background more generally. Estimates based on a variety of methods, including analyses of siblings, suggest that parental family background is at least as important, and may be more important than IQ in determining socioeconomic success in adulthood."[17]
One early critical book was The Bell Curve Debate.
In the book Intelligence, Genes, and Success: Scientists Respond to The Bell Curve, a group of social scientists and statisticians analyzes the genetics-intelligence link, the concept of intelligence, the malleability of intelligence and the effects of education, the relationship between cognitive ability, wages and meritocracy, pathways to racial and ethnic inequalities in health, and the question of public policy. This work argues that much of the public response was polemic, and failed to analyze the details of the science and validity of the statistical arguments underlying the book's conclusions.[18]
William J. Matthews writes that part of The Bell Curve's analysis is based on the AFQT "which is not an IQ test but designed to predict performance of certain criterion variables".[19] Heckman observed that the AFQT was designed only to predict success in military training schools and that most of these tests appear to be achievement tests rather than ability tests, measuring factual knowledge and not pure ability. He continues:
- Ironically, the authors delete from their composite AFQT score a timed test of numerical operations because it is not highly correlated with the other tests. Yet it is well known that in the data they use, this subtest is the single best predictor of earnings of all the AFQT test components. The fact that many of the subtests are only weakly correlated with each other, and that the best predictor of earnings is only weakly correlated with their "g-loaded" score, only heightens doubts that a single-ability model is a satisfactory description of human intelligence. It also drives home the point that the "g-loading" so strongly emphasized by Murray and Herrnstein measures only agreement among tests—not predictive power for socioeconomic outcomes. By the same token, one could also argue that the authors have biased their empirical analysis against the conclusions they obtain by disregarding the test with the greatest predictive power.[13][20]
Janet Currie and Duncan Thomas presented evidence suggesting AFQT scores are likely better markers for family background than "intelligence" in a 1999 Study.
Herrnstein and Murray report that conditional on maternal "intelligence" (AFQT scores), child test scores are little affected by variations in socio-economic status. Using the same data, we demonstrate their finding is very fragile.[21]
Charles R. Tittle and Thomas Rotolo found that the more that written, IQ-like examinations are used as screening devices for occupational access, the stronger the relationship between IQ and income. Thus, rather than higher IQ leading to status attainment because it indicates skills needed in a modern society, IQ may reflect the same test-taking abilities used in artificial screening devices by which status groups protect their domains.[22]
Min-Hsiung Huang and Robert M. Hauser write that Herrnstein and Murray provide scant evidence of growth in cognitive sorting. Using data from the General Social Survey, they tested each of these hypotheses using a short verbal ability test which was administered to about 12,500 American adults between 1974 and 1994; the results provided no support for any of the trend hypotheses advanced by Herrnstein and Murray. One chart in The Bell Curve purports to show that people with IQs above 120 have become "rapidly more concentrated" in high-IQ occupations since 1940. But Robert Hauser and his colleague Min-Hsiung Huang retested the data and came up with estimates that fell "well below those of Herrnstein and Murray." They add that the data, properly used, "do not tell us anything except that selected, highly educated occupation groups have grown rapidly since 1940."[23]
In 1972, Noam Chomsky questioned Herrnstein's idea that society was developing towards a meritocracy. Chomsky criticized the assumptions that people only seek occupations based on material gain. He argued that Herrnstein would not want to become a baker or lumberjack even if he could earn more money that way. He also criticized the assumption that such a society would be fair with pay based on value of contributions. He argued that because there are already unjust great inequalities, people will often be paid, not for valuable contributions to society, but to preserve such inequalities.[24]
In 1995, Chomsky directly criticized the book and its assumptions on IQ. He takes issue with the idea that IQ is 60% heritable saying, the "statement is meaningless" since heritability doesn't have to be genetic. He gives the example of women wearing earrings:
To borrow an example from Ned Block, "some years ago when only women wore earrings, the heritability of having an earring was high because differences in whether a person had an earring was due to a chromosomal difference, XX vs. XY." No one has yet suggested that wearing earrings, or ties, is "in our genes," an inescapable fate that environment cannot influence, "dooming the liberal notion."[25]
He goes on to say there is almost no evidence of a genetic link, and greater evidence that environmental issues are what determine IQ differences.
Race and intelligence
One part of the controversy concerned the parts of the book which dealt with racial group differences on IQ and the consequences of this. The authors were reported throughout the popular press as arguing that these IQ differences are genetic, and they did indeed write in chapter 13: "It seems highly likely to us that both genes and the environment have something to do with racial differences." The introduction to the chapter more cautiously states, "The debate about whether and how much genes and environment have to do with ethnic differences remains unresolved."
Economist Thomas Sowell criticized the book's conclusions about race and the malleability of IQ, writing:[26]
When European immigrant groups in the United States scored below the national average on mental tests, they scored lowest on the abstract parts of those tests. So did white mountaineer children in the United States tested back in the early 1930s... Strangely, Herrnstein and Murray refer to "folklore" that "Jews and other immigrant groups were thought to be below average in intelligence." It was neither folklore nor anything as subjective as thoughts. It was based on hard data, as hard as any data in The Bell Curve. These groups repeatedly tested below average on the mental tests of the World War I era, both in the army and in civilian life. For Jews, it is clear that later tests showed radically different results—during an era when there was very little intermarriage to change the genetic makeup of American Jews.
Rushton (1997) as well as Cochran et al. (2005) have argued that also the early testing does in fact support a high average Jewish IQ.[27][28]
Columnist Bob Herbert, writing for The New York Times, described the book as "a scabrous piece of racial pornography masquerading as serious scholarship." "Mr. Murray can protest all he wants," wrote Herbert; "his book is just a genteel way of calling somebody a nigger."[29]
One prominent critic of The Bell Curve was the late Stephen Jay Gould, who in 1996 released a revised and expanded edition of his 1981 book The Mismeasure of Man intended to more directly refute many of The Bell Curve's claims regarding race and intelligence. Specifically, Gould argued that the then-current evidence showing heritability of IQ did not indicate a genetic origin to group differences in intelligence. This book has in turn been criticized.[30][31]
Psychologist David Marks has suggested that the ASVAB test battery used in the analyses of The Bell Curve correlates highly with measures of literacy, and argues that the ASVAB test in fact is not a measure of general intelligence but of literacy.[32][33]
Melvin Konner, professor of anthropology and associate professor of psychiatry and neurology at Emory University, called Bell Curve a "deliberate assault on efforts to improve the school performance of African-Americans":
This book presented strong evidence that genes play a role in intelligence but linked it to the unsupported claim that genes explain the small but consistent black-white difference in IQ. The juxtaposition of good argument with a bad one seemed politically motivated, and persuasive refutations soon appeared. Actually, African-Americans have excelled in virtually every enriched environment they have been placed in, most of which they were previously barred from, and this in only the first decade or two of improved but still not equal opportunity. It is likely that the real curves for the two races will one day be superimposable on each other, but this may require decades of change and different environments for different people. Claims about genetic potential are meaningless except in light of this requirement.[34]
Noam Chomsky in 1972, in an earlier debate with Herrnstein, argued that even if there is a correlation between race and intelligence, this would have no "social consequences except in a racist society in which each individual is assigned to a racial category and dealt with not as an individual in his own right, but as a representative of this category … In a non-racist society, the category of race would be of no greater significance [than height].[24]
In 1995, Chomsky criticized the book's accusations about race, saying that there is little evidence that IQ is genetic but that it is influenced by the environment. He goes on to criticize the notion that Blacks and people with lower IQs having more children is even a problem and criticized solutions the authors propose to stop it:
There's an easy solution to the problem: simply bring here millions of peasants driven from the countryside in China ...and radically reduce Browne's income...while Black mothers are placed in Manhattan high rises and granted every advantage. Then the Asian influx will raise the IQ level; and as serious inquiry demonstrates, the fertility rate of Blacks is very likely to drop while that of the children of the journalistic elite, Harvard psychology professors, and associates of the American Enterprise Institute will rapidly rise. The problem is solved;[25]
Rutledge M. Dennis suggests that through soundbites of works like Jensen's famous study on the achievement gap, and Herrnstein and Murray's book The Bell Curve, the media "paints a picture of Blacks and other people of color as collective biological illiterates—as not only intellectually unfit but evil and criminal as well," thus providing, he says "the logic and justification for those who would further disenfranchise and exclude racial and ethnic minorities."[35]
Critic Charles Lane pointed out that 17 of the researchers whose work is referenced by the book have also contributed to Mankind Quarterly, a journal of anthropology founded in 1960 in Edinburgh, which has been viewed as supporting the theory of the genetic superiority of the whites.[36]
In his book The Bell Curve Wars: Race, Intelligence, and the Future of America, Steven Fraser writes that "by scrutinizing the footnotes and bibliography in The Bell Curve, readers can more easily recognize the project for what it is: a chilly synthesis of the work of disreputable race theorists and eccentric eugenicists".[37]
Since the book provided statistical data supporting the assertion that blacks were, on average, less intelligent than whites, some people have feared that The Bell Curve could be used by extremists to justify genocide and hate crimes.[38][39] Much of the work referenced by the Bell Curve was funded by the Pioneer Fund, which aims to advance the scientific study of heredity and human differences, and has been accused of promoting scientific racism.[40][41][42]
Evolutionary biologist Joseph L. Graves described The Bell Curve as an example of racist science, containing all the types of errors in the application of scientific method that have characterized the history of scientific racism:
- claims that are not supported by the data given
- errors in calculation that invariably support the hypothesis
- no mention of data that contradicts the hypothesis
- no mention of theories and data that conflict with core assumptions
- bold policy recommendations that are consistent with those advocated by racists.[43]
Author's follow-up
IQ | <75 | 75–90 | 90–110 | 110–125 | >125 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Age 18 | 2,000 | 5,000 | 8,000 | 8,000 | 3,000 |
Age 26 | 3,000 | 10,000 | 16,000 | 20,000 | 21,000 |
Age 32 | 5,000 | 12,400 | 20,000 | 27,000 | 36,000 |
Values are the average earnings (1993 US Dollars) of each IQ sub-population.[44] |
Murray responded to specific criticisms of the analysis of the practical importance of IQ compared to socio-economic status (Part II of The Bell Curve) in a 1998 book Income Inequality and IQ.[45] To circumvent criticisms surrounding their use of a statistical control for socioeconomic status (SES), Murray adopted a sibling design. Rather than statistically controlling for parental SES, Murray compared life outcome differences among full sibling pairs who met a number of criteria, in which one member of the pair has an IQ in the "normal" range and the other siblings has an IQ in a higher or lower IQ category. According to Murray, this design controls for all aspects of family background (full siblings share the same family background, growing up together in the same home and the same community).
Indicator | Bell Curve control for parental SES | Sibling fixed-effect model |
---|---|---|
Annual earnings, year-round workers | 5548 | 5317 |
Years of schooling | 0.59 | 0.45 |
Attainment of BA | 1.76 | 1.87 |
High-IQ occupation | 1.39 | 1.72 |
Out of labor force 1+ month | -0.34 | -0.3 |
Unemployed 1+ month | -0.52 | -0.47 |
IQ | <75 | 75–90 | 90–110 | 110–125 | >125 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mean years of education | 11.4 (10.9) | 12.3 (11.9) | 13.4 (13.2) | 15.2 (15.0) | 16.5 (16.5) |
Percentage obtaining B.A. | 1 (1) | 4 (3) | 19 (16) | 57 (50) | 80 (77) |
Mean weeks worked | 35.8 (30.7) | 39.0 (36.5) | 43.0 (41.8) | 45.1 (45.2) | 45.6 (45.4) |
Mean earned income | 11,000 (7,500) | 16,000 (13,000) | 23,000 (21,000) | 27,000 (27,000) | 38,000 (36,000) |
Percentage with a spouse who has earned income | 30 (27) | 38 (39) | 53 (54) | 61 (59) | 58 (58) |
Mean earned family income | 17,000 (12,000) | 25,000 (23,400) | 37,750 (37,000) | 47,200 (45,000) | 53,700 (53,000) |
Percentage children born out of wedlock | 49 (50) | 33 (32) | 14 (14) | 6 (6) | 3 (5) |
Fertility to date | 2.1 (2.3) | 1.7 (1.9) | 1.4 (1.6) | 1.3 (1.4) | 1.0 (1.0) |
Mother's mean age at birth | 24.4 (22.8) | 24.5 (23.7) | 26.0 (25.2) | 27.4 (27.1) | 29.0 (28.5) |
Values are "Utopian sample" ("Full sample"). Earning values are the 1993 US Dollars.[45] |
Author | Richard Lynn |
---|---|
Language | English |
Publisher | Washington Summit Publishers |
Publication date | 2008 |
Publication place | United States |
Media type | |
Pages | 380 |
ISBN | 978-1-59368-028-2 |
305.8-dc22 | |
LC Class | BF431.I.94 2008 |
The Global Bell Curve
The Global Bell Curve: Race, IQ, and Inequality Worldwide is a book by Professor Richard Lynn, published by Washington Summit Publishers, June 2008. As its title implies, it builds upon the best-selling 1994 book The Bell Curve, by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, which presents extensive data suggesting that, in the United States, intelligence is a better predictor of socio-economic status (including earnings, employment, family size and involvement in crime) than other commonly quoted factors.
The purpose of Professor Lynn in this book is examine how far this thesis holds for other multiracial societies.[46] It follows Lynn's 2006 book IQ and Global Inequality (with Tatu Vanhanen),[47] and his other books on social inequalities and their causes.[48][49] While Lynn and Vanhanen (2006) focus on differences in the development and wealth of nations, The Global Bell Curve finds consistent evidence of race-based social hierarchies in its selected countries and regions.[50]
Racial hierarchies
The book examines whether the same types of racial hierarchies in intelligence quotient (IQ) and socio-economic status that The Bell Curve found in the US are also present in other parts of the world.[46]
Lynn finds that such hierarchies are widespread. They are demonstrated in Africa, Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, the Caribbean, Latin America, the Netherlands, and New Zealand. Worldwide, East Asians (Chinese, Japanese and Koreans) and Ashkenazi Jews have the highest mean IQs and socio-economic positions, followed by Europeans. The Australian Aborigines and sub-Saharan Africans occupy the lowest positions in the observed social hierarchies. Intermediate positions are occupied by the Amerindians, South Asians from the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asians, the Maori in New Zealand, and the mixed race peoples of South Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean. The same pattern is found for many other social and lifestyle variables such as educational levels, income, health, accidents, crime, marriage, fertility, and mortality.[50] Cranial capacity, unemployment, and mental retardation also vary similarly.
The consistent hierarchies of IQ and achievement reported in Lynn's synthesis can be summarized as follows:
- East Asians (Chinese, Japanese, Koreans) (Average IQ of 105)
- Europeans (Average IQ 100)
- South East Asians (Average IQ 87)
- North Africans (Average IQ of 84)
- Sub-Saharan Africans (Average IQ of 67)
- Australian Aborigines (Average IQ of 62)
Lynn gives many examples of these hierarchies and their history. For example, in Brazil, it is Japanese who are today at the top. Originally, they were brought in after the end of slavery as indentured laborers to work on the plantations. Today, the Japanese outscore whites and other racial groups on IQ tests, have higher income, and are over-represented in university places. They are less than 1% of the total population but compose 17% of the students at the élite University of São Paulo.[46]
In Caribbean nations, such as Cuba, Trinidad, and Guyana, it was instead Chinese and South Asians who came to work as plantation laborers. Today, Chinese are at the top with South Asians being placed between whites and blacks. There are also small groups of ethnic Chinese elsewhere such as in Mexico, Argentina, Australia, and Hawaii, where they consistently do well.[50]
South Asians in Africa, Britain, and Australia average intermediate to whites and blacks in IQ scores, educational achievement, and economic success. Afro-Caribbeans in the UK score similarly on IQ tests to US blacks.[50]
J. Philippe Rushton in a review writes "The results are remarkably consistent over time, place, and situation, irrespective of the original status of the people, or the language, history, and political organization of the country concerned."[50]
Explanations
Lynn writes that there are several theories regarding such differences. Structuralism and discrimination theories assert that those with power maintain their dominance by discriminating against subordinate races.[51] However, notes Lynn, Japanese, Chinese and Jewish immigrants all suffered from discrimination, yet rose above the other communities in Brazil, Britain, Canada, the Netherlands and the United States. Cultural value theorists argue for factors such as work ethic, "achievement syndrome"[52] and an ability to delay gratification. Human capital theories argue that groups secure dominant positions through investments in education.[50] This may be true, agrees Lynn, but why do only a few racial groups elect to do this?
Lynn considers that each of these theories may have some merits in particular circumstances, but argues that, overall, they do not properly explain the consistent worldwide racial hierarchies that have developed today. Cultural values cannot be measured, and therefore have no predictive value. Colonialism ended fifty years ago: is it still a credible force? Continuing, widespread, systematic discrimination is implausible, especially in regions such as Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean where the most successful groups like the Chinese are only small minorities. The standard theories also fail to explain why East Asians and European Jews arrive as impoverished minorities yet within two or three generations proceed to join the elites.
Lynn argues that racial differences in IQ map directly to all of these worldwide social hierarchies. He also notes that an explanation based on differences in IQ explain why mixed-race populations consistently fall between their parent populations, in terms of social problems and achievements.[50]
Reviews
Behavior genetics researcher Wendy Johnson reviewed The Global Bell Curve in the journal Intelligence,[53] praising the book as "well organized and easily accessible to the generally educated reader." The overall conclusion of the review is that the book presents quite a lot of correct data with very dubious interpretation.
Like the other theorists he criticizes, Lynn confuses correlation with causation. Read this book if you want to shore up your own pre-existing ideas about the appropriateness of socioeconomic hierarchies correlated with race. Read this book if you want a glimpse into the intellectual process of rationalizing pre-existing ideas through data collection. Don't waste your time with this book if you want to learn something about either intelligence or the evolution of social structures.
See also
Notes
- ^ p. 518.
- ^ p. 526.
- ^ pp. 548–49.
- ^ Racism Resurgent:How Media Let The Bell Curve's Pseudo-Science Define the Agenda on Race by Jim Naureckas January/February 1995
- ^ Arthur S. Goldberger and Charles F. Manski (1995) "Review Article: The Bell Curve by Herrnstein and Murray", Journal of Economic Literature, 36(2), June 1995, pp. 762–76. "HM and their publishers have done a disservice by circumventing peer review. ...a process of scientific review is now under way. But, given the process to date, peer review of The Bell Curve is now an exercise in damage control...."
- ^ Richard Lynn (1999) The Attack on The Bell Curve Personality and Individual Differences 26, pp. 761–65
- ^ See: "Mainstream Science on Intelligence", Wall Street Journal, December 13, 1994.
- ^ Gottfredson, Linda J. (1997), "Mainstream Science on Intelligence (editorial)", Intelligence 24: 13–23.
- ^ See: The APA 1996 Intelligence Task Force Report.
- ^ Neisser, Ulric; Boodoo, Gwyneth; Bouchard, Thomas J., Jr.; Boykin, A. Wade; Brody, Nathan; Ceci, Stephen J.; Halpern, Diane F.; Loehlin, John C.; Perloff, Robert; Sternberg, Robert J.; Urbina, Susana (1996). "Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns" (PDF). American Psychologist. 51 (2): 77–101. doi:10.1037/0003-066X.51.2.77.
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ A Review of the Bell Curve: Bad Science Makes for Bad Conclusions
- ^ "Science" in the Service of Racism
- ^ a b Heckman, James J. (1995). "Lessons from the Bell Curve". Journal of Political Economy. 103 (5): 1091–1120. doi:10.1086/262014..
- ^ August 1995 letter exchange in Commentary magazine
- ^ Interview with James Heckman. Douglas Clement. June 2005. The Region.
- ^ Inequality by Design:Cracking the Bell Curve Myth Claude S. Fischer, Michael Hout, Martín Sánchez Jankowski, Samuel R. Lucas, Ann Swidler, and Kim Vos
- ^ http://ssrn.com/abstract=225294 Korenman, Sanders and Winship, Christopher, "A Reanalysis of The Bell Curve" (August 1995). NBER Working Paper Series, Vol. w5230, 1995.
- ^ Intelligence, Genes, and Success: Scientists Respond to "the Bell Curve" Bernie Devlin, Richard J. Herrnstein ISBN 0-387-94986-0
- ^ William J. Matthews, Ph.D. (1998) A Review of the Bell Curve: Bad Science Makes for Bad Conclusions
- ^ Cracked Bell James J. Heckman. March 1995. Reason
- ^ The Intergenerational Transmission of 'Intelligence' Down the Slippery Slopes of 'The Bell Curve' Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Vol. 38, No. 3, July 1999
- ^ IQ and Stratification: An Empirical Evaluation of Herrnstein and Murray's Social Change Argument Charles R. Tittle, Thomas Rotolo Social Forces, Vol. 79, No. 1 (Sep., 2000), pp. 1–28
- ^ Verbal Ability and Socioeconomic Success: A Trend Analysis Hauser R.M.; Huang M.H.
- ^ a b Chomsky, Noam. 1972. ‘Chomsky on IQ and inequality I.Q. Tests: Building Blocks for the New Class System.’ Rampart:24–30. pp. 26, 27, 28, 30.
- ^ a b Rollback, Part II Noam Chomsky, 1995
- ^ Sowell, Thomas (1995). "Ethnicity and IQ". The American Spectator. 28 (2).
- ^ Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1017/S0021932005027069, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with
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instead. - ^ Rushton J. P. (1997). "Race, Intelligence, And The Brain" (PDF). Personality and Individual Differences. 23 (1): 169–180. doi:10.1016/S0191-8869(97)80984-1.
- ^ Herbert, Bob (1994-10-26). "In America; Throwing a Curve". The New York Times. Retrieved 2007-01-09.
- ^ Flynn, J. R. (1999). "Evidence against Rushton: The Genetic Loading of the Wisc-R Subtests and the Causes of Between-Group IQ Differences". Personality and Individual Differences. 26: 373–93.
- ^ Humphreys, L.; Gould, Stephen Jay (1983). "Review of The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould". American Journal of Psychology. 96 (3): 407–415. doi:10.2307/1422323.
- ^ Marks, D.F. (2010). "IQ variations across time, race, and nationality: an artifact of differences in literacy skills". Psychological Reports, 106, 643-664.
- ^ http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/beautiful-minds/201008/the-flynn-effect-and-iq-disparities-among-races-ethnicities-and-nations-
- ^ The Tangled Wing Biological Constraints on the Human Spirit by Melvin Konner, 2nd edition, p. 428
- ^ Social Darwinism, scientific racism, and the metaphysics of race Journal of Negro Education, The, Summer 1995 by Dennis, Rutledge M
- ^ Charles Lane, "The Tainted Sources of ‘The Bell Curve’", New York Review of Books, December 1, 1994.
- ^ The Bell Curve Wars: Race, Intelligence, and the Future of America Book by Steven Fraser; Basic Books, 1995. ISBN 0-465-00693-0.
- ^ Ann Coulter and Charles Darwin. Coultergeist by Jerry Coyne
- ^ The Bell Curve: An illustration of the existence of social science as a social problem
- ^ Racism Resurgent
- ^ ABC World News Tonight. November 22, 1994
- ^ slate.com, The Bell Curve Revisited, Stephen Metcalf, October 17, 2005.
- ^ Graves, Joseph, L. 2001. The Emperor's New Clothes. Rutgers University Press. p. 8
- ^ Murray, C. (1997). IQ and economic success. Public Interest, 128, 21–35.
- ^ a b Murray, C. (1998). Income Inequality and IQ. Washington: AEI Press.
- ^ a b c Lynn, R. (2008). The Global Bell Curve. Race, IQ and Inequality Worldwide. Washington Summit Publishers, Augusta, GA, USA.
- ^ Lynn, R. and Vanhanen, T., (2006). IQ and Global Inequality. Washington Summit Publishers, Augusta, GA, USA.
- ^ Lynn, R., and Vanhanen, T. (2002). IQ and the Wealth of Nations. Praeger, Westport, CT, USA.
- ^ Lynn, R. (2006). Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis. Washington Summit Publishers, Augusta, GA, USA.
- ^ a b c d e f g The Global Bell Curve: Race, IQ and Inequality Worldwide By Richard Lynn, Reviewed J. Philippe Rushton, Personality and Individual Differences 45 (2008) 113-114, http://www.wspublishers.com/review2.php
- ^ Wade, P. (1997). Race and Ethnicity in Latin America. Pluto, London, UK.
- ^ Rosen, B.C., (1959). Race, ethnicity and the achievement syndrome. American Sociological Review, 24, 47-60.
- ^ Johnson, Wendy (2009). "Book review: The global bell curve: Race, IQ, and inequality worldwide, Richard Lynn, Washington Summit Publishers, Augusta, GA, USA, ISBN 978-1-59368-028-2". Intelligence. 37 (1): 119–120. doi:10.1016/j.intell.2008.08.001. ISSN 0160-2896.
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References
- Montagu, Ashley, ed. (1999). Race and IQ. Oxford University Press. p. 496. ISBN 978-0-19-510220-8.
- Jacoby, Russell; Glauberman, Naomi, eds. (1995). The Bell Curve Debate: History, Documents, Opinions – 81 articles by 81 academics and journalists from the full spectrum of political views on title topic. Random House/Times Books. p. 720. ISBN 978-0-8129-2587-6.
- Claude S. Fischer et al. Inequality by Design: Cracking the Bell Curve Myth Princeton University Press, 1996, ISBN 0-691-02898-2.
- Bernie Devlin et al. Intelligence, Genes, and Success: Scientists Respond to The Bell Curve. Copernicus Books, 1997, ISBN 0-387-94986-0.
- Weiss, Volkmar (1995). "The Emergence of a Cognitive Elite. Comment on 'The Bell Curve' by Herrnstein and Murray." Mankind Quarterly 35, 373–90.
Further reading
- Tucker, William H. (2007). The funding of scientific racism: Wickliffe Draper and the Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-07463-9.
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External links
- "The Inequality Taboo", Commentary Magazine. By political scientist Charles Murray.
- Interview with Charles Murray
- Booknotes interview with Murray on The Bell Curve, December 4, 1994.
- The Open Mind interview with Charles Murray Part 1 & Part 2
- Audio Commentary on The Bell Curve from the Internet Archive.
Responses to The Bell Curve
- James Heckman's critique of Murray and Herrnstein's statistical techniques
- American Psychological Association 1996 statement on issues raised by The Bell Curve
- "Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns" Full text of American Psychological Association report in response to The Bell Curve]
- Devlin B, Daniels M, Roeder K (July 1997). "The heritability of IQ". Nature. 388 (6641): 468–71. doi:10.1038/41319. PMID 9242404.
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Dickens WT, Flynn JR (April 2001). "Heritability estimates versus large environmental effects: the IQ paradox resolved". Psychol Rev. 108 (2): 346–69. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.108.2.346. PMID 11381833.
- Opinion piece called "Mainstream Science on Intelligence" The Wall Street Journal, December 13, 1994, p. A18
- "Revisiting the Bell Curve" An article by Alan Reifman, which reviews pertinent research on the genetic contribution to intelligence, the relative contributions of intelligence and social factors to success in life, and the potential of educational experience to improve cognitive ability.
- "Flattening The Bell Curve" by Nicholas Lemann in Slate magazine, January 18, 1997
- Rothbard, Murray N. (December 1994). "Race! That Murray Book". LewRockwell.com.
- Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, Racism Resurgent: How Media Let The Bell Curve's Pseudo-Science Define the Agenda on Race
- Critical analysis of Bell Curve statistical methodology
- Nobel Prize-winner James Heckman, "Lessons from the Bell Curve", Journal of Political Economy, October 1995.
- The Bell Curve Wars: Intelligence and the Future of America", Steven Frazer, editor
- Marks, D.F. (2010). "IQ variations across time, race, and nationality: an artifact of differences in literacy skills". Psychological Reports, 106, 643–64.