Member-only story
The Myth of IQ — and Why It Matters
Summary: Among the many myths that support the racial and economic current status quo in the United States, none is more widely accepted by scientists and laypeople alike than the myth of general intelligence (IQ).
Psychology can save the world. After all, psychology is the field of science that connects to everything we think, feel, and do. So, unlike physics or chemistry, psychology can help reduce both racism and obesity. Likewise, psychology can help us save more for retirement, save decent marriages, and save the planet from climate change. But psychology is not perfect. It is home to at least one racist and classist myth that was born in the early 1900s. This myth is the idea that human intelligence is a single thing. I’d like to chip away at this myth.
When Alfred Binet invented the IQ test in 1905, many psychologists firmly believed that women were poorly suited to higher forms of thinking. They also assumed that people of color were intellectually inferior to Whites — and that they were inherently so. That is, they believed in racial essentialism. To some degree, racial essentialism hides in the shadows today. But in the early 1900s, racial essentialism flourished in broad daylight. It was in full force when the IQ test was invented. By itself, that fact’s not necessarily a problem. Einstein proposed his theory of relativity in 1905, and it has…
