To the best of our knowledge, the genetic foundations that guide human brain development have not changed fundamentally during the past 50,000 years. However, because of their cognitive potential, humans have changed the world tremendously in the past centuries. They have invented technical devices, institutions that regulate cooperation and…

We review recent research about the development of creativity in South America focusing on studies of individual differences in creativity and educational and developmental studies of children and adolescents' creativity. Most South American researchers are influenced by mainstream psychometric approaches, although computational and cultural…

The Personality Psychopathology-Five (PSY-5; Harkness & McNulty, 1994) is a model of individual differences relevant to adaptive functioning in both clinical and non-clinical populations. In this article, we review the development of the PSY-5 model (Harkness, 1992; Harkness & McNulty, 1994) and discuss the ways in which the PSY-5 model is…

The idea of Matthew effects in reading--the widening achievement gap between good and poor reader--has attracted considerable attention in education research in the past 25 years. Despite the popularity of the topic, however, empirical studies that have analyzed the core assumption of Matthew effects in reading have produced inconsistent results.…

We are grateful to the commentators for providing many stimulating and valuable observations. The main point of our article was to call attention to the overestimation of individual differences correlations in a subset of neuroimaging papers. To structure our discussion of these comments, we list the main points from our paper, note where…

Addresses the theoretically important question of whether g is merely an artifact of the method of constructing psychometric tests and the mathematical operations of factor analysis or whether it has an authentic claim to represent some natural phenomenon that exists independently of psychometrics and factor analysis. (Author/ABB)

This final report reviews the main theoretical and empirical developments concerning components of individual differences in human intelligence. The report is divided into three main sections. The first briefly reviews alternative approaches to understanding the nature of intelligence. The second provides the proposed componential metatheory, a…

This paper summarizes empirical findings of research on a theory of general mental ability, based on laboratory studies of the relationship between measurements of individual differences on conventional psychometric tests and in speed and efficiency of information processes. The paper covers characteristics of "g" (general mental ability),…

Commentary discusses two components of "The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life." First, evidence is presented demonstrating central role intelligence plays in American life; second is Spearman's g, the general factor underlying individual differences involving cognitive ability. Concludes that data does not…

Reviews career-related issues for employees with diverse characteristics and job status. Evaluates 44 psychometrically sound career-assessment instruments for their usefulness in dealing with issues. (SK)

Notes that significantly different results frequently exist between tests that purport to measure the same skill when the same child is tested on both instruments. Considers discrepancies related to examinee, examiner, examinee-examiner interactions, environment, and psychometric characteristics of the tests employed. Cites 10 major psychometric…

Reviews psychometic studies of human spatial ability and studies of environmental, genetic, hormonal, and neurological influences that interact in producing individual variation in spatial test scores. (MP)

The construction of cognitive tests is largely based on a Thurstonian model of the structure of the intellect, with test content described in terms of loadings on broad constructs called factors. Knowledge of factorial content of a test does not necessarily correspond to knowledge of mental activities elicited by test performance. Modern cognitive…

The purpose of this report is to distill curricular and testing implications of brain research. The report will focus on three topics. One topic is the possibility that brain lateralization--that is, the degree to which the two brain hemispheres specialize in different types of information processing--is an individual differences variable that…

Issues in the testing of bilinguals are examined, particularly in the context of poor results attained on standardized tests by bilingual children. Discussion begins with an examination of definitions and classification of bilingualism, citing some evidence of confusion in use of terminology. Causes for this confusion are seen in popular…