Empathy is an essential component of human social life. It requires the ability to understand another's mental state and respond with an appropriate emotion or action. Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have been described to exhibit atypical empathic responses which limit communication and social interactions. This review highlights…

James R. Flynn is an accidental IQ specialist. In the early 1980s, the American-born political scientist thought he might spend a few pages in a planned book on "how to defend humane ideals" grappling with the argument that the gap in IQ scores between blacks and whites was genetically rooted. It was not his first foray into that subject, but this…

The two featured articles and eight commentaries on the WISC-IV (Wechsler, 2003) and WAIS-IV (Wechsler, 2008) in this special issue of "Journal of Psychoeducational Assessment" are of exceptional quality. As a collective, this special issue greatly advances the field of cognitive assessment by intelligently synthesizing the best of…

The consensus of most intelligence scholars is that the Flynn effect (FE) is real, IQ test batteries are now routinely restandardized on a regular basis. A cornerstone in Flynn's explanation of the FE is his analysis of select Wechsler subtest scores across time. The featured articles by Kaufman and Zhou, Zhu, and Weiss question whether Flynn's…

"Atkins v. Virginia" (2002) dramatically raised the stakes for mental retardation in capital punishment cases, but neither defined this condition nor imposed uniform standards for its assessment. The basic premise that mean IQ scores shift over time enjoys wide recognition, but its application--including the appropriateness of…

Despite Kaufman, Raven's Progressive Matrices and the Wechsler subtest Similarities are tests whose gains call for special explanation. The spread of "scientific spectacles" is the key, but its explanatory potential has been exhausted. Three trends force us to look elsewhere: (a) gains on Wechsler subtests such as Picture Arrangement,…

In this webinar, Dr. Carol Tomlinson of the University of Virginia presented the research base supporting the practice of differentiation and described the characteristics of effective differentiation. She led a discussion of how quality preparation can build and strengthen teachers' knowledge and skills in implementing differentiated instruction…

Flynn has proposed a grand integrative theory, which he calls "scientific spectacles," to explain the phenomenon of rising IQ scores across multiple decades known as the Flynn effect (FE). In his theory, he purports that modern society has placed increasing value and emphasis on the application and education of scientific…

School readiness is a quality that adults believe exists within the child, but it actually is an artifact of age-graded schools. Even in a single grade, there will be a one-year spread in ages and, therefore, in development. Instead of sorting children into those who are ready to learn and those who are not, schools should provide opportunities…

Because English language teachers should take into account the social-psychological situation of the students they teach, they must be sensitive to the effects of traumatic stress among learners. Refugee and immigrant children are frequently survivors of trauma, along with their peers in crisis-torn English as a foreign language settings around…

In longitudinal studies data is collected in a series of waves. Each wave after the first suffers from attrition. Therefore it can be difficult to discriminate between changes in sample parameters due to a longitudinal process (e.g. ageing) and changes due to attrition. The problem is particularly vexing if one of the purposes is to compare…

Discusses the effects of schooling on the development of intelligence in children and how the amount of schooling should be considered when developing norms for turning intelligence test performance into IQ scores. Suggests that because of differences in schooling among same-age children, use of age-based norms results in biased deviation IQS.…

A definition of giftedness is proposed based on the constructs of intelligence, creativity, and problem solving. Research on relationships among intelligence domains and problem-solving processes is summarized, with specific findings concerning problem-solving processes used by children versus adults, by gifted versus average individuals, and…

The Davidson Academy of Nevada may have one of the most-intelligent student bodies in America, with each student required to be in the 99th percentile on IQ or achievement tests. But these kids need room to run and jump and have someone to talk to as much as any middle schooler. The 44 students now at the academy are at the precarious stage of…

Practicing teachers and principals in selected Government schools in Victoria provided data on their levels of emotional intelligence and teacher efficacy beliefs. The data supported the theoretical expectation of a linkage between emotional intelligence and teacher self efficacy. Regression analyses showed that neither gender nor age moderated…