The claim that tests of intelligence and abilities are the best predictors of academic success fails to examine closely the important moderator variable as test and criterion characteristics rather than as person characteristics. (EH)

A defense is presented against the criticism that school psychologists who critically evaluate the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment (SOMPA) are biased (TM 504 174). (MH)

This commentary re-examines Linda Siegel's four basic assumptions (in EC221505) inherent in the Intelligence Quotient-achievement discrepancy commonly used to define learning disability. The commentary also discusses the uses of alternative measures of intelligence and the role of Intelligence Quotient in the identification of learning-disabled…

Issues raised in responses to Linda Siegel's paper (EC221505) on the relationship between intelligence test scores and learning disabilities are addressed. Discussed are the nature of intelligence, classification of learning disabilities by discrepancy between intelligence test scores and achievement scores, the existence of learning disabilities,…

The purpose of this study is to examine the role of the cultural distance hypothesis in determining group differences on intelligence and performance scales in Black and White subjects. This view, the Cultural-Distance Approach, briefly stated is that a sub-culture's distance from the major culture, on which test questions of a test are based and…

This essay provides an overview of the controversies surrounding intelligence: its definition, its genetic or environmental basis, its relationship to achievement and learning ability, cultural factors, and the use of intelligence tests in the schools. This article is part of a theme issue on intelligence. (SJL)

Several common assumptions about human intelligence are challenged in this paper. The "bucket" theory of intelligence describes intelligence as a stable psychological characteristic which affects learning, and which, when accurately measured, predicts an individual's learning capacity. The authors reject the idea that people who have…

Heavy migration into Canada and migration from Native rural communities to urban areas has made it necessary to identify appropriate instruments for assessing minority children's academic abilities. In Canada, IQ tests have been used extensively for academic placement in school. This paper reviews the literature evaluating cultural bias in IQ…

Contrary to popular opinion, it is very difficult to find any objective evidence of culture bias that could account for social class and racial differences in performance on current standard tests of intelligence, even those like the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT), which give the appearance of being highly culture-loaded. They may be…

The effects of the changing nature of intelligence test items during the follow-up period for compensatory education program evaluations on the judgments about program effectiveness are examined. Data from the Stanford-Binet and from three compensatory education evaluations, are examined. Methods for dealing with differential validity are…

Since their beginning, intelligence tests have favored the higher social classes. Despite federal mandates to the contrary, bias in assessment is likely to remain a problem. Claims of test bias can be categorized as popular (naive); clinical (intuitive); statistical (predictive); and psychometric (construct and content). A literature review has…

Data available from the Fall and Spring administration of the Stanford Achievement Test: Intermediate I: Form X and the Otis-Lennon Mental Ability Test for all Title I pupils in the State of New Hampshire plus a random sample for the entire state, made possible the item-by-item comparison of Fall and Spring performance on the same groups of…

Black students from two cities and Mexican-American students, both male and female, showed small but consistent tendencies to perform better, relative to White groups, on three nontraditional measures: tests of inductive reasoning, spatial scanning, and associative memory. These measures showed somewhat less discrepancy between the groups than did…