Nature vs, Nurture?

[RadioRaheem84]

What factors are social and what factors are natural in determining a persons intelligence?

I was asked if societal factors are determinative in a persons development, can IQ be taught?

[Wall$reet_Weenie]

IQ is generally accepted as being an inherent quality. However how intelligent someone is is usually dependent on their environment.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I think intelligence (I.Q) is gained at conception while knowledge is acquired over time.Your I.Q then determines how much you are able to learn.

[The Jay]

Nutrition is an environmental factor so nurture definitely has a lot to do with mental development, and; therefore, intelligence.

[Kitty_Paine]

Both factors have an influence but genetics is the geatest factor that contributes to one's IQ. And yes, don't freak, I brought evidence...

There have been adoptive studies done to find out exactly this, which has more of an impact on a persons IQ? Genetics or environmental/social factors?

Now picture a mother with an IQ of 85 who has a child adopted by a mother with an IQ of 120. And lets say that child's IQ is 110 when he turns 7 (having lived with the adoptive mother for sometime).

If you were to adjust the biological mother's IQ up or down, her biological child's IQ would fluctuate more closely with her's than if you were to adjust the adoptive mother's IQ.

Basically speaking if you have two kids from two different mother's (Mom A - IQ 85 and Mom B - IQ 100) and these kids have the same IQ at the same age (IQ 100 at age 5 for example) and they are both adopted by a mother with an IQ of 125; the child from Mom B will show a greater IQ improvement over the other child (from Mom A), over the same amount of time even in the same environment with the adoptive mother.

Of course I'm speaking broadly and not refering to a specific adoptive study just to give you an overall picture of what the studies found.

And if you're wondering "What does a mother's IQ have to do with the environment a child is raised in?" First I'll say to you they were made sure to be "enriched" environments (no don't ask me to describe an "enriched" environment, use your imagination). Second, directly relating to a person's IQ is a thing called Active Genotype/environment Correalations. Which basically means you will pick an environment that suites your genotype. Therefore people with higher IQ's GENERALLY pick more "enriched" environments for themselves.

I use the term "pick" loosely. Please don't jump down my throat for stupid semantics reasons either. Thank you :)

[Tablo]

I would say both.

[DeBon]

Both, but I always like to think nurture and environment always over come nature. Prepare yourself to take a dive into one of my long meaningless posts that is fueled by my lack of sleep and will contain a minimum of 5 grammatical errors. :D

Let's say you have two pairs of mice, two females and two males. Intelligence speaking, they are on equal footing. Now let's say we take a gene out of one pair of mice that impairs its ability to learn things fast. So one pair is perfectly normal, and the other pair is mentally impaired, but not challenged. They just have a harder time learning things. So these pairs breed and have babies. Take the normal off spring and put them in a dull environment with little to no stimulation. No toys, no colors, even their food is the same old pellet, just dull and extremely plain. They would also be deprived of interaction with humans. The normal mice will be about average intelligence. Now we go to the genetically altered mice, who lack the genes to learn well. Their environment is full of color, toys, tubes, and their food is diverse (not the same thing over and over again). You take them out for 30 minutes a day to do tests, cheese mazes, puzzles, and just give them the attention almost all animals crave. The mentally impaired mice will be nearly as curious, smart, optimistic, and social as the normal mice.

I personally think greed can be cured by the nurture method (but then again I'm a pseudo-science fan boy). I strongly believe almost all traits, from greed, to social skills, to intelligence, to self-motivation, are all nurtures traits. But I do believe in certain formulas of traits overcoming each other, and they are all greatly influenced by the environmental conditions. But that's just me.

edit:
This (http://www.physorg.com/news99144459.html) isn't the original story I based my post on, but I just so happened to have found it.

[NewLeft]

Just throwing this in here: An observation made by Jane Elliott was that institutional oppression could lead to lower IQs scores.

[tir1944]

Both of course.

[RadioRaheem84]

So then let's dissect the Bell Curve. I keep hearing about this book, when discussing IQ with right wingers.

[EvilRedGuy]

What factors are social and what factors are natural in determining a persons intelligence?

I was asked if societal factors are determinative in a persons development, can IQ be taught?


IQ can be taught. Yes.

Right-wings argue that some people have higher IQ than others, we on the left: don't.

[RadioRaheem84]

Bump.

Any links disproving the Bell Curve?

[NewLeft]

Bump.

Any links disproving the Bell Curve?

http://newlearningonline.com/new-learning/chapter-6-the-nature-of-learning/chomsky-on-iq-and-inequality/

[tir1944]

Right-wings argue that some people have higher IQ than others, we on the left: don't.
This is seriously the dumbest post on Revleft.

[EvilRedGuy]

Go and get restricted?

[tir1944]

I'm pretty sure Stephen Hawking has a higher IQ than me or you.
What does this has to do with restrictions lol?:laugh:

[EvilRedGuy]

A higher IQ and those more sacred than you and i?

For sure bigger than yours dude. ;)

[tir1944]

A higher IQ and those more sacred than you and i?
What?

[Kenco Smooth]

It baffles me how quickly many on the left accept the claims, from the truly insane members of the right wing, that if IQ differs genetically this spells the end of all attempts at equality and a brave new world must be built with our higher IQ masters ruling us.

A seriously significant influence on the differences between groups of IQ is genetics, possibly as high as 50 percent. There is nothing reactionary about such a claim nor anything progressive in denying it. Anyone who wishes to claim so builds left politics upon a foundation of sand which every day comes closer to being washed away.

The paper may be 15 years old but it's still the best summary of where modern research into IQ stands.

http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/siegle/research/Correlation/Intelligence.pdf

However the nature/nurture debate really lies on very dodgy use of language and categorisation as a user above pointed out with the influence of nutrition on healthy biological development. I'm not entirely convinced such a debate even makes sense and can only see it becoming more nonsensical if epigenetics continues to develop into a healthy area of study.