Getting Smarter

Every generation likes to think itself smarter than the last. Today, thanks to recent studies, the next generation will have the raw data to prove its point.

Intelligence researchers say that IQ scores are on the upswing. In fact, those who would have been considered of average intelligence 100 years ago would be deemed below average by today's testing results.

In the U.S., intelligence is rising by three to six points per decade. The largest increase was found in results on an IQ test called Raven's Progressive Matrices, while the older Stanford-Binet test and the Wechsler Scales showed the smallest rise.

But the rise in IQ is a global phenomenon. Dubbed the "Flynn effect" after New Zealand-based researcher James R. Flynn, this global increase in brain power was discovered by evaluating the results of tests which have not been adjusted in decades, such as those used by the military.

So, the rise in IQ depends on which set of IQ test results one chooses to accept – assuming, of course, one accepts IQ testing at all. Critics of testing claim the rise in results shows only that people are getting better at taking tests. Even James Flynn rejects his own effect, noting that he finds it implausible that today's children are more intellectually gifted than their grandparents.

At the same time, psychologists and intelligence researchers cite a host of factors which could well contribute to a rise in intelligence: improved nutrition, the influence of urbanization, a general improvement in socioeconomic conditions, even the influence of television, videogames, and computers in making minds more nimble.

Several studies have shown that computers and videogames are having an effect on IQ. One study found that after playing a videogame which required object manipulation in a three-dimensional space, children improved their performance on established IQ tests which require similar spatial manipulation.

However, psychologists and educators continue their fierce debate on whether younger people are truly smarter than their elders, what they may be smarter at doing, and how they might have gotten that way.

Written by Sean Wolfe with graphic design by Emily Fader