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Declining IQ of college grads

Darat said:
Depends if talking about mean or median averages?
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Or mode, which is what I think the stat is actually referring to.

ETA: iirc, and it's been a while, mean literally means the average, so if one of the others is meant, it should be qualified as such. That's what I meant about playing games.
 
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Thermal said:
Or mode, which is what I think the stat is actually referring to.

ETA: iirc, and it's been a while, mean literally means the average, so if one of the others is meant, it should be qualified as such. That's what I meant about playing games.
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Pretty sure its all the same in a normal distribution, which I'm pretty sure IQ is in a normal distribution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_distribution#Statistical_inference

ETA: It is a good point though, IQ of college grads may not actually be normal distribution as it should represent the upper side of the normal distribution of IQ. And now I've exhausted my knowledge of statistics.

Not entirely exhausted. If they are comparing median or mode then that could easily be a lot lower for college grads than the mean. If we assume that the top 40% of IQ havers is going to college the distributions peak will be at the low end as a lot more folks have an IQ of 110 than 140. So, Mode is the most common number, that will clearly be a lot closer to 102 than 140. the median is the number in the middle of the list of numbers, also a lot lower than the average.

I don't actually think thats going on but it could be.
 
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ahhell said:
Pretty sure its all the same in a normal distribution, which I'm pretty sure IQ is in a normal distribution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_distribution#Statistical_inference

ETA: It is a good point though, IQ of college grads may not actually be normal distribution as it should represent the upper side of the normal distribution of IQ. And now I've exhausted my knowledge of statistics.

Not entirely exhausted. If they are comparing median or mode then that could easily be a lot lower for college grads than the mean. If we assume that the top 40% of IQ havers is going to college the distributions peak will be at the low end as a lot more folks have an IQ of 110 than 140. So, Mode is the most common number, that will clearly be a lot closer to 102 than 140. the median is the number in the middle of the list of numbers, also a lot lower than the average.
I don't actually think thats going on but it could be.
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Disagreed on the hilite. One genius in the school drags the median way up,but you wouldn't have a corresponding idiot to bring it lower than the average. I would expect the median to be disproportionately high. Also, median averaging is generally ******* useless.
 
Thermal said:
Disagreed on the hilite. One genius in the school drags the median way up,but you wouldn't have a corresponding idiot to bring it lower than the average. I would expect the median to be disproportionately high. Also, median averaging is generally ******* useless.
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Generally, you are correct but in my example I'm assuming that college kids are the top 40% of IQs so median would be lower than the mean in that case. That distribution would have a peak at the low end and a long tail at the high end.

ETA, I'd actually expect the distribution of IQ in college to be something like a normal distribution with a peak higher than the general population but tilted toward the low end of college IQs.
 
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So, I went back to read the article in the OP more closely. There's an add for an online IQ test that claims 70% of americans have a below average IQ.
 
Thermal said:
Disagreed on the hilite. One genius in the school drags the median way up,but you wouldn't have a corresponding idiot to bring it lower than the average. I would expect the median to be disproportionately high. Also, median averaging is generally ******* useless.
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An outlier would affect the mean, not the median. Changing the value of the endpoints in a distribution does not affect the value of the central point.
 
Elaedith said:
An outlier would affect the mean, not the median. Changing the value of the endpoints in a distribution does not affect the value of the central point.
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Outliers affect both median and mean, but the median more dramatically.

Say you have 10 people, 9 with IQs of 100 and one with an IQ of140.

Mean average IQ: 104
Median average IQ: 120
Mode average IQ: 100.

Median is powerfully more affected by the outlier.
 
Thermal said:
Outliers affect both median and mean, but the median more dramatically.

Say you have 10 people, 9 with IQs of 100 and one with an IQ of140.

Mean average IQ: 104
Median average IQ: 120
Mode average IQ: 100.

Median is powerfully more affected by the outlier.
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The median is the middle score (100) when rank ordered. It is not affected at all by the value of the highest score.
 
Gulliver Foyle said:
The same system largely prevailed in the US which, while having no formal system of titles, was just as class ridden as the UK.
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It still is.

Rich kids with no academic achievement or interest will come tongue to get college degrees. Smart kids from families that have never been to college will continue to pick non-college career paths that are more familiar to them.

My neighbor volunteers at the local high school to help combat that second scenario, but the fact that it still requires active intervention to steer even a few gifted kids towards college is an indication that it requires effort to overcome these class boundaries.
 
Dr. Keith said:
It still is.

Rich kids with no academic achievement or interest will come tongue to get college degrees. Smart kids from families that have never been to college will continue to pick non-college career paths that are more familiar to them.

My neighbor volunteers at the local high school to help combat that second scenario, but the fact that it still requires active intervention to steer even a few gifted kids towards college is an indication that it requires effort to overcome these class boundaries.
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Yeah all these kids were going to get in based on their academic ability:

https://www.businessinsider.com/college-admissions-scandal-full-list-people-sentenced-2019-9
 
Dr. Keith said:
It still is.

Rich kids with no academic achievement or interest will come tongue to get college degrees. Smart kids from families that have never been to college will continue to pick non-college career paths that are more familiar to them.

My neighbor volunteers at the local high school to help combat that second scenario, but the fact that it still requires active intervention to steer even a few gifted kids towards college is an indication that it requires effort to overcome these class boundaries.
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Dude... you could employ a more tasteful euphemism.
 
Brainster said:
The utility of that knowledge is actually quite a bit less than you might think. A college is looking at students and trying to figure out which ones can make the grade at their institution. Businesses are looking at college grads and trying to figure out which ones to hire. Nobody is comparing them to people in 1940.
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You are
 
A lot depends on what kind of degree you get.
I suspect a degree in the hard sciences or engineering is harder to get then a lot of liberal art degrees.
 
I doubt that's had time to seep through and be affecting average IQ scores. That being said it could be an interesting subject for some research.
 
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dudalb said:
A lot depends on what kind of degree you get.
I suspect a degree in the hard sciences or engineering is harder to get then a lot of liberal art degrees.
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Many STEM students would have a hard time getting a degree in the fields they like to trash. I went to grad school with a bunch of history and English majors. My writing sucked by comparison and other STEM majors had the same issue. Some were better at catching up than others. My GPA recovered some, but that first semester was an eye opener.
 
Dr. Keith said:
Many STEM students would have a hard time getting a degree in the fields they like to trash. I went to grad school with a bunch of history and English majors. My writing sucked by comparison and other STEM majors had the same issue. Some were better at catching up than others. My GPA recovered some, but that first semester was an eye opener.
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Sure, but the evidence suggests, it's true that by most metrics of academic aptitude, STEM majors outperform, well, everyone else.

https://www.sciencealert.com/your-college-major-can-be-a-pretty-good-indication-of-how-smart-you-are

https://thetab.com/us/2017/04/10/which-major-has-highest-iq-64811
 
Thermal said:
The list is actually a little psychotic, because the discussion was about high IQ being correlated to success, and that list was presented as a counterpoint by showing... people with presumsbly high IQs that went on to achieve great success.
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No, the claim was that high academic achievement correlated strongly with 'societal' success.

Poo poo it as much as you like, but I personally know people who were hopeless at school and yet achieved considerable success after leaving, including my own brother. And these are not geniuses, just people of average or even below average intelligence.

I also knew a guy with high qualifications who was definitely a genius, but lived with his parents and worked in a slaughterhouse because he had no ambition and it paid well. But was he successful? He moved to the US to be with his online girlfriend. If that worked out then he was by one measure a lot more successful than me.
 
ahhell said:
Sure, but the evidence suggests, it's true that by most metrics of academic aptitude, STEM majors outperform, well, everyone else.

https://www.sciencealert.com/your-college-major-can-be-a-pretty-good-indication-of-how-smart-you-are

https://thetab.com/us/2017/04/10/which-major-has-highest-iq-64811
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Right, if you are gifted academically are you going to get a degree in a high paying field or a low paying field? STEM degrees attract more academic high achievers because they lead to higher paying jobs.

That doesn’t make non STEM degrees easier. Underwater basket weaving is a lot harder than the brochure makes it out to be.
 
ahhell said:
Sure, but the evidence suggests, it's true that by most metrics of academic aptitude, STEM majors outperform, well, everyone else.

https://www.sciencealert.com/your-college-major-can-be-a-pretty-good-indication-of-how-smart-you-are

https://thetab.com/us/2017/04/10/which-major-has-highest-iq-64811
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Not sure what you are trying to prove here.

What is the average IQ of your major?
Physics and Astronomy 133
Mathematical Sciences 130
Philosophy 129
Materials Engineering 129
Economics 128
Chemical Engineering 128
Electrical Engineering 126
Physical Sciences 125
Banking and Finance 125
Other Humanities and Art 124
Chemistry 124
Computer and Information Science 124
Civil Engineering 124
Biological Sciences 121
Social Sciences 115
Health and Medial Sciences 111
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STEM Majors List
Astronomy
Biology
Chemistry
Computer science
Engineering
Earth sciences
Health sciences
Information technology
Mathematics
Physics

Philosophy isn't STEM, but it's right up there with math, physics and astronomy. Health science is STEM, but it's towards the bottom of the IQ list.

Average SAT Math & Verbal
Mathematics/Statistics 574
Physical Sciences 571.5
Social Sciences 557.5
Engineering 553.5
Biological/Biomedical 544.5
Computer/Information 539.5
Liberal Art/Humanities 535
Health Professions 490
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The only way you get 'STEM majors outperform everyone else' is by cherry picking.
 
One aspect, that I don't think has been mentioned, is that there is a lot more support for people with various conditions that make learning difficult (dyslexia, autism, ADHD, etc). Many people with such conditions would, in the past, have most likely recorded a lower IQ than they actually had, and would not have been able to achieve a degree-level education on their own. What effect this all has on IQ levels, I'm not sure.
 
ahhell said:
Sure, but the evidence suggests, it's true that by most metrics of academic aptitude, STEM majors outperform, well, everyone else.

https://www.sciencealert.com/your-college-major-can-be-a-pretty-good-indication-of-how-smart-you-are

https://thetab.com/us/2017/04/10/which-major-has-highest-iq-64811
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It's a fascinating study by Prof Wai that I read with interest. But how meaningful is it. It simply tells you that people doing the hard sciences tend to have a higher average IQ within their population than those doing other topics. Looking at his graph based on standard deviation (rather than meaningless IQ scores which vary depending on which test) the average IQ of engineering/hard sciences 'majors' (whatever that means), together with PhD's and Masters, is at +1.5 sd > norm, whereas those at the bottom, as it were, going into education (teachers training) are at an average, as a group, +0.5 sd > norm. That represents a difference (over >440,000 subjects included in Wai's study) of just 0.7 sd (from Z-tables) or 24% of the area under a normal distribution curve. IMV all it tells you is that brighter pupils are directed towards STEM at a young age which is not rocket science...? More interesting would be what they actually do some years after graduating in whatever. In addition, knowing someone is a teacher really does not tell you that they are less intelligent than some NASA astrophysicist. Wai's study is over an entire population over generations and is more to do with demographic trends. The fact that people are now being directed into Business Studies and things such as Marketing and Media Studies doesn't indicate lower IQ's but more the demands of the workforce marketplace, I would have thought.

ETA: I misread the graph. The ±sd of engineering majors is +1.3, not +1.5. And in fact, the lower imputed IQ of the lowest average in 'Education' is actually over +0.5sd >norm but the gradations are not shown, and the top group, the hard engineers are just below +1.3 above the mean. So the variation is even less, than pointed out, above. Let's say +0.525sd versus +1.275sd. A difference of just 19.43% of the area below the Gaussian curve. IOW just a broad 20% variation in IQ between college graduates of all sorts in the USA separating the hard STEMS from the soft arts.
 
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How reliable were the older tests? I did a few IQ tests as part of my psychology degree in 1979ish and my score on those tests ranged from 126 to 164 and on a bell curve that's quite a difference. Sadly the lower scores were from the better validated tests.
Alice Heim kicked the legs from under quite a few in the early 70s.
 
Roger Ramjets said:
No, the claim was that high academic achievement correlated strongly with 'societal' success.
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Nope. Here's the quote:

Ron Obvious said:
It appears to be highly correlated to academic and societal success.
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This is why reading comprehension is so valuable.

Poo poo it as much as you like, but I personally know people who were hopeless at school and yet achieved considerable success after leaving, including my own brother. And these are not geniuses, just people of average or even below average intelligence.

I also knew a guy with high qualifications who was definitely a genius, but lived with his parents and worked in a slaughterhouse because he had no ambition and it paid well. But was he successful? He moved to the US to be with his online girlfriend. If that worked out then he was by one measure a lot more successful than me.
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And as I mentioned already, a contractor buddy of mine is dumb as a rock, yet makes a lot of jingle. He's literally too stupid to recognize his own incompetence.

You can be happy and/or successful with or without a high IQ. But what Ron Obvious was pointing out was that high IQs are strongly correlated with acedemic and societal success. And that's a true statement. Can you have a brilliant but tortured soul who lives in squalor and depression? Sure. But no one here is claiming that higher education and IQ translates to success.
 
Wudang said:
How reliable were the older tests? I did a few IQ tests as part of my psychology degree in 1979ish and my score on those tests ranged from 126 to 164 and on a bell curve that's quite a difference. Sadly the lower scores were from the better validated tests.
Alice Heim kicked the legs from under quite a few in the early 70s.
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The difference would be different tests. 126 sounds like Stanford-Binet or Ravens Matrices and the 164 Cattell, adjusted for age(in adults it only goes up to 160 or so, for those under 18 up to 178). The former has an sd of apx 15 per sd whilst the latter has apx 20. So you would be just under 2sd in the former and apx just over 2.5 sd in the latter. From the z tables, this equates to top 2% apx and top 1% apx respectively.
 
I was a guinea pig for grad students learning to administer the S-B and WAIS in the USA. I had to write to my primary school requesting my kindergarten IQ test scores (they still had access to the score after 15 years). The kindergarten and adult scoring were all within 4 points of each other, with testers blind to the other results till after scoring.

My then-girlfriend (who got me roped into the damned testing) scored me the lowest. It prompted a class discussion about bias, because she had enough insight to realize that she was grading me "hard" when she thought I could have answered better than I did, especially on the analogies. Basically, she reduced points on me that she would have afforded to someone she did not know personally, giving the same response.

Still, pretty impressed with a 4 point spread with three different testers and three different tests across a decade and a half. That says something for the validity of the tests. My only caveat is that I scored unnaturally high on all of them, far higher than my actual intellect is. Like, scoring mid to upper 130s. My gut feel is that I have a good sense for what people want to hear and I can unconsciously "work them" to like me and treat me favorably, which is a defense mechanism I developed out of a profound mistrust of others.

[/Freudian wanking]
 
I've had three that I remember, and the results all caused a bit of a stir.

One gave me a result of 'out of the bounds of this instrument'.

:)

I'm fond of pointing to myself as an example of someone that doesn't achieve success despite high test results.

However, I did educate myself to the point of working as a systems analyst and own my own home.

Given my starting point, maybe that counts as success?
 
Dr. Keith said:
It still is.

Rich kids with no academic achievement or interest will come tongue to get college degrees. Smart kids from families that have never been to college will continue to pick non-college career paths that are more familiar to them.

My neighbor volunteers at the local high school to help combat that second scenario, but the fact that it still requires active intervention to steer even a few gifted kids towards college is an indication that it requires effort to overcome these class boundaries.
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Sorry, I did mean that post to also encapsulate the present tense.
 
I do NOT believe it is related. But it was an odd frame of timing.

I first clicked on this thread while watching a YT video about how statistically more females were finishing college than males, mostly due to programs and policies that gave them an advantage in some way. Scholarships and assistance programs and all that.
The video said it was a 40-60% split in the study they quoted.

But I must restate that I do not believe the decline is directly related to this.

What I believe is as the economy took a dip many people had to go to work and college for the working class became but a dream. Meanwhile rich kids get into premium colleges and stay in the course no matter what class of lazy dolt they really are. Trump and Bush Jr are excellent examples of money buying a prestigious degree for an idiot.

My brother worked nights all the way through DeVry a bunch of years back and never made the stats because it was a technical college. He had a career in robotics and retired not long ago.
I went into the military and then just worked.
I have never tested for IQ that I know of but one can't be an idiot and get as far into life as I did. It took learning skills and being smarter than others to do it.
Including a lot of college grads I worked with that couldn't think on thier feet and adapt.
Wasn't all the extra homework and papers to get that degree supposed to get them better pay automatically?

College is a corrupted system and has been a long time. Bring it back to the merits and personal drive of the student to excell in ilfe no matter the finances of the family.

Any idiot can protest world events, party and learn to weave baskets without encumbering a college campus.
Hell, I can weave baskets...
 
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Good barometer: did you meaningfully get what you wanted out of your life, and feel satisfied? Congratulations, you are a success! If not, it doesn't matter what you banked or degrees you bagged, you done ****** up.
 
success is a broad enough term that you can kind of get away with saying college degrees are unimportant, albert einsten dropped out of middle school and look at him. but as far as i know college degrees are still the most reliable path to employment opportunities and a higher income and you ain’t albert einstein
 
Well at least this generated some discussion.

Someone asked for evidence standards have been lowered, lol.

We award high school degrees for "special education" students now who cannot compete with average students. There's a lot of money in it. A whole slew of acts direct funding to making sure stupid people, most of all, are awarded degrees.

In 1893 the Massachusetts supreme court upheld the expulsion of a student solely due to poor academic ability. My God, have times changed.

Generally the education-industrial complex likes to conflate stupidity with "disabilities", as if a moron was the same thing as Stephen Hawking being in a wheelchair.

When you increase the proportion of people attending school by 250% the education-industrial complex is the primary beneficiary.

But this is the one place we are to never question economic motivations.
 
I had it drilled into my head by my teachers that education was critical to my economic future.

And we have all seen the comparison of average incomes for those with, or without high school degrees, likewise for college degrees.

It is the education-industrial complex advancing this economic argument.

It follows that everyone should have a high school degree and everyone should have a college degree. Not logically. But in the sophistry of the self-interested educational-industrial complex.

It doesn't matter whether the degrees become meaningless when the objective is doubling or tripling the size of your industry.
 
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