Of "In-Group" & "Race"

bpesta22 said:
Yahzi, I wouldn't mind continuing the debate but I have no idea where to begin.

I see several lines of attack re your last post, but it seems to me we've been over this a few times already.

That said, I'm wondering if anyone else is reading this thread, and would be interested in hearing my counter to Yahzi's last post re the Flynn effect, the validity of IQ tests, and / or whether I am a woo and this is theology.

If you are indeed a poor sap who has read this far, what seems like it still needs explaining?

TIA
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I'm with you, and I bailed out awhile ago. I didn't see much progress.

The good news is that not all forum participants post, so as long as you make a good case, just because you haven't convinced an avid poster does not mean all is lost.

Low hanging fruit, and all that, efforts may be more productive elsewhere.
 
I say keep the thread alive! My only intent by saying "to the casual reader" was a summary, perhaps a bad one. The sheer volume of debate here might put off somebody who was interested, dispassionate, non-trolling, curious, willing to post.

My money is like this: I think there is more to gain by exploring the social sources of human differences than the biological, in the short term. The terms "social-cognitive" have been joined together in psychology lately. All part of a "tripartite" theory that came from A. Bandura. It links up to common sense in a way that other psychology-theoretical-talk doesn't, in my experience.

In this realm it seems to me that the pure physiological, neuronal, what-have-you theories are running well back in the pack at the moment. Yes, it will be neat and nifty when we can say that a certain chemical affects a certain neuron during certain situational moments. But right now we are not able to make any decent decisions based on that, like how to treat a patient or teach a student. I find it more useful to consider larger constructs, like "motivation" or "self-concept."

IMHO and humbly submitted.
 
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bpesta22 said:
oh, and how would you characterize the debate so far. Any side winning? Anything new learned? Any world views modified, even if slightly?
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One original topic was whether the social theory of race had any validity, simply because it accidentally predicted a few similar observations. This argument was left unresolved, as the people who had originally asserted that it was partially right chose not to respond to the charge that it was only accidentally right.

The other issue is whether or not psychometric testing can measure small differences between poorly defined groups, given that it has been shown unable to measure large differences between generational groups. This argument is not so much unresolved as simply ignored. Various posters assert that psychometric testing of poorly defined traits can be trusted to be accurate to small percentages, that cultural bias can be accounted for even while we have no idea how to measure or define cultural bias, and that even though the Flynn effect remains a complete mystery[i/] we can safely ignore it.

That's pretty much where the debate stands.

Oh, and that Dawkins was less of a scientist than some racist boob named Jensen.
 
bpesta22 said:
Not Dawkins-- gould.
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I stand corrected. It wasn't really a relevant point, which is why I didn't pay that much attention.

We know cultural bias can be huge, we know we don't know how huge, and we know we don't know how to separate out its effect from the other effects we want to measure. All attempts at measuring differences in groups presumes that we have solved the differences in cultures problem. This presumption is false; ergo, all conclusions based on it are unjustifiable.
 
With all the careful attention to measurement we can apply, reliability and validity (R&V) carefully attended to, with sample sizes of a big enough number, well, that's when I get interested. The constructs themselves have a way of splitting up or recombining. The samples never get big enough to test a particular guess. Big giant samples with crappy measures only lead to nothing. Tiny little ungeneralizable samples are intriguing, but only hold a carrot/stick to the interested researcher.

Would anyone care to comment on the trend, in the social sciences in some areas (education, for example) for the "rich description" and "grounded theory" approaches? In other words, if you have no theory, just go out and take a lot of field notes, and concoct a theory or massage your observations to fit one that your dissertation advisor is fond of.
 
This is interesting, because it confirms what I think Yahzi has posited: that reporting that one group is better at something than another group can lower the that group's actual performance. At least with regards to men, women, and math. I don't think this should be a reason not to pursue politically incorrect research topics, but this is itself useful information.

From William Saletan's Slate column:

Women do worse on math tests when they're told that men are genetically better at math. A study divided 220 female students into four groups, each with an assigned reading. One reading talked about images of women in art; a second said men have an innate advantage at math; a third said there's no innate difference; a fourth said preferential treatment accounts for male success. Women in the latter two groups averaged 15 to 20 correct answers out of 25 on a subsequent math test. Women in the first two groups averaged only 5 to 10 correct answers, and their test scores were lower after the reading than before. Researchers' conclusion: Faced with deterministic stereotypes of female vulnerability, women "are likely to choke under the pressure." Rebuttal: Thanks for another deterministic stereotype of female vulnerability. (For Human Nature's takes on gender, science, and Larry Summers, click here and here.)
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Dave1001 said:
This is interesting, because it confirms what I think Yahzi has posited: that reporting that one group is better at something than another group can lower the that group's actual performance. At least with regards to men, women, and math. I don't think this should be a reason not to pursue politically incorrect research topics, but this is itself useful information.

From William Saletan's Slate column:
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Seems like a very weak manipulation, but a huge effect (5-10 versus 15-20 correct). Seems fishy-- do you have the full cite; what journal it was published in???
 
bpesta22 said:
Seems like a very weak manipulation, but a huge effect (5-10 versus 15-20 correct). Seems fishy-- do you have the full cite; what journal it was published in???
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I recommend tracking it down from slate, where I saw it mentioned today. I agree that it seems fishy to me, but I think it deserves rigorous scrutiny.

Slate is the same publication that aired Easterbrook's recent claim that autism may be caused by tv watching. That seemed to be thoroughly debunked by folks on this forum, which at least raises the possibility that Slate may be promoting weak research again.

But it would be great if you (and other qualified board members) could look at and evaluate the actual study.
 
Foster Zygote said:
Stem cells. Feh! That's just science fiction mumbo jumbo. The real secret behind atomic supermen lies in my electronium ray, which harnesses the light of the sun to produce electromagnetic radiation. "Mad" they called me. Fools! I'll destroy them all!
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But where are you going to find all the chronotons you need to speed up the process, without destroying civilization?
 
"stereotype threat" is the related idea, it garnered some attention, when focusing on black/white. I could find cites up to about 2002 but won't go further unless provoked. Personally, I don't believe that the stereotype threat theory explains much at all. No more than any other social perception can explain much.
 
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