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01/15/2008: "Flynn effect an artifact of earlier maturation"

A possible explanation for the increase in IQ scores is that children today mature sooner, both physically and mentally, than children did decades ago (Sarich, 1999). Today’s children score higher, not because their real intelligence has increased, but because their brains are more mature. A 10 year old today has a brain that has grown faster and has more neural connections than the brain of a 10 year old who lived, say, 50 years ago. Because today’s 10 year olds have brains that, perhaps, 12 year olds had 50 years ago, they do better on an IQ test taken by 10 year olds 50 years ago. Psychologists think they are comparing identical groups of children – 10 year olds to 10 year olds, but they are actually comparing apples and oranges – 10 year old brains to 12 year old brains. Real intelligence has not increased, children just acquire it sooner, and fully mature people today may actually be less intelligent than fully mature people were decades ago.

[ So world IQ is declining, not rising. Awesome. ]

http://majorityrights.com/index.php/weblog/comments/a_possible_explanation_for_the_flynn_effect/