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Poverty Stunts IQ In the US But Not In Other Developed Countries (arstechnica.com)

Posted by Soulskill on from the expensive-elmo-dolls-are-the-key-to-intelligence dept.

An anonymous reader writes: New research published in the journal Psychological Science (abstract) found that children who grow up in poverty within the United States tend to have lower IQs than peers from other socioeconomic brackets. Previous studies have shown a complex relationship between a child's genetics, his environment, and his IQ. Your genes can't pinpoint your IQ, but they can indicate a rough range of values within which your IQ is quite likely to fall. For kids in poverty, they seem to consistently end up on the low end of that window. Interestingly, this effect was not seen for any of the other countries hosting kids within the study, which included Australia, Germany, England, Sweden, and the Netherlands. The study authors speculate that "inequalities in educational and medical access in the U.S." may be the root of the differences, though another researcher is planning to study the effect of school environments as well.

11 of 519 comments (clear)

  1. Schooling, perhaps? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Public schools in the US are beholden to teacher's unions, and teacher's unions are all about funneling dues collected from members into contributions to politicians who tend to do things that increase the power of the teacher's unions.

    And the kids be damned - especially poor kids with no alternative.

    Ever notice how politician's kids go to private schools?

    1. Re:Schooling, perhaps? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      a good 1/2 of my friends are teachers
       
        every single one of them complains about how they are stopped from doing the right thing because of the unions
       
        bad teachers cant be fired, and good teachers are pushed to the "good schools"

    2. Re:Schooling, perhaps? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The TV is just always on while they're home and doing other things.

      I was listening to NPR, and the interviewee mentioned that her research showed that for 40% of American children, the TV was on, and visible, during all three meals.

      So, yes, Americans watch a lot of TV, but is there any evidence that watching TV lowers IQ? I would suspect that the causation is the other way around.

    3. Re:Schooling, perhaps? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Family emphasis on scholastics outweigh anything else.

      Several studies, described in Freakonomics and elsewhere, found that this is not true. Parental attitudes make surprisingly little difference. Who the parents are, makes far more difference that what the parents do. Family income, and the IQ of the biological parents (but not adoptive parents) makes much more difference than reading to your kids, helping them with homework, etc.

  2. Um... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    I don't want to point out the obvious, but what countries like Australia, Germany, England, Sweden, and the Netherlands DON'T have, is a whole bunch of people of African descent living there. Statistically speaking, regardless of wealth, people who are of African descent typically have an IQ of, give or take 10 IQ points, 75. Regardless of whether they live in Africa, or the USA, that tends to be the case. Blaming anything EXCEPT genetics is stupid, and this is one of those times where being politically correct would essentially require people to straight up ignore facts and reality.

    1. Re:Um... by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Then why don't blacks in the other countries pull down the averages in those other countries? Oh, right, because "Murikah, f*ck yeah!"

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  3. 75% of intelligence is inherited by mi · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Supposedly, 75% of intelligence is determined by genes. The results reported in TFA would seem to explain the reasons of poverty in the US — the poor aren't too smart to begin with. Their children — despite going to the same schools as others — remain stupid.

    If other countries do not demonstrate an effect so profound, that may mean, being intelligent is not as rewarding over there and smart people may remain poor.

    --
    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    1. Re:75% of intelligence is inherited by mi · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Those factors are 50 times more important in determining a person's ability to learn than genetics.

      Citations needed.

      all of those kids are 100% fucked for the rest of their life

      Rather gloomy. What makes you so convinced? All I found was talk of potentially dangerous ...

      greedy rich asshole fuckheads that made decisions they had no right making

      Relax, pal — a town spending less money on water-supply has more money left for public schools, has it not?

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    2. Re:75% of intelligence is inherited by HiThere · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Your comment is excessively extreme. Flint is an outlier...admittedly not as much of an outlier as one would wish. And many rich children are also poisoning themselves, admittedly usually by choice and in different ways.

      I, personally, suspect that poorer US citizens feed their children more junk food than wealthier ones do. That would probably be sufficient environmental degradation to explain most of the statistics.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  4. Duh. by Lumpy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Here in the USA lead abatement in rentals is a thin coat of paint. Elsewhere they require the landlord to remove it ALL from the home.

    And who lives in the shitty run down really old homes with lead paint in them? poor people.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  5. 'Psychological Science' by swell · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Ah yes, 'Psychological Science' ... that's akin to 'Military Intelligence' and 'Astrological Science'.

    When I studied psickology in 1959, and then again in 1969, I couldn't help noticing that the field had changed about as much as the runways of Paris fashion. Since then many more dynamic changes; each generation displacing the previous and 'outing' their theories.

    Sorry to demean them, and in fact I believe there is some truth in this observation. I also assume that as their peers and others review this work we will see different conclusions drawn from the same data.

    --
    ...omphaloskepsis often...