Critical Thinking Questions

1. Intelligence can be viewed as a single ability, several abilities, or many processes. List the characteristics that you think are the most important components of intelligence and explain their relevance.
2. Individual differences in intelligence are more stable than individual differences in other areas of psychological functioning such as emotional regulation or aggression. Why do you think this is so?
3. Among children from middle- and upper-income families, genetics are more influential than the shared environment on individual differences in intelligence, but among children from low-income families, the opposite is the case. Why do you think that is?
4. Participation in Head Start does not lead to higher IQ or achievement test scores by the end of high school, but it does lead to lower rates of dropping out or being placed in special-education classes. Why do you think this is the case?
5. Explain Chall’s (1979) statement: “In the primary grades, children learn to read; in the higher grades, they read to learn.”
6. The development of reading, writing, and mathematics shows a number of similarities. What are these similarities, and why do you think development occurs in similar ways in the three areas?