• @taiyang@lemmy.world
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    4921 days ago

    16 points, so about a standard deviation. That’s big, but your own varience can be just as high; the original point of IQ is a measure of how well you’ll do in school to detect who may need additional attention (and not an inherent intelligence) so later aged tests include more on knowledge base while earlier tests are more about things like pattern recognition, mental rotation, etc. Infact, it has to get recurved regularly as each generation tends to be roughly 10 or 15 points higher (although idk about gen Z).

    All this is to say that a slump of 16 points doesn’t have to be shit like lead poisoning or gas fumes (although that certainly doesn’t help, and pollution matters), it can simply be the US education system isn’t good at teaching students. Cross culture studies already show that, as do differences between the rich and the poor. Or hell, just playing Tetris raises IQ, lol.

    It’d obviously help if this wasn’t a click bait article, though. People wanting to know why need to read a lot of actual research to know the myriad of different things that impact IQ and not just “haha US stupid.”

        • Victor
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          21 days ago

          I thought it was hilarious, can’t lie. But I don’t think gen Z (or alpha, or beta, or whatever gen is the currently self-aware one) are unintelligent, I just think they have shit influence. Parents need to stay extra vigilant in this age.

          • @taiyang@lemmy.world
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            721 days ago

            Real talk the main driver of advances are usually healthier environments, better nutrition and access to knowledge (e g. Via tech). I don’t think Z or alphas are getting better in those regards, kind of inheriting the opposite.

            • Victor
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              21 days ago

              You might be right on that, indeed. At least some countries are backpedaling hard on all of the above right now.

    • ZephyrXero
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      1021 days ago

      The article says 7 points is standard in twins. So this is over twice what is normally seen