There’s a story in the Daily Mail about a woman named Alicia Englert accused of leaving her baby in a neighbor’s trashcan, but the neighbor heard noises and the baby was luckily rushed to the hospital and saved. Englert took a court ordered IQ test (apparently the Wechsler) and scored 51. The Wechsler scale is normed so that Americans have a mean IQ of 100 with a standard deviation of 15, but because of massive demographic changes that have occurred in America over the last several decades, the white IQ distribution tends to be higher (but narrower) than America’s as a whole (103, SD = 14.5). As a result, scholar Richard Lynn converts IQs based on American norms onto a scale where Whites have a mean of 100 and an SD of 15, because this makes scores more comparable with older IQ tests normed when the country was more white. Compared to whites, the average American has an IQ of 97, and Englert would have an IQ of 46.
Now, presumably the reason Englert took an IQ test is that people with IQs below 70 (below 66 on white norms) are not legally responsible for their alleged crimes in certain states so scoring low would help her defence. What’s interesting about her having a white IQ of 46 is that she has an online dating profile, graduated high school, and was apparently literate enough to write the following:
‘hi my name is alicia im 23 years old I work full time I have brown hair im 5’1 I have no kids I do drink but only on the weekends I have my own car I still live with my mom and dad for now!!! if you want to know more just ask
Back in 1980, scholar Arthur Jensen talked about the expected achievements of people with different IQ levels. Jensen didn’t distinguish between IQ and white IQ because back in 1980, America was overwhelmingly white, so IQs based on American norms were pretty much the same as IQs based on white norms, so it was pointless to make that distinction. Jensen wrote the following:
The four socially and personally most important threshold regions on the IQ scale are those that differentiate with high probability between persons who, because of their level of general mental ability, can or cannot attend a regular school (about IQ 50), can or cannot master the traditional subject matter of elementary school (about IQ 75), can or cannot succeed in the academic or college preparatory curriculum through high school (about IQ 105), can or cannot graduate from an accredited four-year college with grades that would qualify for admission to a professional or graduate school (about IQ 115).
So based on Jensen’s thresholds, someone with an IQ below 50 should not have been able to attend a regular school, let alone graduate high school.
But then thanks to the Flynn effect, which is probably mostly caused by rising nutrition improving brain size and brain function over the 20th century, a white IQ of 46 is probably a lot smarter than it used to be. Indeed Richard Lynn argues that the average bushman has a white IQ of 54.
The alleged crime itself indicates a lack of IQ on Englert’s part. Why not just give the baby up for adoption when there are so many loving couples that would provide it with a wonderful home? And if she wanted to do something as terrible as putting her baby in a trashcan, she should have known that a trashcan that belongs to a neighbour greatly increased the odds of her getting caught.
Even still, it does seem suspicious that someone with an IQ this low would be smart enough to graduate high school, drive a car and use the Internet. I hope she didn’t score low on purpose for legal reasons.
Here is something similar to Cosby..a comedian and prolific writer scoring low on the SAT, but otherwise seeming to have a high IQ https://books.google.com.tr/books?id=fkXBBGmGWcEC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
Interesting. The SAT seems produce a lot if wierd anomalies.
Whoever saved that baby is a hero
Due to the heredibility of IQ, he/she probably saved a future welfare recipient and Democratic voter
I wonder how smart the father is
exactly. I would not have saved that baby.
Hilarious. So true. Even worse that the mother’s IQ is the best predictor for the child’s.
http://education.jhu.edu/PD/newhorizons/Neurosciences/articles/Brains%20on%20Fire/
If those Jensen thresholds are accurate, then the IQ still doesn’t seem to add up even with FE. Maybe HS has become much easier, maybe she’s the most extreme outlier, maybe she somehow cheated on her proficiency tests. I don’t believe her IQ is actually that low, though.
How g-loaded was WISC again?
The WISC is for kids. She likely took the WAIS; most likely the WAIS-IV. The g loading is at least 0.9; probably higher than any other standardized test.
I’ve heard of courts administering WISC arbitrarily if the judge thinks the mental age of the prosecuted is low, but it’s probably WAIS
Yes, the WISC is sometimes given to mentally retarded adults when the WAIS is too difficult.
not caring for your baby has nothing to do with IQ, child-care is a must for a mammal. This is a disorder probably. Animals in nature do not need high IQs but they survive and function quite well. Not fitting in higher IQ environment might be a reason, though.
she has the same surname as the nobel prize laureate for physics, Francois Englert.
and the eyes, yes, the eyes give a lot of information about the intelligence…
her mother went to prison when she was a baby… so its genetic. it is impossible to survive with these kind of genes.
and she is extremely white…
and if she can use internet and have even an online profile, and type things there… she cannot have an iq of 51…
many problems in the story…
not caring for your baby has nothing to do with IQ,
Except that according to Rushton, more K selected mammals (i.e. greater parental investment) and more K selected races tend to be more intelligent. Not sure if the correlation can be extended to individuals though:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0191886985901370
she has the same surname as the nobel prize laureate for physics, Francois Englert.
That might not be a coincidence. Certain genes or alleles might cause EXTREME IQ (extremely high or extremely low, depending on the other genetic variants the individual inherited). Total speculation though,
and the eyes, yes, the eyes give a lot of information about the intelligence…
Yes, that does seem to be the case. Not entirely sure why.
and she is extremely white…
Yes, it is odd that someone with such extreme white genes would have such a low IQ.
and if she can use internet and have even an online profile, and type things there… she cannot have an iq of 51…
Yes it doesn’t seem to add up. I think one of several things might be going on:
1) she faked a low performance on the IQ test to avoid responsibility for the alleged crime
2) she was under the influence of drugs or alcohol at that time of the testing
3) she has some learning disability that skews her test results
4) Any combination of the above.
Hey pumpkin person. My name is Mikey.im 20 years old .. I’m mixed race (both parents are a mixture of black and white) 6 foot 2 with an iq of 88 (which is very low and puts me at a mental age of a 16-17 year old). I also have ADD(so does my father). and I have a naturally extraordinary “beutiful” face… I’ve been called beutiful/pretty boy ever since I was about 12 and a half …..I’ve been reading your blogs about intelligence and you are so right. I’ve never been able to use my looks to my advantage in life or grasp the concepts that others were able too at the higher levels of education. And I’ve constantly been homeless on and off during my teenage years because it’s hard for me to adapt to the evolutionarily novel environment of modern day America. Im also a psychopath (father and other family members are also psychopaths) I try to manage my psychopathy and low iq by saving up my money (I know I can’t make a lot if it) and spending it on a large reward (psychopaths behave better when there rewarded instead of punished) I wanted to ask you if there’s anyway I can improve my life even tho the odds are stacked against me. Please help!
Pumpkin, check out JayMan’s new page about genetic confound. http://emilkirkegaard.dk/en/?page_id=4742
Another thing to point out. You know the people who say that “g is a statistical myth?” They are wrong. http://lambdaphagy.tumblr.com/post/111348327174/starting-over-with-a-new-post-because-tumblr-is
The g</blockquote factor has been empirically verified.
Jensen says:
I wrote a post on this here.
https://notpoliticallycorrect.me/2016/05/18/more-g-denialism-and-more-gould-refuting/