Perth Amboy evening news., 1923-06-30

WASHINGTON, June 30:-Those
optimists who are convinced that
everything is getting better and bet
ter may prepare for a shock. Amer
lean intelligence is not getting bet
ter. 1t is on the decline, if we can
believe the report of a Princeton
professor of psychology, DR.. Carl C.
Brigham.
What this really NEAR is that the
intelligence of immigrants to this
country is lower than in the past.
And as more and more immigrants
of inferior mentality arrive to be-
come part of our. population, the
average grade of intelligence in A
merica will be further lowered.
This rather serious state of affairs
is dedueed from a study of the army
intelligence tests. All problems of
American intelligence lead sooner
or later to the army tests. Filed "a
way in some musty War Department
storeroom, these tests contain a
vast amount of information. The
scientist who insists On a large num-
Der of cases and fairly uniform con-
ditions of experiment to prove a
theory is for once confronted by
more than sufficient material. In
telligence records Of one and a half
million men await his study,
Scientists who dig into this unwieldy
mass of material generally select a
mere 100000 cases or perhaps even
fewer for their tasks.
Some time ago, DR.. Brigham set
himself the problem of comparing
intelligence scores made by native
born Americans and immigrants. He
took at random about 1000 cases of
white drafted men from each state
and added 10000 more cases to
bring his material up TO 100, 600.
Some u.s. 900 intelligence records Of
the negro draft men were added and
$4,000 officers records.
This collection gave him 10000
records of foreigners, and he pro-
ceeded to study these records accord
ing to countries and races, and ac-
cording to each mans period of RES
idence in this country.
English Score Highest
The figures showed that draft men
from England made higher intelli-
gence score than those from any
other country. Their mental age
averaged almost 10 years.
This term, mental age, by the way,
is depIored by DR.. Brigham. He
points out that it is ridiculous to
raise a commotion over an idea that
the typical American nla has the
mind Of a child of thirteen. In q
single kind of intelligence test, the
scores happened to be expressed in
terms of mental age because the
tests We're first tried out and stan
dardized in the schools.
Only a thousand school children
were tested to fix the mental age
levels, however, Willie more than a
million adults have taken the army
test. The average American soldier
did strike the same level on the test
IS the IA year old California school
children, but the cores of the army
men obviously represent normal
adult mentality as it is today. The
scale originally set 16 years as the
level for the average adult and Is
years as the superior adult score,
United States army officers averaged
llmost 10 years.
To return to the mental ages OF
the nations, England, Scotland, Hol-
land and Germany ranked in the or
der named just above our native
JUN dAdLk AHCHs DSlOW LILO udLlNe
Americans are listed Denmark, Can
ada, Sweden, Norway, Belgium, Ire
land, Austria, Turkey, Greece, Rus
ska, Italy, and Poland. Poland aver
aged a little less than IL years men,
tai age, which is slightly higher than
the colored draft average.
The listing of countries is not to
be taken to mean that the nations
of the world rank in this exact NJ
der in intelligence. The men who
represent each country are all mimi
grants. But America is concerned
only with the specific immigration
factors that are sent by each country.
1t is only these factors that go into
the melting pot and become America.
It is a well known fact that our
early immigration for northern Eu-
rope was inspired by the urge for
religious freedom and high ideals OF
government ami the colonists were
in consequence a substantial type of
citizenry. America has never ceas-
ed to attract ambitious and idealistic
settlers from all parts Of the world,
but Of late years this type of immi-
grant has been over-shadowed by
wholesale Importation of cheap la
Dor.
Living Here Helps Foreign Born
The trend of intelligence in the
United States Is clearly shown by Or.