Some Chimes from the Bell Curve: A Psychologist's Perspective

This article covers some important psychological dimensions found in the Bell Curve, a composition that vigorously generated volatile arguments and disagreements related to egalitarianism, evolution and ethnicity a few years ago. Some positive psychosocial ideas and features from this work have been herein extracted, followed by supports and refutations. Herrnstein and Murray, authors of The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life, leave no stone unturned or leaf unscanned in the "search for truth" or some might say "search for probabilities", since the authors have evolved through social science passageways where such questions as "what are the chances?" predominate. Their research in these fields has been honed finely from basic statistical methods offering statements of probability calling for degrees of "belief" by the readers of their book. This is no different from science or technical journals whose readers must make a judgment. Those who have read The Bell Curve tend to believe or not believe depending on their backgrounds, biases, fields of endeavor and ethnicity, at least this is what had been found by way of most media: TV, print, radio and Internet. Much of the fanfare and even verbal rage, generated by a large segment of the public ('94-'95), seemed out of control based on diluted versions of this book. Presented is a rigorous compilation of data which would require of the reader, a modicum of sophistication for statistics, sampling procedures, probabilities and sociology. Their longitudinal samples, some in the thousands, are most impressive in light of what all scientists are seeking, "veracity" somewhere on a grade. Such samples command the focus of colleagues. The normal distribution associated with the work of Gauss (Downie and Heath 1965;  1993) in the early 1800's is the bastion of this writing. It represents naturalism. Measurements of biological traits when plotted produce what approaches a normal curve and that is what the data demonstrate and reflect. Nothing has been planned as some wish to pretend or surreptitiously conjure. Gauss was not in error. If one reads this work carefully one easily senses a homeostatic approach in the authors' presentation of each of their two themes, group IQ differences and individual IQ variability forming a curve. Their research outcomes are compelling, weighted on the genetic side but also providing counterbalancing evidence freely in these analyses. They studiously uncover findings world-wide from the literature, confirming ethnic differences in cognitive abilities. Herrnstein and Murray thrive on a balanced perspective that allows for disconfirming research. Blinders are certainly not a part of their armamentaria. This is consistent with most scholarly attempts to maintain objectivity and a strong sense of scientific inquiry. In the process, intellectual antiegalitarianistic flavors emit which are difficult to ignore considering the data. Individual cognitive differences have always been with us. We are not a straight fine but a jaunty bell continuum, like it or not. A person's IQ on individually administered testing has always remained steady without significant fluctuations over life's decades. When they do increase or decrease significantly, such erraticism can be related clinically to examiner error, a traumatic environmental change, a precipitous psychosis or emotional disturbance or more currently polypharmacy effecting responsivity. As well, group testing renders scores or IQ's that tend to hold. This writer believes in a strong genetic component here in the order of the range amplified in the authors' writings. The term clustering describes an occurrence obvious at divergent poles. Historical reviews and contemporary studies have uncovered a clustering of traits, biopsychosocial, at the far ends or tails of the normal distribution. The writer would refer to "adequacies" to the right and "inadequacies" to the left as a generalization. …

Field of study: Education