Many of the early intelligence tests were culturally biased, favoring people who were from urban rather than rural environments, middle-class rather than lower-class, and White rather than African American (Miller-Jones, 1989). For example, a question on an early test asked what should be done if you find a 3-year old child in the street. The correct answer was “call the police. ” But children form inner-city families who perceive the police as adversaries are unlikely to choose this answer. Similarly, children form rural areas might not choose this answer if there is no police force nearby.
Such questions clearly do not measure the knowledge necessary to adapt to one’s environment or to be “intelligent” in an inner-city neighborhood or in rural America (Scarr, 1989). Cultures also vary in the way they define intelligence (Rogoff, 1990). Most European Americans, for example, think of intelligence in terms of technical skills, but people in Kenya consider responsible participation in family and social life an integral part of intelligence. Similarly, an intelligent person in Uganda is someone who knows what to do and then follows through with appropriate action.
Intelligence to the latmu people of Papua New Guinea, involves the ability to remember the names of 10,000 to 20,000 clans, and the islanders in the widely dispersed Caroline Islands incorporate the talent of navigating by the stars in their definition of intelligence. Another example of possible cultural bias in intelligence tests can be seen in the life of Gregory Ochoa. When Gregory was a high school student, he and his classmates took an IQ test. When Gregory looked at the test questions, he understood only a few words, since he did not speak English very well and spoke Spanish at home.
Several weeks later Gregory was placed in a special class for mentally retarded students. Many of the students in the class, it turns out, had last names such as Ramirez and Gonzales. Gregory lost interest in school, dropped out, and eventually joined the Navy. In the Navy, Gregory took high school courses and earned enough credits to attend college later. He graduated from San Jose City College as an honor student, continued his education, and became a professor of social work at the University of Washington in Seattle.As a result of such cases, researchers have tried to develop tests that accurately reflect a person’s intelligence.
Culture-fair tests are intelligence tests that are intended to not be culturally biased. Two types of culture-fair have been devised. The first includes questions that are familiar to people from all socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds. For example, a child might be asked how a bird and a dog are different, on the assumption that virtually all children are familiar with birds and dogs. The second type of culture-fair test removes all verbal questions.Even though tests such as the Raven Progressive Matrices are designed to be culture-fair, people with more education still score higher than those with less education do.
One test that takes into account the socioeconomic background of children is the SOMPA, which stands for System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment (Mercer & Lewis, 1978). This test can be given to children from 5 to 11 years of age, and was especially designed for children from low-income families. Instead of relying on a single test, SOMPA is based on information from four different areas of the child’s life.1) verbal and nonverbal intelligence, assessed by the WISC-111; (2) social and economic background, obtained through a one hour parent interview; (3) social adjustment to school, determined through a questionnaire that parents complete; and (4) physical health, assessed by a medical examination. Why is it so hard to create culture-fair tests? Most tests tend to reflect what the dominant culture thinks is important (Sax, 1977).
If tests have time limits, that will bias the test against groups not concerned with time. If languages differ, the same words might have different meanings for different language groups.Even pictures can produce bias because some cultures have less experience with drawings and photographs (Anastasi & Urbina, 1996). Even within the same culture, different groups could have different attitudes, values, and motivation, and this could affect their performance on intelligence tests.
Items that ask why buildings should be made of brick are biased against children who have little or no experience with brick houses. Questions about railroads, furnaces, seasons of the year, distance between cities, and so on can be biased against groups who have less experiences than others with these circumstances.
