
Average IQ in Europe by country (map) - givan
http://jakubmarian.com/average-iq-in-europe-by-country-map/
======
fsloth
One of the authors of one of the reference materials (Tatu Vanhanen) of Lynn
and Vanhanen is fairly suspect in his methodology of applying and analysing of
IQ scores.

Fact #1: It's not actually obvious what IQ scores measure, what amount of
cultural bias the scores have and does it even make sense to compare IQ scores
between different populations. Well, it's a number so yes, you can numerically
compare it, but - as we engineers would put it - it's not obvious that the
scalar value of 'IQ' has the same dimension in disjoint populations.

There are various attempts to map human beings mental capabilites on various
basis functions (IQ, Briggs-Meyers etc.). From the point of view of armchair
natural scientist none of the the approaches are very convincing as hard core
analysis tools. As facilitation tools they can provide value, but facilitation
always includes discussion and holistic analysis of what actually the number
means in each situtation.

Fact #2: Tatu Vanhanen has quite a lot of publicized work where he expresses
views that are quite openly racist - veiled in a thin cloack of
pseudoscientific analysis. It appears that he starts from the theory that some
populations have higher IQ:s and then he massages the numbers until he can
"prove" his original hypothesis of bias between some populations. I will not
trust any number that man quotes because figuring out who he computed it would
be a waste of time. IMHO, YMMV and so on but this has been his way or working
for at least three decades. So, yes, crackpot radars ahoy.

Although it would be cool to pat oneself in the back and say yes, we finns are
really smart... seeing Vanhanens work quoted here makes me actually a bit
shamed.

~~~
programmernews
It turns out that calling things "facts" does not, unfortunately, make them
facts.

To go beyond the armchair, try looking at, for example,
[http://books.google.ca/books?id=jj4tKn9gb1IC&pg=PT172](http://books.google.ca/books?id=jj4tKn9gb1IC&pg=PT172)

------
tomp
There's something wrong here... most (and most populous) countries have IQ
below 100, but IQ 100 is defined as being the average of human populations.
Unless other continents have significantly more intelligent people than in
Europe (seems unlikely), then this chart must be significantly uncalibrated.

~~~
staticelf
Maybe the overall IQ has lowered since we set the standard of 100? :)

As the movie "Idiocracy" put it, evolution does not necesserily reward
intelligence.

~~~
CapitalistCartr
On the contrary, raw IQ rises about 3 points per decade. The Flynn Effect.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect)

~~~
dragonwriter
OTOH, the 2012 map shows generally _lower_ numbers than the 2007 map, which
seems to suggest that Europe is running contrary to the general trend.

~~~
seszett
The whole article is about how the 2007 map was biased and how the 2012 map
attempts to correct this bias. So you can't compare them the way you do it.

~~~
dragonwriter
The only thing in the article about the relation to the older map is "Since
the maps above [the 2012 maps] are based on more recent data, the map shown
here [the 2007 map] should be considered outdated."

There's not one word in the linked piece about bias in the older map, so
saying that's what the whole article is about is, well, odd.

------
higherpurpose
I've always thought that IQ-tests are biased towards education, too, and not
just "raw intelligence". This seems to confirm it. The richer countries tend
to have higher average IQ than the poorer ones.

~~~
purringmeow
No, not necessarily the richer - I can spot a direct correlation between the
quality of the education system and the IQ reported here. Finland, the country
with maybe the best schools(not Universities, schools) in Europe is leading.

~~~
FranOntanaya
Yet, the quality of schools could be correlated to teachers and politicians
with higher IQ. Chicken and egg...

~~~
Symmetry
If you were to compare a similar map from 1970 with the current one the notion
of which came first would be much more clear. Before WWII IQ was pretty evenly
distributed across the regions of Germany, but during the partition the IQs of
children born in East Germany fell way behind those born in West Germany. And
now with reunification and economic convergence IQ scores have converged too.
Genetics may play a fairly large role in explaining outcomes for individuals,
but if it affects measurable differences in outcomes between large groups the
effect is small enough to be drowned out by other factors.

------
mziel
In addition to all the standard arguments against IQ (tailor at specific
culture circles, can be taught and improved upon, measures subset of
intelligence) it is important to remember that this is a sample of people who
took the test, which by and far may not be a representative sample of a
population. Most probably it's upwardly biased, but one has no way of knowing
if the bias is constant across countries, which in turn makes any inference
impossible.

------
wil421
How can you get an accurate average IQ? I've never taken a formal IQ test in
my life. I asked serval people around if they have and no one else has in
their adult life.

~~~
bane
When I was young, as part of my move into the public school system (from a
private school in my first and second grades), I had to take one. Later, I was
identified by a gifted program and had to take an entire battery of tests for
most of the rest of my schooling, including numerous IQ tests. In those
circles, I _didn 't_ know anybody who had never taken an IQ test.

~~~
wil421
Interesting perhaps I took one but didnt realize it. How accurate can an IQ
test for elementary schoolers be for an adult population?

Maybe the test I took were not called IQ tests but were very similar. Most
test I took were similar to what the SAT was, but I never got back an "IQ"
score. Usually they gave us back a percentile score against the whole pool,
but never an IQ number or range.

~~~
bane
Yeah, I took a bunch of those as well, like the ITBS. They're more aptitude
tests than IQ tests, but I imagine there some correlation. Usually they're
looking for specific subjects or learning styles

There's a bunch of different IQ tests as well (WISC, SB5, DAS, WJ) and some
designed for adults, but they should give you a score. There's some special
tests for people with high percentile IQs as well.

I don't know if I'd call any IQ test accurate. Mine have varied wildly over
time and depending on the test.

------
jclos
Maybe it's just me, but I would find those numbers much more interesting if
they were accompanied by a measure of spread of the IQ distribution.

------
tokenadult
The blog post author did a terrible job of research on IQ by encountering the
writings of Richard Lynn (funded by the Pioneer Fund, and later an
administrator of the Pioneer Fund) and not finding the writings of James R.
Flynn,[1] the acknowledged expert on IQ trends over time, after whom the Flynn
effect[2] is named. Flynn's TED talk[3] is the place to start for
understanding what is really going on in IQ score trend and in national
average IQ differences to date.

By contrast, Lynn is decried as a sloppy scholar,[4] and is not taken
seriously by the mainstream of human intelligence researchers.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/What-Is-Intelligence-Flynn-
ebook/dp/B0...](http://www.amazon.com/What-Is-Intelligence-Flynn-
ebook/dp/B000SGBL9U/)

[http://www.amazon.com/Are-Getting-Smarter-James-Flynn-
ebook/...](http://www.amazon.com/Are-Getting-Smarter-James-Flynn-
ebook/dp/B009H7L0V0/)

[http://www.amazon.com/Intelligence-Human-Progress-Story-
Hidd...](http://www.amazon.com/Intelligence-Human-Progress-Story-Hidden-
ebook/dp/B00DG25JW8)

[2]

[http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/education/edlife/james-
r-f...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/education/edlife/james-r-flynn-on-
rising-iqs.html)

[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/sep/23/james-
flyn...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/sep/23/james-flynn-iq-
scores-environment)

[http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/books/what-is-
intellig...](http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/books/what-is-intelligence-
beyond-the-flynn-effect/400077.article)

[3]
[http://www.ted.com/talks/james_flynn_why_our_iq_levels_are_h...](http://www.ted.com/talks/james_flynn_why_our_iq_levels_are_higher_than_our_grandparents)

[4]
[http://wicherts.socsci.uva.nl/wichertsRavenAfr2010rej.pdf](http://wicherts.socsci.uva.nl/wichertsRavenAfr2010rej.pdf)

[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1994/dec/01/the-
tai...](http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1994/dec/01/the-tainted-
sources-of-the-bell-curve/)

~~~
Symmetry
I thought Unz's criticisms of Lynn were an excellent blend of accessible and
thorough.

[http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/race-iq-
and-...](http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/race-iq-and-wealth/)

------
seszett
Is the difference between say 97 and 101 IQ really significant?

I'd attribute the scores that are lower than 90 (or maybe 95, or 98, I don't
know) directly to lackings regarding national education, but does fluctuation
among the others really mean something?

~~~
lmm
With a large enough sample size small differences can be significant. It's bad
practice to display a more precise IQ number than your confidence intervals,
so I'll assume the differences are real.

------
chriscool
I wonder why people focus so much on IQ instead of better metrics.

In this article, "The play deficit":

[http://aeon.co/magazine/being-human/children-today-are-
suffe...](http://aeon.co/magazine/being-human/children-today-are-suffering-a-
severe-deficit-of-play/)

there are these very interesting sentences:

"Other research, by the psychologist Mark Runco and colleagues at the Torrance
Creativity Center at the University of Georgia, shows that scores on the TTCT
are the best childhood predictors we have of future real-world achievements.
They are better predictors than IQ, high-school grades, or peer judgments of
who will achieve the most."

TTCT is "Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking".

People should really be much more interested in metrics like TTCT, rather than
IQ tests, SAT tests or other not very relevant metrics.

~~~
programmernews
Probably because general intelligence is "the best-established, most
predictive, most heritable mental trait ever discovered in psychology."
(Geoffrey Miller, Spent)

~~~
chriscool
I googled it and found the following:

[http://www.barrelstrength.com/2013/12/31/ramachandran-
iq/](http://www.barrelstrength.com/2013/12/31/ramachandran-iq/)

where there is:

"Intelligence (says Prof. Miller at page 189 of Spent) is positively
correlated to:

    
    
        brain size
        speed of performing basic sensory motor tasks (“reaction time is a factor”, as the cop said in Blade Runner)
        height
        symmetry of face and body
        semen quality (!)
        health, physical and mental
        longevity
        sexual attractiveness for long term relationships"
    

So it is most predictive of many things, but maybe not of future real-world
achievements...

------
Grue3
Interesting how you'll never meet a person whose IQ is less than 100 (or even
120) on the Internet. It's a rather flawed metric.

~~~
jiggy2011
Have you tried twitter?

~~~
Grue3
The point is, nobody would ever admit to having low (even above average) IQ,
not that they are actually smart.

------
legulere
Isn't the average IQ by definition 100?

~~~
lmm
The overall average, sure. But just as that doesn't mean every single person's
IQ is 100, it doesn't mean every country's average is the same.

------
Zenst
IQ as a measure is like comparing computers on speed of the CPU. It is only
one measure that defines us and with that many aspects make us what we are.

------
nodata
This is a map of how well someone can use English, IQ tests are biased towards
that.

~~~
seszett
IQ tests are usually done using the person's first language, not English. What
you are saying is only true if English tests are used for non-English-speaking
people.

------
phaemon
>Tip: Did you know that “iron” is pronounced as “I earn”, not as “I Ron”?

Who pronounces those the same? And who ever said it was the "correct" way?

------
nailer
Relevant:
[http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html)

Also relevant: [http://48laws-of-
power.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/law-38-think-a...](http://48laws-of-
power.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/law-38-think-as-you-like-but-behave.html)

The study might be true, but there's little benefit to us discussing it right
now.

~~~
purringmeow
Why? Are you worried it might bring forward discussions about race superiority
and that kind of crap?

In my opinion, this study can start a reasonable discourse on the difference
between education systems.

~~~
nailer
Not worried, it's just a waste of time.

