Hostname: page-component-5d84bcc8dc-59lmv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-09-05T19:10:12.900Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

g as Bridge Model

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Devin Sanchez Curry
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Psychometric g—a statistical factor capturing intercorrelations between scores on different IQ tests—is of theoretical interest despite being a low-fidelity model of both folk psychological intelligence and its cognitive/neural underpinnings. Psychometric g idealizes away from those aspects of cognitive/neural mechanisms that are not explanatory of the relevant variety of folk psychological intelligence, and it idealizes away from those varieties of folk psychological intelligence that are not generated by the relevant cognitive/neural substrate. In this manner, g constitutes a high-fidelity bridge model of the relationship between its two targets and, thereby, helps demystify the relationship between folk and scientific psychology.

Information

Type
Cognitive Sciences
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 88 , Issue 5 , December 2021 , pp. 1067 - 1078
Copyright
Copyright 2021 by the Philosophy of Science Association. All rights reserved.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

†

Thanks to Dan Dennett, Nabeel Hamid, Bill Lee, Angela Potochnik, Jordan Rodu, Sharon Ryan, and Robert Sternberg for comments and conversation; to Sam Curtis, Daniel Hoek, Karen Kovaka, Deborah Mayo, Kelly Trogdon, and other members of my audience at Virginia Tech in October 2020 for a stimulating Q&A; and to two anonymous reviewers for invitations to say more.

References

Alfano, Mark, Holden, LaTasha, and Conway, Andrew. 2016. “Intelligence, Race, and Psychological Testing.” In The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Race, ed. Zack, Naomi, 474–86. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Block, Ned, and Dworkin, Gerald. 1974. “IQ, Heritability and Inequality.” Pt. 1. Philosophy and Public Affairs 3 (4): 331–409.Google Scholar
Borsboom, Denny, Kievit, Rogier, Cervone, Daniel, and Hood, S. Brian. 2009. “The Two Disciplines of Scientific Psychology; or, The Disunity of Psychology as a Working Hypothesis.” In Dynamic Process Methodology in the Social and Developmental Sciences, ed. Valsiner, Jaan, Molenaar, Peter, Lyra, Maria, and Chaudhary, Nandita, 67–97. New York: Springer.10.1007/978-0-387-95922-1_4CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carruthers, Peter. 2015. The Centered Mind: What the Science of Working Memory Shows Us about the Nature of Human Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198738824.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Conway, Andrew, and Kovacs, Kristof. 2018. “The Nature of the General Factor of Intelligence.” In The Nature of Human Intelligence, ed. Sternberg, Robert, 49–63. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781316817049.005CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curry, Devin Sanchez. 2020. “Street Smarts.” Synthese, forthcoming. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-020-02641-z.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deary, Ian, Penke, Lars, and Johnson, Wendy. 2010. “The Neuroscience of Human Intelligence Differences.” Nature Reviews: Neuroscience 11:201–11.10.1038/nrn2793CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fisher, Cynthia, Hall, D. Geoffrey, Rakowitz, Susan, and Gleitman, Lila. 1994. “When It Is Better to Receive than to Give: Syntactic and Conceptual Constraints on Vocabulary Growth.” Lingua 92:333–75.10.1016/0024-3841(94)90346-8CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fodor, Jerry. 1987. Psychosemantics: The Problem of Meaning in the Philosophy of Mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.10.7551/mitpress/5684.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Godfrey-Smith, Peter. 2004. “On Folk Psychology and Mental Representation.” In Representation in Mind: New Approaches to Mental Representation, ed. Clapin, Hugh, Staines, Phillip, and Slezak, Peter, 147–62. Oxford: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Gomez-Lavin, Javier. 2021. “Working Memory Is Not a Natural Kind and Cannot Explain Central Cognition.” Review of Philosophy and Psychology 12:199–225.10.1007/s13164-020-00507-4CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gottfredson, Linda. 1997. “Why g Matters: The Complexity of Everyday Life.” Intelligence 24 (1): 79–132.10.1016/S0160-2896(97)90014-3CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hacking, Ian. 1999. The Social Construction of What? Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Haier, Richard. 2017. The Neuroscience of Intelligence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781316105771CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hampshire, Adam, Highfield, Roger, Parin, Beth, and Owen, Adrian. 2012. “Fractionating Human Intelligence.” Neuron 76 (6): 1225–37.10.1016/j.neuron.2012.06.022CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Henrich, Joseph, Heine, Stephen, and Norenzayan, Ara. 2010. “The Weirdest People in the World?” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33 (2–3): 61–135.10.1017/S0140525X0999152XCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jaušovec, Norbert, and Jaušovec, Ksenija. 2012. “Working Memory Training: Improving Intelligence—Changing Brain Activity.” Brain and Cognition 79:96–106.10.1016/j.bandc.2012.02.007CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jensen, Arthur. 2006. Clocking the Mind. Oxford: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Jensen, Arthur. 2011. “The Theory of Intelligence and Its Measurement.” Intelligence 39 (4): 171–77.10.1016/j.intell.2011.03.004CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jung, Rex, and Haier, Richard. 2007. “The Parieto-Frontal Integration Theory (P-FIT) of Intelligence.” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30 (2): 135–87.10.1017/S0140525X07001185CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mackintosh, Nicholas. 2011. IQ and Human Intelligence. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Morton, Jennifer, and Paul, Sarah. 2019. “Grit.” Ethics 129:175–203.10.1086/700029CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shipstead, Zach, and Engle, Randall. 2018. “Mechanisms of Working Memory Capacity and Fluid Intelligence and Their Common Dependence on Executive Attention.” In The Nature of Human Intelligence, ed. Sternberg, Robert, 287–307. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/9781316817049.019CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sellars, Wilfrid. 1963. Science, Perception and Reality. Atascadero: Ridgeview.Google Scholar
Siegler, Robert, and Alibali, Martha. 2005. Children’s Thinking. 4th ed. Hoboken, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Spearman, Charles. 1927. The Abilities of Man: Their Nature and Measurement. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Sternberg, Robert, and Grigorenko, Elena. 2004. “Intelligence and Culture: How Cultures Shapes What Intelligence Means, and the Implications for a Science of Well-Being.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 359:1427–34.Google ScholarPubMed
van der Maas, Han, Dolan, Conor, Grasman, Raoul, Wicherts, Jelte, Huizenga, Hilde, and Raijmakers, Maartje. 2006. “A Dynamical Model of General Intelligence: The Positive Manifold of Intelligence by Mutualism.” Psychological Review 113:842–61.10.1037/0033-295X.113.4.842CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
van der Maas, Han, Kan, Kees-Jan, and Borsboom, Denny. 2014. “Intelligence Is What the Intelligence Test Measures: Seriously.” Journal of Intelligence 2 (1): 12–15.10.3390/jintelligence2010012CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weisberg, Michael. 2013. Simulation and Similarity: Using Models to Understand the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199933662.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar