> The claim that immigrants were mislabeled by IQ testers who didn't
>understand
>the relationship between culture, langauge, and IQ is another "academic myth"
>(or, to be kind, an exaggerated claim based on a germ of a fact taken out of
>context). In some texts it says "80%" of the non-WASP immigrants were labeled
>as mentally defective, and this is simply wrong. I quote from Cohen et al.
>_Psych Testing and Assessment_ (Mayfield Publishing, 1996, Third Ed.) p. 54.
> "Soon after Alfred Binet introduced intelligence testing in France, the
>United States Public Health Service began using such tests to measure the
>intelligence of people seeking to immigrate to the Uninted States. Henry
>Goddard (1913), the chief researcher assigned to the project and a specialist
>in the field of mental retardation, early raised (and studied) questions about
>how meaningful such tests are when used with people from various cultural and
>language backgrounds. Goddard used interpreters in test administration,
>employed a bilingual psychologist, and administered mental tests to selected
>immigrants who appeared mentally defective to trained observers (Goddard,
>1917). This last point is the basis of the false (though widely circulated)
>claim that Goddard estimated over 80% of all immigrants to be mentally
>retarded. Goddard states accurately that his research could not make such an
>estimate about immigrants in general because _his subjects were selected_ for
>low mental ability." (emphasis mine).
>--
>* John W. Kulig
Stephen J. Gould (The Mismeasure of Man, rev, 1996, p195ff) gives a
slightly different account:
******
Goddard's women tested thirty-five Jews, twenty-two Hungarians, fifty
Italians, and forty-five Russians. These groups could not be regarded as
random samples because govertnment officials had already "culled out those
they regarded as defective." To balance this bias, Goddard and his
associates "passed by the obviously normal. That left us with the great
mass of 'average immigrants.'" (1917, p.244).
******
This certainly sounds like Goddard regarded this sample as representative,
based on his last sentence.
Gould then describes how Goddard himself found the resultant 80%
feebleminded figure incredible, and fiddled with his data until he had
reduced it to about 50%. Goddard obviously was a trained scientist by the
standards of his times; not a simple-minded bigot.
However, Gould quotes more of his work which does indicated that he
supported immigration standards biased against central and southern
Europeans.
He also synthesized (a polite word for invented) the Kallikak family.
* PAUL K. BRANDON [EMAIL PROTECTED] *
* Psychology Department 507-389-6217 *
* "The University formerly known as Mankato State" *
* http://www.mankato.msus.edu/dept/psych/welcome.html *
