William Stern’s Study on Intelligence: Collection of Specific Abilities or a Single General Factor?

What did William Stern seek to examine in his studies preceding the findings of Binet, and how did he conduct this study? What did he conclude?

Stern conducted the “Reality Experiment,” which seemed to examine the suggestibility of witnesses: – participants were exposed to staged events and were then asked to provide information about the event. Consistent with the findings of Gattell and Binet, Stern found that the testimony of participants were often incorrect, and that recall was the worst for portions of the event that were particularly exciting. Stern concluded that emotional arousal can have a negative impact on the accuracy of a person’s testimony

William Stern was a German psychologist who sought to examine individual differences in intellectual ability. He wanted to determine if intelligence could be measured as a single, general factor or if it was a collection of specific abilities.

To conduct his study, Stern administered a variety of tests to children, including sensory discrimination, motor coordination, and mental reasoning tasks. He analyzed the results of these tests and looked for patterns and correlations among the different abilities that were measured.

Stern concluded that intelligence is not a single, general factor, but rather a collection of specific abilities. He argued that these specific abilities could be organized into a hierarchy, with general intelligence (g) at the top, followed by more specific abilities like verbal, spatial, and social intelligence.

Stern’s work was influential in the development of intelligence testing and the understanding of the nature of intelligence. His ideas about the structure of intelligence continue to be explored and debated by psychologists today.

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