Abstract
Modern psychological theory views cognitive ability as multidimensional while acknowledging that the many different abilities are themselves positively correlated. This positive correlation across abilities has led most psychometricians to accept the reality of a general cognitive ability that is reflected in the full scale score on major tests of cognitive ability or IQ. This article provides an introduction to the history of cognitive testing and some of its major controversies. Evidence supporting the validity of measures of cognitive ability is presented and the nature and implications of group differences are discussed along with evidence on its malleability.
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Dickens, W.T. (2018). Cognitive Ability. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2810
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2810
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