What Does the SAT Test? (2004)

If you had the same access to the item content of IQ tests that you have to the item content of the SAT, you could definitely develop an IQ test-prep application of similar effectiveness.

One paragraph in the submitted article caught my eye, because it reports an opinion I had previously found in another set of sources: IQ tests correlate strongly with the SAT because both primarily tap scholastic ability (as contrasted with "general intelligence"). Who says this? Lewis Terman said something much like this when discussing the second major version of his Stanford-Binet IQ test:

" There are, however, certain characteristics of age scores with which the reader should be familiar. For one thing, it is necessary to bear in mind that the true mental age as we have used it refers to the mental age on a particular intelligence test. A subject's mental age in this sense may not coincide with the age score he would make in tests of musical ability, mechanical ability, social adjustment, etc. A subject has, strictly speaking, a number of mental ages; we are here concerned only with that which depends on the abilities tested by the new Stanford-Binet scales." (Terman & Merrill 1937, p. 25)

Julian Stanley, the founder of the Center for Talented Youth at Johns Hopkins University,

http://cty.jhu.edu/set/jcs-apa.html

and probably personally acquainted with more young high scorers on the SAT than any other researcher until very recently, long ago noticed that IQ tests tap mostly scholastic aptitude.

"The Binet scales and their descendants are perhaps the most publicized accomplishments of modern psychology. The term IQ, though often misunderstood, is a household word. The practical success of the 'IQ test,' in its ability to place individuals along a spectrum of scholastic aptitude from dull to bright and in its relationship to school and occupational success, has overshadowed doubt about what the tests were measuring in an exact, psychological sense." (Hopkins & Stanley 1981, p. 348).

"Most authorities feel that current intelligence tests are more aptly described as 'scholastic aptitude' tests because they are so highly related to academic performance, although current use suggests that the term intelligence test is going to be with us for some time. This reservation is based not on the opinion that intelligence tests do not reflect intelligence but on the belief that there are other kinds of intelligence that are not reflected in current tests; the term intelligence is too inclusive." (Hopkins & Stanley 1981, p. 364).

REFERENCES

Hopkins, Kenneth D. & Stanley, Julian C. (1981). Educational and Psychological Measurement and Evaluation. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Terman, Lewis & Merrill, Maude (1937). Measuring Intelligence: A Guide to the Administration of the New Revised Stanford-Binet Tests of Intelligence. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.