cjgone

Okay, so people who say licking their elbow does not measure intelligence just can't lick their elbow.

Nice argument-- it makes no sense. I don't think the SAT is very indicative of "intelligience" at all, and even if it did, it's not very important. The people who change society are the hard-working people. Being smart is so vaguely useless; go look at the list of MENSANS and you can find many worthless people that are very smart but have never contributed anything to society. Great, no one care, however.

My point: stop worrying about IQ and get over yourselves. These debates about intelligience are very sad and explain why our society is so flawed. Intellect, a trait based on randomness, much like skin color\ gender, etc, is valued more over hard-work-- I don't understand, but who knows. The SAT is the SAT. It measures a variety of unique skills, use of application is questionable, but will never be an IQ test. In fact, if I wanted to measure my IQ I'd take an IQ test (which are completely flawed, but oh well).

ThisCouldBeHeavn

It's not. If something correlates with something else, than it is an indicator of that other thing. The strength of the indication varies with the strength of the correlation. Does the SAT ONLY indicate wealth? Definitely not. But the correlation is there, even if it's because of some unknown (or obvious) confounding variable.

Disagree. A lot of people that argue that SAT does not correlate with intelligence are just trying to justify their own inadequate scores. The value of intelligence versus work ethic is a completely separate debate.

prismatic

I don't think intelligence can be measured. First one needs a definitive definition for intelligence and what it encompasses. There are huge debates over whether social skills and physical skills should also be measured under intelligence, along with creativity, because these are also skills one can learn that are desirable, as more standard "intelligence" like math and reading skills are.

One thing is for sure - SATs don't measure full out intelligence, or my intelligence leaped about 10 percentiles from studying specifically for an SAT. SATs don't even measure math and English success in college - they correlate much better to the equivalent graduate exams. So I don't believe it measures intelligence at all.

Some people in this thread were saying SAT scores and IQ scores are correlated, but then, does IQ measure intelligence? Some people would argue that IQ scores show how much one is CAPABLE of learning quickly. That doesn't mean he or she is more intelligent per se. It just means he or she has the ability to learn in certain fields of education (math, vocab, etc) faster, and these fields are also found in the SAT. However, I have many friends with IQs of 140+ who I, someone with an IQ in the low 120s, did better than on the SAT because I studied more.

In conclusion, although SAT scores may be correlated to IQ, the SATs measure an even more limited amount of learning than the IQ tests do, and furthermore, it's easy to argue that even IQ tests don't measure intelligence, but rather the potential to learn. So no, the SAT does not measure intelligence. It measures a selectively minuscule amount of math, reading, and grammar skills.

prismatic

Also, people are arguing that CR is the best indicator, but I disagree. When I took CR on the PSAT I got a 69, but after studying I got an 800 on the exam. You can study for any of the sections, CR is just the hardest to study for.

174IQPartier

SAT scores do measure intelligence.
People like to play it off that you have to be wealthy to do well but that isn't the truth.
There are a lot of dumb rich people who can't quite do well on the SAT while there are plenty of very bright lower-middle class people who pull off 1600 (Math + Verbal) every year..

112358

Right -- but by mentioning wealth and leaving out other factors, he implies that those other factors (i.e. intelligence) are less relevant. My issue is not that he says that wealth and SAT scores have a certain correlation, but that he places undue emphasis on the fact.

dshinka

I don't have the statistics in front of me, I but would guarantee you that over half of the people that scored a 1600 had the time and money to study some. I imagine very few people do it raw these days (back a long time ago, when it was taboo to study, that was different...).

ThisCouldBeHeavn

It does, actually. That's pretty much the definition of intelligence

cjgone

^None of that describes the SAT.

eg2333

The SAT measures how good you are at taking the SAT.

IQ tests measure how good you are at taking IQ tests.

Avalanche Lily

I take a bit of offense to the fact that you can be "wrong, pure and simple" when analyzing literature, but that's because I don't much buy into the idea of great literature and its accepted shades of meaning. For me, reading critically is a profoundly personal endeavor, and many people with their own differing opinions on a piece can all be right. But that's nowhere near what the SAT is even trying to measure, so I should not fault it for that.

And as for the claim that people who say the SAT does not measure intelligence have bad SAT scores...I expect that one example to the contrary will not dissuade you, but I actually got a 2400.

Unholy Sigma

Lily, you are obviously an intelligent person as judged from that post. You are a perfect example of the SAT's intelligence measuring capabilities. Thanks for backing up my point.

Avalanche Lily

I do not accept compliments well, Unholy Sigma. I am not particularly intelligent; I am simply pretentious.

KRNpro

SAT Score = (Preparation * Test Taking Ability) ^ (I.Q. / 100)

Unholy Sigma

Prep can only get you so far.