Giftedness

Type of psychology: Developmental psychology; intelligence and
intelligence testing
Fields of study: Ability tests; cognitive development; general issues in
intelligence; intelligence assessment
Giftedness refers to a capability for high performance in one or more areas of accomplishment.
The focus on giftedness as a human capability has led to efforts to identify
giftedness early in life, to develop special programs of instruction for gifted children
and adolescents, and to design counseling interventions to help gifted learners realize
their potentials.
Key concepts
• asynchronous development
• child prodigies
• gifted education program
• intelligence test scores
• Marland definition
• precociousness
• prodigious savants
• standardized test scores
• talent
Modern studies of giftedness have their origin in the work of Lewis Terman
at Stanford University, who in the 1920’s used intelligence test scores to
identify intellectually gifted children. His minimal standard for giftedness
was an intelligence quotient (IQ) of 140 on the Stanford-Binet Intelligence
Test, a number at or above which only 1 percent of children are expected to
score. (The average IQ score is 100.) Terman and his associates identified
more than fifteen hundred children in California as gifted, and follow-up
studies on “the Terman gifted group” were conducted throughout these
children’s later lives. Although individuals in the gifted group tended to
achieve highly in school and in their careers, they were not greatly different
from average scorers in other ways. Terman’s research dispelled the myths
that high scorers on IQ tests were, as a group, socially maladjusted or
“burned out” in adulthood. They were high achievers and yet normal in the
sense that their social relationships were similar to those of the general population.
By the time the Terman gifted group reached retirement age, it was clear
that the study had not realized the hope of identifying eminence. None of
the children selected had, as adults, won a Nobel Prize, although two children
who were rejected for the study later did so (physicist Luis Alvarez and
engineer William Shockley). High IQ scores did not seem to be characteristic
of artistic ability. Apparently, an IQ score of 140 or above as a criterion for giftedness in children was not able to predict creative accomplishments in
later life.
Studies conducted in the 1950’s under the direction of Donald Mac-
Kinnon at the University of California at Berkeley tended to confirm this
conclusion. Panels of experts submitted the names of whomever they believed
to be the most creative architects, mathematicians, and research scientists
in the United States. Then these individuals were invited to take part
in assessments, including measurement of their intelligence through the
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. The IQ scores of these highly creative individuals
ranged from 114 to 145, averaging around 130, significantly below
Terman’s criterion for giftedness. No one knows how these adults would
have scored on the Stanford-Binet test as children, or how creative adults in
other domains would have scored, but the results confirmed that a score of
140 on an intelligence test is not a prerequisite for outstanding creative accomplishment.
More recent studies have cast light on the importance of nurture in the
development of a broader range of talent. A team of researchers at the University
of Chicago headed by Benjamin Bloom investigated the lives of 120
talented adults in six fields: piano, sculpture, swimming, tennis, mathematics,
and research neurology. They found that in most cases, accomplishments
on a national or international level by the time an individual has
reached the age of forty had their origin not in a prodigious gift but in childcentered
homes. The child’s early experiences of the field were playful, rewarding,
and supported by parents. Rapid progress was due to a work ethic
instilled by parents (“always do your best”) and by increasingly expert and
selective teachers, whom parents sought out. Bloom’s findings did not exactly
contradict those of Terman (no testing was done), but they suggested
that nurture and motivation play the lead and supporting roles in the development
of a wide range of talent.
Just what general ability IQ tests measure remains uncertain, but increasingly,
psychologists and educators have conceptualized giftedness as a function
of specialized capabilities and potential for performance in specific
fields such as mathematics, biology, dance, or visual arts. A definition of
giftedness first offered in a 1971 report to the Congress of the United States
by Sidney Marland, then commissioner of education, indicates a much
broader concept of giftedness than high IQ scores have been found to measure.
“Gifted and talented children are those identified by professionally
qualified persons who, by virtue of outstanding abilities, are capable of high
performance.” He continued,
Children capable of high performance include those with demonstrated
achievement or potential ability in any of the following areas, singly or in combination:
1. general intellectual ability
2. specific academic aptitude
3. creative or productive thinking
4. leadership ability
5. visual or performing arts
6. psychomotor ability.
This definition of giftedness, known after its author as the Marland definition,
does not distinguish giftedness from talent and includes performance
capabilities that are sometimes related only distantly to performance on an
IQ test. Nevertheless, the legacy of the Terman study of giftedness is that
high IQ test scores remain one among several ways for psychologists and educators
to identify intellectual giftedness among children in the general
population. Giftedness in academic, creative, leadership, artistic, and psychomotor
domains, however, is generally identified in other ways. 358