In
Lewis Terman’s experiment to discover innate intelligence, he began tracking a
group 1500 students in California that were “exceptionally superior” (91).
However, of the supposedly exceptional students, none of them matured into
exceptional adults. Given that it is strongly believed that there are different
distinct skills required to be successful as an adult versus as a child, do you
think a successful child prodigy can also be a successful “adult creator?”
Furthermore, do you think that Terman’s experiment to find innate intelligence
was focused on the wrong group, and had it been focused on another group of
students those students would be successful as adults? Relate your response to
the biology theme of evolution.
-Edward Wu (edwardwu0@gmail.com)
Child prodigies like Akrit Jaswal, “who performed his first surgery at the age of seven” or Kim Ung-Yong, “who attended university at the age of four and received his doctorate in physics at age fifteen” are really not guaranteed to be successful adults (http://www.scilearn.com/blog/child-prodigies.php). Lewis Terman himself saw that none of his 1500 test subjects turned out to be as successful as he had predicted, and that might be because of the vast difference between being a prodigy at a young age versus at an older age (91).
ReplyDeleteThe child prodigies, for some reason, have no better chance at being successful as adults as we typically would think they would, and this is also discussed by Ellen Winner, Boston College professor of psychology when she says, “their young minds seem to be able to master knowledge that has already been discovered, but that does not always come with the ability to create” http://www.scilearn.com/blog/child-prodigies.php). Malcolm Gladwell also addressed the atypical success rates for child prodigies as adults by concluding that “a gifted child is…a gifted learner. And what a gifted adult is, is a gifted doer.” http://www.scilearn.com/blog/child-prodigies.php).
I do believe however, that the group of exemplary children used in Terman’s study was a little bit skewed because as seen from his rejected group, four became world famous and quite a bit more successful than everyone in his “prodigy group”. It is very difficult to say whether the results would have been different had Terman used a different group of children because as stated earlier, the rate of success is not much different.
This relates to evolution because as advanced as humans are, we are always developing and can never be guaranteed that natural selection, which we strive for. Additionally, when recalling the various methods of learning linking experience and behavior together, the innate behavior may be good for a certain length of time, but eventually acquired learning is a crucial part of growing up, which could be why prodigies aren’t guaranteed to be much more successful than the average student.
Shivani Thakker (shivanithakker1357@gmail.com)