Asking the Right Questions About g

This chapter presents the questions that reflect common themes seen in the debate regarding the nature and importance of general cognitive ability, sources of individual and group differences, and the viability of arguments against g theory. It examines questions reflecting aspects of these debates that are commonly ignored or misconstrued. g is a psychometric and psychological construct that describes a class of phenomena associated with results of human mental functioning. The chapter aims to help researchers and debaters continue or begin to ask clear, critical, and dispassionate questions about g that will stimulate productive research and promote informed public policy. The argument is that correlations between g and criteria only exist because people have been preselected on the basis of g. In cases where the g-threshold value is high, the variance in g may be so restricted that its impact will not be evident in correlations.