Weird News

[Aliantha]

There were quite a few errors in that piece, but that was the funniest. I thought the tv in Africa thing was funny too. lol

[DanaC]

Actually, this is pretty important research with major implications for how children fare in education.

IQ has long been thought to remain stable over a person's lifetime.

The new findings might have implications for kids' educations, the researchers said, because they suggest that children, especially those with lower IQs, should not be pigeonholed into specific educational and career trajectories based on their IQ alone.

"Approximately one-fifth of our sample had very substantial changes such that they moved from above average to below average or vice versa," said Cathy Price, senior study author and professor at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, U.K.

The team report that changes in IQ did seem to occur, with some participants improving their scores by as much as 20 points over time, relative to people of similar age, while other kids saw declines in IQ levels.

"A change in 20 points is a huge difference," Price said in a statement to the media. For example, she said, "if an individual moved from an IQ of 110 to an IQ of 130 they move from being 'average' to 'gifted.' And if they moved from 104 to 84 they move from being high average to below average.

In the media statement, Price explained that "the degree to which verbal IQ changed correlated with the degree to which brain structure changed in an area of the brain that we are referring to as a 'motor speech area.' " She added that this region, the brain's left motor cortex, "is very active when we (including the participants in our study) articulate speech."

Nonverbal performance correlated to changes in the anterior cerebellum, which is also activated when making hand movements, Price noted.

The authors don't know yet what is driving these variations in IQ over time.

The same story was covered on the BBC site.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15369851

Until now the assumption has been that intellectual capacity, as measured by IQ, stays quite static during life.

But tests conducted on teenagers at an average age of 14 and then repeated when their average age was nearly 18 found improvements - and deterioration

The results show that a change in verbal IQ was found in 39% of the teenagers, with 21% showing a change in "performance IQ" - a test of spatial reasoning.

The findings are seen to have greater validity because for the first time the variations in IQ correlated with changes in two particular areas of the teenagers' brains.

An increase in verbal IQ corresponded with a growth in the density of part of the left motor cortex - a region activated during speech.

And an increase in non-verbal IQ correlated with a rise in the density of the anterior cerebellum - an area associated with movements of the hand.

Professor Price said: "We have a tendency to assess children and determine the course of their education relatively early in life.

"But here we have shown that their intelligence is likely to be still developing.

"We have to be careful not to write off poorer performers at an early age when in fact their IQ may improve significantly given a few more years."

The paper suggests that the results could be "encouraging to those whose intellectual potential may improve and… a warning that early achievers may not maintain their potential".

[Pete Zicato]

I got a lot dumber when my girls turned into teenagers. Now that they're in college, I seem to be getting smarter again.

[Lamplighter]

For me, "fluctuate" means up and down. I love my grandkids, but
honestly sometimes it seems they drop back into middle school
for a week, and then they are back to normal grade levels.

Dana... no evil intent

[ZenGum]

The only "weird" thing about that is that we're only just acknowledging this.

The brain is massively plastic. So many factors effect it, from diet and general health to education and mood, that these things will bounce around a lot.

If you want to increase your IQ, just practise doing lots of IQ tests. Better, study them and find out how they are designed. You won't get much smarter in real life, but you'll get better at scoring good marks on IQ tests.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

If you want to increase your IQ, just practise doing lots of IQ tests. Better, study them and find out how they are designed. You won't get much smarter in real life, but you'll get better at scoring good marks on IQ tests.

Pretty true about all standardized testing. Teach to the test and you will do fine.

[classicman]

not in our educational system..

[TheMercenary]

Are you kidding? Bush's failed No Child Left Behind is a perfect example of the failure of standardized testing.

[Clodfobble]

an individual moved from an IQ of 110 to an IQ of 130 they move from being 'average' to 'gifted.' And if they moved from 104 to 84 they move from being high average to below average.

Obviously the generalized categories overlap here, but this is worded very poorly.

[Spexxvet]

From Wiki:

An intelligence quotient, or IQ, is a score derived from one of several different standardized tests designed to assess intelligence. When modern IQ tests are constructed, the mean (average) score within an age group is set to 100 and the standard deviation to 15.[1] Today almost all IQ tests adhere to the assignment of 15 IQ points to each standard deviation, but this has not been the case historically. Approximately 95% of the population have scores within two standard deviations of the mean. If one SD is 15 points, then 95% of the population would be expected to have an IQ within a range of 70 to 130.

I interpret this to mean that the measurement is guaranteed to change over time. Years, by definition, but perhaps over shorter periods as well.

[footfootfoot]

Drunken Prank Lands French Men in Jail

FIVE drunken French tourists landed in a Texas jail after breaking into a county courthouse in the middle of the night and sparking terrorism fears, officials said.

Security footage showed the men wearing sombreros and playing around with a judge's gavel before they were arrested by police, who were tipped off by the courthouse security system at around 1.30am...Local officials were puzzled by the motive, but not the severity of the crime.

"At this point we do not believe nor do we have any evidence of a terrorist plot," said sheriff's department spokesman Ronald Bennett.

"We believe at this point the five individuals were here to see our country and after a night of drinking on the famous San Antonio River walk, things spun out of control and they decided to unlawfully enter a building. The reason why they entered the historic courthouse is unknown."

Obviously, you've never been drunk.

[GunMaster357]

Keep them!

If they're stupid enough to do a B&E in an official building, they don't have what it takes to be a PhD.

Thus, we don't want them back.

[Lamplighter]

On two local ballot measures, for the final election results...

A YES vote on one is consistent with a NO vote on the other, and visa versus.
A NO / NO outcome would leave the situation as it is now.
But, a YES / YES vote is incompatible with reality.

We saw a similar situation before regarding a 5-member Board of Education.
One measure added 2 members, the other removed 2 members.

[Lamplighter]

Do Ohio School Boards or Administrations not have any authority at all without going to court ?

The Columbus Dispatch
October 6, 2011 7:24 AM

John Freshwater has lost his court case seeking to overturn the Mount Vernon
school board’s decision to fire him for teaching creationism and religious doctrine
in his middle-school science classroom.
<snip>
The school board put Freshwater on unpaid leave and voted in 2008 that it intended to fire him.
Among the allegations were that he failed to remove religious materials from his classroom
and burned crosses on students’ arms with a Tesla coil during science experiments.

The Ohio Department of Education issued a letter of admonishment against Freshwater
for using the electrical device [a Tessla coil to burn crosses] on students’ arms,
but it removed the letter in July pending an appeal by the Virginia-based Rutherford Institute.

[Gravdigr]

Cause, you know, these are the criminals we need to worry about.