"Validity" of short-form intelligence tests.

A short-form intelligence test is commonly "validated" by demonstrating a high correlation between it and the full scale from which it is taken. It has been argued, however, that the correlation between the short form and the full scale is less meaningful than the extent to which they agree in classifying individuals as to intellectual level; the latter depends in part upon the width of the categories in the classification system. A table is provided which shows the theoretical agreement between the short form and the full scale as a function of their correlation and category width. Empirical values from two studies approximate fairly closely the values given in this table. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional intelligence as a standard intelligence.

The authors have claimed that emotional intelligence (EI) meets traditional standards for an intelligence (J. D. Mayer, D. R. Caruso, & P. Salovey, 1999). R. D. Roberts, M. Zeidner, and G. Matthews (see record 2001-10055-001) questioned whether that claim was warranted. The central issue raised by Roberts et al. concerning Mayer et al. (1999) is whether there are correct answers to questions on tests purporting to measure EI as a set of abilities. To address this issue (and others), the present authors briefly restate their view of intelligence, emotion, and EI. They then present arguments for the reasonableness of measuring EI as an ability, indicate that correct answers exist, and summarize recent data suggesting that such measures are, indeed, reliable. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Slow down, you move too fast: Emotional intelligence remains an "elusive" intelligence.

Comments (see records 2001-10055-002, 2001-10055-003, 2001-10055-004, and 2001-10055-005) on the R. D. Roberts, M. Zeidner, and G. Matthews (see record 2001-10055-001) article on the measurement of emotional intelligence (EI) made various pertinent observations that confirm the growing interest in this topic. This rejoinder finds general agreement on some key issues: learning from the history of ability testing, developing more sophisticated structural models of ability, studying emotional abilities across the life span, and establishing predictive and construct validity. However, scoring methods for tests of EI remain problematic. This rejoinder acknowledges recent improvements in convergence between different scoring methods but discusses further difficulties related to (a) neglect of group differences in normative social behaviors, (b) segregation of separate domains of knowledge linked to cognitive and emotional intelligences, (c) potential confounding of competence with learned skills and cultural factors, and (d) lack of specification of adaptive functions of EI. Empirical studies have not yet established that the Multi-Factor Emotional Intelligence Scale and related tests assess a broad EI factor of real-world significance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional intelligence as an aspect of general intelligence: What would David Wechsler say?

R. D. Roberts, M. Zeidner, and G. Matthews (see record 2001-10055-001) have carefully examined the controversial issue of whether emotional intelligence (EI) should be classified as an intelligence and whether EI's constructs meet the same psychometric standards as general intelligence's constructs. This article casts their efforts into the framework of both historical and modern IQ-testing theory and research. It details David Wechsler's attempts to integrate EI into his tests and how his conception of a good clinician would be that of an emotionally intelligent clinician. Current theories and research on IQ also have a role in EI beyond what Roberts et al. described, including J. L. Horn's (1989) expanded model and A. R. Luria's (1966) neuropsychological research, and better criteria than the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery should be used in future EI studies. The authors look forward to more research being conducted on EI, particularly in future performance-based assessments. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional intelligence or adaptive emotions?

R. D. Roberts, A Zeidner, and G. Matthews (see record 2001-10055-001) challenged the adequacy of the psychometric properties of the principal performance measure of emotional intelligence (EI). They raised doubt about the existence of emotion-related abilities that influence behavioral outcomes and social competence after controlling for general intelligence and personality. I agree with Roberts et al. that demonstrating the discriminant and predictive validity of a measure of EI in the context of rival predictors will require more research. I agree with the proponents of EI that emotion-related abilities do exist and show that such abilities in children account for unique variance in measures of adaptive behavior and social competence. However, evidence from developmental and clinical research suggest that these emotion-related abilities and their influence on socioemotional competence stem more from the direct effects of emotions than from a special form of intelligence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Emotional intelligence: Psychometric status and developmental characteristics--Comment on Roberts, Zeidner, and Matthews (2001).

States, in this comment on the article by R. D. Roberts, M. Zeidner and G. Matthews (see record 2001-10055-001) that there is now sufficient work in the literature on emotional intelligence to suggest that this construct or series of constructs deserves serious attention, but several questions remain as to adequate construct validation as well as to the emergence and development of these constructs. There is a need to conduct convergent and divergent validity studies on a midlife sample that is likely to show the optimal level of differentiation of the new constructs. The reference domain of cognitive intelligence should be constructed in a multiple-construct manner, and the validation procedure should use confirmatory factor analysis and P. S. Dwyer's (1937) extension method. Once properly validated, there is a need to study the emergence, age differences, and age changes in the level and structure of emotional intelligence. A paradigm that investigates the invariance of factor structure across age and uses the model of differentiation-dedifferentiation would be useful for this purpose. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Spoonish spanerisms: A lexical bias effect in spanish.

Lexical bias is the tendency for phonological errors to form existing words at a rate above chance. This effect has been observed in experiments and corpus analyses in Germanic languages, but S. del Viso, J. M. Igoa, and J. E. García-Albea (1991) found no effect in a Spanish corpus study. Because lexical bias plays an important role in the debate on interactivity in language production, the authors reconsidered its absence in Spanish. A corpus analysis, which considered relatively many errors and which used a method of estimating chance rate that is relatively independent of total error number, and a speech-error elicitation experiment provided converging evidence for lexical bias in Spanish. The authors conclude that the processing mechanisms underlying this effect hold cross-linguistically. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Rejoinder to L. Siegel.

Following the recent publication within Canadian Psychology of our concerns about the Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT; see record 1984-02928-001) and its utility for Canadian educators, we received supporting letters from several provinces, most notably Ontario. Particularly within school systems, personnel agreed that the WRAT, in all three subject areas, tended to be unreliable and to be extremely limited in the amount of practically useful information which it could provide to assist in educational decision-making. However, the fact that Dr. Siegel's comments in support of the WRAT are the only ones in such a vein to come to our attention obviously does not imply that her concerns are not worthy of address. As concisely as possible we shall further clarify our subject population, and reiterate our contention that the WRAT provides misleading information concerning both the use of the term "reading" to refer to the measurement of only a very limited subskill therein and its presentation of only grade norms on the test protocol. Given the numbers of published criticisms of the WRAT, in terms of its reliability and validity, and given alternatives which provide more practical, relevant, and comprehensive information, we would again encourage professionals particularly in Canada to move away from a rather static ability estimate which has undoubtedly outlived any initial utility which it may have had. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Measuring emotional intelligence with the MSCEIT V2.0.

Does a recently introduced ability scale adequately measure emotional intelligence (EI) skills? Using the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT; J. D. Mayer, P. Salovey, & D. R. Caruso, 2002b), the authors examined (a) whether members of a general standardization sample and emotions experts identified the same test answers as correct, (b) the test's reliability, and (c) the possible factor structures of EI. Twenty-one emotions experts endorsed many of the same answers, as did 2,112 members of the standardization sample, and exhibited superior agreement, particularly when research provides clearer answers to test questions (e.g., emotional perception in faces). The MSCEIT achieved reasonable reliability, and confirmatory factor analysis supported theoretical models of El. These findings help clarify issues raised in earlier articles published in Emotion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relationship of deficits in intelligence test performance of preschool children to perinatal experience.

The intelligence test records of 193 children age 3 and of 119 age 5 were analyzed in relation to their perinatal experiences and intelligence level (average or superior). The children were classified as unstressed (Group 1), suspect (Group 2), and presumably stressed (Group 3). At both ages, significant differences were found at both intelligence levels between Groups 1 and 2 + 3 in ability to copy forms. At 3 yr. a significant difference between Groups 1 and 2 + 3 in verbal skill was found among the average Ss. It is concluded that isolated deficits on complex verbal and visuomotor tasks may be indicative of minimal birth injury and that such injury is more observable among average than superior children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The cascaded nature of lexical selection and integration in auditory sentence processing.

An event-related brain potential experiment was carried out to investigate the temporal relationship between lexical selection and the semantic integration in auditory sentence processing. Participants were presented with spoken sentences that ended with a word that was either semantically congruent or anomalous. Information about the moment in which a sentence-final word could uniquely be identified, its isolation point (IP), was compared with the onset of the elicited N400 congruity effect, reflecting semantic integration processing. The results revealed that the onset of the N400 effect occurred prior to the IP of the sentence-final words. Moreover, the factor early or late IP did not affect the onset of the N400. These findings indicate that lexical selection and semantic integration are cascading processes, in that semantic integration processing can start before the acoustic information allows the selection of a unique candidate and seems to be attempted in parallel for multiple candidates that are still compatible with the bottom-up acoustic input. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Suicide Attempt Self-Injury Interview (SASII): Development, reliability, and validity of a scale to assess suicide attempts and intentional self-injury.

The authors describe the development of the Suicide Attempt Self-Injury Interview (SASII), an instrument designed to assess the factors involved in nonfatal suicide attempts and intentional self-injury. Using 4 cohorts of participants, authors generated SASII items and evaluated them with factor and content analyses and internal consistency statistics. The final measure was assessed for reliability and validity with collateral measures. The SASII assesses variables related to method, lethality and impulsivity of the act, likelihood of rescue, suicide intent or ambivalence and other motivations, consequences, and habitual self-injury. The SASII was found to have very good interrater reliability and adequate validity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A Convergent-Divergent Approach to Context Processing, General Intellectual Functioning, and the Genetic Liability to Schizophrenia.

Convergent and divergent validity are critically important in developing psychological measures that reveal interpretable deficits in disordered populations. This article reports on 2 studies that evaluated the validity of context processing measures. In Experiment 1, a confirmatory factor analysis of data from 481 healthy adults established the convergent validity of 2 context processing measures and showed that context processing accounted for significant amounts of variance in standard IQ and working memory measures. In Experiment 2, 20 schizophrenia patients, 16 of their healthy siblings, and 28 controls were evaluated using a novel, short context processing measure, the dot pattern expectancy (DPX) task. The DPX was sensitive to specific deficits in schizophrenia patients and their healthy siblings. These findings support the construct validity of context processing measures, suggest context processing is a component of intellectual functioning, and demonstrate that brief context processing measures remain sensitive to psychopathological deficits. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Deficient response modulation and emotion processing in low-anxious Caucasian psychopathic offenders: Results from a lexical decision task.

The clinical and research literatures on psychopathy have identified an emotion paradox: Psychopaths display normal appraisal but impaired use of emotion cues. Using R. D. Hare's (1991) Psychopathy Checklist--Revised and the G. S. Welsh Anxiety Scale (1956), the authors identified low-anxious psychopaths and controls and examined predictions concerning their performance on a lexical-decision task. Results supported all the predictions: (a) low-anxious psychopaths appraised emotion cues as well as controls; (b) their lexical decisions were relatively unaffected by emotion cues; (c) their lexical decisions were relatively unaffected by affectively neutral word-frequency cues; and (d) their performance deficits were specific to conditions involving right-handed responses. The authors propose that deficient response modulation may underlie both the emotional and cognitive deficits associated with low-anxious psychopaths. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A reason to rhyme: Phonological and semantic influences on lexical access.

During on-line language production, speakers rapidly select a sequence of words to express their desired meaning. The current study examines whether this lexical selection is also dependent on the existing activation of surface properties of the words. Such surface properties clearly matter in various forms of wordplay, including poetry and musical lyrics. The experiments in this article explore whether language processing more generally is sensitive to these properties. Two experiments examined the interaction between phonological and semantic features for written and verbal productions. In Experiment 1, participants were given printed sentences with a missing word, and were asked to generate reasonable completions. The completions reflected both the semantic and the surface features of the preceding context. In Experiment 2, listeners heard sentence contexts, and were asked to rapidly produce a word to complete the utterance. These spontaneous completions again incorporated surface features activated by the context. The results suggest that lexical access in naturalistic language processing is influenced by an interaction between the surface and semantic features of language. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Using emotional intelligence to develop executive leadership and team and organizational development.

This case study explores how emotional intelligence (EI) was used to facilitate team and organizational cohesiveness. An organizational development (OD) consultant and an executive coach, both senior consultants, facilitated this engagement. An EI assessment and a team-building retreat served as the foundation for the process. In addition, the relationship between the executive coach and the OD consultant is examined, and comments from the CEO in this engagement and consultants are included. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

On the adequacy of the Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT): A reply to Snart, Dennis, and Brailsford.

Replies to comments by Snart, Dennis, and Brailsford (see record 1984-02928-001) voicing concerns about the validity of the Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT). They have concluded that the WRAT overestimates the performance of Canadian children. They have also noted that the WRAT measures only word recognition and that word recognition is overemphasized as a measure of "reading." The present author addresses what are seen to be "fundamental" problems with their arguments. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development and validation of a scale to assess the symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in young adults.

In this study, the authors describe the development and subsequent validation of an attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) scale for young adults. The authors constructed 2 parallel forms of the scale to assess items that relate directly to DSM–IV criteria. Each form comprised Inattention, Hyperactivity, and Impulsivity subscales. Confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to assess the dimensionality of the scale, and the hypothesized structure was confirmed. In addition, the measures obtained show that the scale possesses satisfactory reliability with regard to the level of internal consistency, and there was equivalence between the 2 parallel forms. Furthermore, the relevance of the scale’s content and its relationship to other variables was adequate. In sum, sufficient evidence is provided regarding the validity of the measures obtained with the ADHD scale, thus illustrating that the scale could be a useful tool to assess the symptoms of ADHD in a sample of young adults from the United States. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Retranslation of expectations: An approach to the construction of unambiguous anchors for rating scales.

A procedure was tested for the construction of evaluative rating scales anchored by examples of expected behavior. Expectations, based on having observed similar behavior, were used to permit rating in a variety of situations without sacrifice of specificity. Examples, submitted by head nurses as illustrations of nurses' behavior related to a given dimension were retained only if reallocated to that dimension by other head nurses, and then scaled as to desirability. Agreement for a number of examples was high, and scale reliabilities ranged above .97. Similar content validity should be obtained in other rating situations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)