by Randy Cima, Ph.D.

IQ – Intelligence Quotient – is a problem in psychology. At best, IQ tests provide nothing more than the score you received on a test you took, on that day. At worst, IQ tests can be a humiliating, debilitating, and sometimes a lifelong imposed burden for some that negatively impacts employment, education and, most distressing, psychological assessments.

In general, just about everyone agrees with the following definition of intelligence, more or less, from Wikipedia (bold mine):

Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. More generally, it can be described as the ability to perceive or infer information, and to retain it as knowledge to be applied towards adaptive behaviors within an environment or context.

With a task of developing a universal tool to measure human intelligence, professionals from more than a century ago disagreed about one essential, fundamental question. Are we creating a test to measure someone’s intellectual ability (skill), or to measure someone’s intellectual capacity (volume)? These are two different things. This question was never resolved then – or now. It didn’t matter to them. Without knowing what, exactly, was being measured, the tests were created anyway.

Authors of WAIS, WISC, Stanford-Binet, Woodcock-Johnson, and others, cleverly alternate the terms ability and capacity when explaining their theories – as if the right answer to the question is “it’s both.” Incidentally, if you read the history of this science, eugenics (“biological determinism”) played a big roll. In 1908, Henry Goddard, an avowed eugenicist, created The Binet Test of Intellectual Capacity, seeking to expose and eliminate the “feeble-minded.” In the next six years his test was being used in public schools, courts of law, and for Ellis Island immigrants. This eventually led to 60,000 sterilizations nationwide of the “feeble-minded,” that also included the poor and a disproportionate number of minorities, California leading the way. (See Buck v. Bell 1927 that found sterilization constitutional, cited as one of the worst SCOTUS decisions ever.)

If IQ is an ability, then it seems some type of coaching would help, as it would with any ability. Or are we just born with limited abilities and coaching is a waste of time? Instead, if intelligence means capacity – more brain cells, more brain folds, more something biological – then is this itself its own natural limitation? Or are there ways to increase someone’s volume of intelligence? None of these explanations appealed to me, then or now, and the science of all of this, once your take the time to look at it, borders on superstition.

As a novice in the late 1970’s I couldn’t help but notice African American kids always scored 10-15 points less than white kids. How was that possible, I asked myself. I knew this black kid here was smarter than that white kid over there. Not according to the test. In addition to race, your gender matters, as does vocabulary, education, income, and a variety of other social variables that impacts the score you received on a test you took, on that day.

The IQ test itself - the actual categories and questions – are created by groups of like-minded scientists. These professionals are particularly detailed, fine-tuning among their specialties. As if searching for something, IQ tests include a number of logic questions, some math questions, questions about perception and spatial relationships, questions about pattern recognition and classification skills, and other obscure areas. The tests are made so that only a few could get the right answers for some of the questions. Then, they take those scores and compare them with other children with scores that deviate one way or another from an arbitrary “baseline” of one kind of another. That’s how we measure intelligence in human beings.

By the way, who does the best on IQ tests? Other like-minded scientists, who else? People like Einstein, most science teachers, all those IT guys and gals that keep our computers alive, and others who are born intrigued by puzzles and are stimulated by logic and similar thoughts. Elon Musk and Neil deGrasse Tyson come to mind. They, and others like them, have “high IQ’s.” Which means they did really good on the test they were given, on that day.

As an administrator for children living in mental health facilities, I ignored thousands of IQ tests. Completely. We were required to have them done, I always had a psychologist on my staff to perform this function, and we completed our obligation to our licensing body. We dismissed the results of IQ tests because they didn’t provide any useful information regarding treatment or prognosis. The problem is, most professionals think they do. It is especially prevalent when frustrated adults point to the problem child’s IQ as an “inherent limitation.”

As you can tell, I don’t like IQ tests, for what it’s worth. I suggest you ignore them too.

Randy Cima, Ph.D., is a psychologist by training. He was the Executive Director for several mental health agencies for children. He is avid opponent of psychotropic chemicals for children, and his efforts have successfully reduced and even eliminated chemicals in his work in helping them with a variety of problems. He also teaches, writes, and lectures on these matters.

by Phil Sinaikin, M.D., M.A.

In an August 5, 2022 edition of The Week (an excellent magazine by the way) there is a brief article entitled “Reassessing depression” that reports the results of a recent study by Joanna Moncrieff and her colleagues. The opening line: “Depression may not be caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain, a new analysis of research says--a finding that could upend our understanding of the science behind antidepressants.” (p.21, italics mine)

HUH?   HUH???

A new analysis? It’s been decades since we have officially debunked the chemical imbalance theory of depression and all other psychiatric “disorders.” How can this possibly be news now?

It is because it has nothing to do with science or research. What this is about is the social construction of “truth” independent of facts or science.

Those of us living in the current political environment of the past few years are acutely aware of this phenomenon: Pick a leader and trust them and what they claim. Don't trust your lying eyes. Don't be skeptical. Don't demand evidence. Don't think for yourself.

The institution of psychiatry is one of these leaders in our world, and it has unjustifiably attained that position of authority by sinking its tentacles into every aspect of life. It is fed by guild interests and financial gain, based on a lie, but has built itself to look like a shining city on the hill, when, in fact, that city is an alluring facade with no foundation. It is more like the seductive but inescapable hotel in the Eagles' song "Hotel California."

I am no longer practicing traditional psychiatry. My job now is prescribing medical marijuana exclusively. But as such I am kept acutely aware of the ongoing polydiagnosis, polypharmacy practices of psychiatrists. How often I see poor victims of this now seeking an alternative in medical marijuana? Very often. Usually after numerous medication trials rife with undesired side-effects (except of course for legal methamphetamine, Adderall, for recently diagnosed adult ADD).

So what do I want to say here? What can I say? I’ve already said it in my 375-page 2010 book Psychiatryland. From what I am seeing this book and numerous others critical of the medical model has done little to change psychiatric thinking or practices.

Perhaps the reason is best summarized by the final sentence in the above article in The Week: “The use of these medicines is based on clinical trial evidence,” says Allan Young, from Kings College London. “This review does not change that.” And I would add: nor his ability to make a good living practicing psychiatry.

By the way, notice the article doesn't say "Depression is not caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain." The power of psychiatry still has a hold on people's thinking, even in the face of incontrovertible evidence, enough to force "Depression may not be caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain."

I'll leave on a somewhat positive note. In the article it is stated: “Instead the researchers found a strong link between depression and negative life events.” To that I say No s**t Sherlock.

Phil Sinaikin, M.D., M.A., is a psychiatrist who has been in clinical practice in numerous venues for over 35 years. He has been involved in the critical psychiatry movement for many years. He has published critical, humanistic and philosophical articles in peer reviewed journals and books. He is also the author of Psychiatryland, a comprehensive consumer friendly examination of what has gone so terribly wrong in psychiatry and what, if anything, can be done about it.