Media History: Dear America Letters Home From Vietnam

Media Historydear America Letters Home From Vietnam Is A Compilation

Media Historydear America: Letters Home from Vietnam is a compilation of selected letters from correspondent soldiers who served in the Vietnam war to their friends and family in the United States. Despite the suffering, many of these original letters from their loved ones still exist and hold a sentimental value to them. The film presents the history of the war in a way that is somewhat misleading, due to the exclusion of some essential details. Like how it avoids the fact that the United States lost the war.

Cattell was interested in removing culture bias from intelligence tests.

Cultural bias in terms of intelligence testing refer to the standard definitions of intelligence based in our own culture and access to certain resources or practices. Cattell was interested in creating a more fair approach to intelligence testing that took into considerations things that may affect us, such as "our experiences, schooling, culture, and motivation" (Neukrug & Fawcett, 2010, p. 144). What Cattell suggested from his findings of original test scores of individuals was that there are actually two types of intelligence. The first is Fluid intelligence, which Cattell describes as the "culture-free" (2010, p. 144) portion of our intelligence. The fluid intelligence of a person can be described as their innate knowledge, and is not affected by things such as school and experiences. The other type of intelligence Cattell suggests is Crystallized, which changes as we learn new things and have new experiences. As opposed to the fluid intelligence, crystallized can be described as "learned" intelligence. Crystallized intelligence would be the one most affected by culture.

Cattell found that when this "learned" or "crystallized" intelligence was removed from an intelligence test, the fluid intelligence score was much different than the crystallized intelligence score. This finding suggests that our culture and experiences have an affect on our intelligence scores, and that when we remove these culture based questions from an intelligence test, the fluid or innate intelligence score is much different. Piaget discussed assimilation and accomodation in his cognitive developmental model of intelligence. Piaget argues that we change our mental constructs to maintain a balance with new information through the processes of assimilation and accomodation. Assimilation is the process of "incorporating new stimuli or information into existing cognitive structures" (Neukrug & Fawcett, 2010, p. 145). Accomodation is the process of "creating new cognitive structures and/or behaviors based on new stimuli" (Neukrug & Fawcett, 2010, p. 145). These two processes differ in the sense of what a person is reacting to. When there is a new stimuli present, a person may need to readjust their cognitive structure to accomodate that stimuli.

Or, a person may be presented with new information and then look at certain simuli differently based on this information. These two concepts would be beneficial to use together to define intelligence, because we can not unlearn cultural influences such as schooling or experiences. These are things that have happened, and everyone is affected by their culture. When we look at only one type of intelligence using Piaget's model, such as crystallized intelligence, we are only looking at a limited scope of a person's intelligence level, such as their experience with school. When we look at fluid intelligence as well, we look at overall intelligence, which many theorists believe "is maintained evenly across the lifespan" (Neukrug & Fawcett, 2010, p. 144).

The Stanford-Binet (SB4) and The Wechsler Intelligence scale (WAIS-R) are two tests that examine intelligence. This is where there similarities begin.

Both tests seek to ascertain the intelligence of the examinee. The book states that the Stanford-Binet is probably the most well known intelligence test. It measures verbal and non-verbal intelligence across five categories. The Wechsler, also an intelligence test, is the most widely used measure for adult intelligence. It provides a full scale IQ and according to Alan Kaufman, in his review of the test, "The WAIS-R is THE criterion of adult intelligence." They are also similar in that the norm samples of both tests are large.

I went to the Mental Measurements Yearbook and compared the WAIS-R and the SB4 norm samples. In the WAIS-R, a sample of 1880 individuals were used. In the SB4 the sample size is slightly over 5,000. Good size pools of examinees for both. Similarly, both tests also accounted for region, sex, age, socioeconomic status, and education and the variables were stratified.

The tests seek to uncover the same type of information but try to get at it from different ways.

The SB4 and the WAIS-R had many differences too. The SB4 has a 2 stage process by which a routing test is used and then the examinee is put into the appropriate category to begin. With the Wechsler, there are 3 different levels of tests one that tests pre-school to 7, then 6-16 and then 16 up so the tests are geared to the age. Another difference is that the Wechsler subtests, according to Alan Kaufman, are more informative when it comes to "diagnosing educational difficulties." though the SB4 subtests are more informative when it comes to things like memory. The Stanford-Binet 4 is a test that has only 1 correct answer for each item and the items are passed or failed based on a set standard, and that is positive.

Another strength was that the norm sample on the test was stratified to the 1980 Census. In this way all groups are represented. It also measures verbal and non-verbal intelligence through 5 different factors and discrepancies are an accurate assessment of a learning disability. It is also efficient to administer. A weakness of the SB4 is that it is less game-like than other tests and, as a result, would not be as attractive to children.

Another weakness of this test is that the examiner of the test, due to the manual, is given poor accuracy information. The retest studies were also not well developed. As a strength, the WAIS-R is a test that "shows sensitivity to woman and blacks." They also alternated the Verbal and Performance subtests, which was considered an improvement. Another positive about the WAIS-R is that it's reliability and stability are, according to Kaufman, "outstanding for the IQ's". Joseph Matarazzo, another reviewer for the WAIS-R states,"It is my opinion that the WAIS-R is probably the best standardized test designed for individual administration...produced to date." As far as weaknesses, for the test, the validity data is lacking in the manual. It relies on prior validity from the 1955 test. Another issue with this test is that the re-scaled the standard deviation for the test. In doing so they needed to smooth any irregularities. This has implications for comparing results of tests down the road. Lastly, the test is the most expensive one that has ever been produced.

References: Neukrug, E., & Fawcett, C.R. (2015). The Essentials of Testing and Assessment, Third Edition. Stamford,CT:Cengage Learning. Information from the reviews of Anne Anasstasi & Lee Cronbach. Information from the reviews of Alan Kaufman & Joseph D. Matarazzo. Mental Measurements Yearbook