IQ Development Tips – 8 Types of Intelligence

What is intelligence?

• The ability to solve problems and to adapt to and learn from life’s everyday experiences

• The ability to solve problems

• The capacity to adapt and learn from experiences

• Includes characteristics such as creativity and interpersonal skills

• The mental abilities that enable one to adapt to, shape, or select one’s environment

• The ability to judge, comprehend, and reason

• The ability to understand and deal with people, objects, and symbols

• The ability to act purposefully, think rationally, and deal effectively with the environment

As you think about what intelligence is, you should ask the following questions:

• To what extent is intelligence genetic?

• To what extent is intelligence stable?

• How do cognitive abilities interact with other aspects of functioning?

• Are there true sex differences?

• Is intelligence a global capacity (similar to “good health”) or can it be differentiated into various dimensions (called “factors” or “aptitudes”)?

• Are there a number of “intelligences”?

Check out this infographic that summarizes the post:

IQ Development Tips – 8 Types of Intelligence

How do you measure intelligence?

Intelligence Quotient (IQ):

Measure of intelligence that takes into account a child’s mental and chronological age.

IQ Score = MA / CA x 100

• Mental age (MA): the typical intelligence level found for people at a given chronological age

• Chronological age (CA): the actual age of the child taking the intelligence test

People whose mental age is equal to their chronological age will always have an IQ of 100. If the chronological age exceeds mental age – below-average intelligence (below 100). If the mental age exceed the chronological age – above-average intelligence (above 100).

The normal distribution: most of the population falls in the middle range of scores between 84 and 116.

• Very Superior Intelligence ( gifted) – Above 130

• Superior Intelligence – 120 to 129

• High Average Intelligence – 110 to 119

• Average Intelligence – 90 to 109

• Low Average Intelligence – 80 to 89

• Borderline Intellectual Functioning – 71 to 79

• Mild Mental Retardation – 55 to 70

• Moderate Retardation – 40 to 54

• Severe Mental Retardation – 25 to 39

• Profound Mental Retardation – Below 25

Types of Intelligence

Gardner thinks there are eight types of intelligence. He believes each of us have all of the eight types of intelligence to varying degrees. These multiple intelligences are related to how an individual prefers to learn and process information.

1. Verbal skills: The ability to think in words and use language to express meaning

Sensitivity to the meanings and sounds of words, mastery of syntax, appreciation of the ways language can be used (authors, journalists, speakers, poets, teachers)

2. Mathematical skills: The ability to carry out mathematical operations

Understanding of objects and symbols and of actions that be performed on them and of the relations between these actions, ability for abstraction, ability to identify problems and seek explanations (scientists, engineers, accountants)

3. Spatial skills: The ability to think three-dimensionally

Capacity to perceive the visual world accurately, to perform transformations upon perceptions and to re-create aspects of visual experience in the absence of physical stimuli, sensitivity to tension, balance, and composition, ability to detect similar patterns (architects, artists, sailors, chess masters)

4. Bodily-kinesthetic skills: The ability to manipulate objects and be physically adept

Use of one’s body in highly skilled ways for expressive or goal-directed purposes, capacity to handle objects skillfully (surgeons, craftspeople, dancers, athletes, actors)

5. Musical skills: A sensitivity to pitch, melody, rhythm, and tone

Sensitivity to individual tones and phrases of music, an understanding of ways to combine tones and phrases into larger musical rhythms and structures, awareness of emotional aspects of music (musicians, composers, sensitive listeners)

6. Interpersonal skills: The ability to understand and effectively interact with others

Ability to notice and make distinctions among the moods, temperaments, motivations, and intentions of other people and potentially to act on this knowledge (teachers, mental health professionals, parents, religious and political leaders)

7. Intrapersonal skills: The ability to understand oneself

Access to one’s own feelings, ability to draw on one’s emotions to guide and understand one’s behavior, recognition of personal strengths and weaknesses (theologians, novelists, psychologists, therapists)

8. Naturalistic skills: The ability to observe patterns in nature and understand natural and human-made systems

Sensitivity and understanding of plants, animals, and other aspects of nature (farmers, botanists, ecologists, landscapers, environmentalists)

© 2015. Courtesy: Nigerian Scholars

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