To what extent do you think intelligence is genetic?

Is intelligence genetic? Or is it envrionmental? Or Both?

Hmmmm. Both.

So do you think if someone in year 6 scored poorly in their SATs, they could still do well in GCSE's and A Levels if they were put in the right environment?

Isn’t intelligence 100% genetic?
Doing well at school =/= intelligent

So do you think if someone in year 6 scored poorly in their SATs, they could still do well in GCSE's and A Levels if they were put in the right environment?

It is both.

All of the below have proper technical nomenclature that I cannot remember anymore, as I've sort of appropriated whatever research there is on intelligence to just improve my own understanding of how it works.

Intelligence can be influenced by environmental factors within a single person's life span. Such as nutrition, especially in a person's early years. Apparently very low body fat levels during early years also impact negatively the development of intelligence, which would explain some problems in some parts of the world perhaps.

Intelligence is also genetic. People who argue otherwise are deluded, but it seems to be a surprisingly popular opinion (that is wrong) advocated by people with political motives. If it weren't genetic, there'd be no difference in intelligence between us and the apes we descended from. I will not debate trolls on this.

That said, your genetics are also influenced by inter-generational environmental factors. So, there was an experiment done on mice, where they had to pass through a maze to find a piece of cheese at the end of it (or some other treat, I don't remember). Each new generation of mice, got a little faster at finding their way through the maze... until eventually the reduction in time evened out and stopped decreasing anymore. I think the plateau took about 10 generations.

So although intelligence has genetic influences, these are also 'elastic' to a certain degree and themselves a function of environmental factors, before we hit diminishing returns & a plateau after several generations. No reason to believe that humans are much different.

What does it take to break the plateau? Not sure. Tbh. Happenstance. I don't think very much is known about this. A 1 in a million genetic fluke that doesn't end in a life-threatening birth defect instead.

very interesting points made there
that study you mentioned sounds like a good read, do you have the link for it; i'd like to read it myself

I do not remember sorry. Maybe if you google keywords like "mice, intelligence, maze", it will turn out something.

I don't know how much evidence there is to prove that, but yes I have heard that being said as well.

And yes that is true, although generally doing well at school is a good measure of intelligence on average.

I think anyone can do well at school, especially gcses if they were willing to learn the textbook.

Intelligence is ability to acquire knowledge and that’s genetic I think but whether someone chooses to use their intelligence is not

that's nonsense. anyone with an average or above IQ (100+) can do well at school with right work ethic/attitude. people with lower iq's, however, will simply be lacking the abillity to memorise/learn the textbook in order to apply their knowledge. IQ holds people back, that's the sad truth.

for example, the army doesn't accept people with an IQ lower than 83. if someone with a low iq is unable join the army, how do you suppose they can do well at school?

And yes, whether people use their intelligence or not is up to them. some people just waste it.

Actually what you said there got me thinking.

Traditionally, I (and many people too) think of 'intelligence', and 'memory' as two seperate pieces of hardware in the brain. Like the processor or graphics card in your computer, vs. your hard drive.

But people are not computers. Memory works in several ways. Strongest memories tend to be created through some sort of emotional reactions. But other ways in which strong memories are formed, is through 'associating' some new piece of information you've come across, with your existing knowledge. Or in other words: trying to remember something that is entirely of out any context in your life, is normally pretty difficult. Unless it is something that instead evokes an emotional reaction.

Memorisation techniques often teach you to do precisely this: try to associate the thing your are trying to remember, with something you already remember, or a time in your life that you really enjoyed (or hated).

So anyway. All that is meant to say, is it stands to reason intelligence would effect a person's ability to memorise things, since intelligence effects a person's ability to contextusalise information, draw connections between things, and put things into context. 'Joining the dots' in other words, or 'pattern recognition'.