University Student Intelligence and Occupation of Father

HE EVIDENCE on the relationship between level of performance on intelligence tests and occupational affiliation has generally revealed a close positive correlation.' A variety of different studies have been made, including those of intelligence of children by occupation of parent. These embrace studies of nursery school children, elementary school children, high school pupils and students at college or university level. Several of the investigations were of the intelligence of people classified according to occupation held before entering military service. One reported the high school intelligence of people later found in certain occupational classes. However, in view of the fact that only two investigations have been reported on intelligence of college students classified by father's occupation,2 and those were small and made a number of years ago, it is worth while to examine this question still further. Another objective of the present study was to obtain a more detailed occupational classification than has frequently been employed; this was made possible by the size of the sample. Records of undergraduate students first entering the University of Kansas during the period September I934-June I938' were analyzed. The total of 5,487 cases represents those whose report of father's occupation was readily classified. A few students reported no parental occupation, some of the fathers were only reported as deceased and records of a small number were too general to be meaningful (for example, railroad employee, oil worker, business man.) The intelligence records eliminated in these ways totalled between ioo and 200. The intelligence tests employed were those approved by the American Council on Education. Percentile scores were used for analysis so as to make the records of the different tests used in the different years more comparable than raw scores on varying tests would

Mathematics education · Sociology · Career Development and Diversity · Diverse Educational Innovations Studies · Psychology

• Factors Contributing to Attrition in College Populations

  Virginia Staudt Sexton•The Journal of General Psychology•1965

  Add to list