Intellectual Talent: Psychometric and Social Issues

With intelligence and academic talent a focus of national debate, such concepts as diverse classrooms, multiple intelligences, heterogeneous schooling, and learning curves are frequent topics of discussion. Based on the work of Julian C. Stanley and his landmark model for working with gifted youth, Intellectual Talent brings together a distinguished group of authorities to examine the dominant techniques used to educate gifted youth today and the exemplification of those techniques in various university-based programs across the country. From a review of the current research on individual differences and its relevance to intellectual talent, to descriptions of the current knowledge about educating gifted children, this book illustrates how our educational system can enhance gifted youths' academic achievement.

Part One of Intellectual Talent examines the political ramifications of emotionally loaded findings about individual differencesdocumenting cases in which findings that contradict prevailing social values are simply ignored. Part Two explores what is known about educating gifted children and why educators sometimes fail to act on that knowledge. Topics include genetic antecedents to human behavior, the underuse of knowledge, proper provisions for gifted students, the use of knowledge, psychometrics, and genius. Intellectual Talent will be of interest to professionals and students of education and psychology, educational researchers and policymakers, parents of gifted children, and anyone concerned with fostering excellence in our nation's schools.

Contributors are Betsy Jane Becker, Camilla Persson Benbow, Carol C. Blackburn, Thomas J. Bouchard, Jr., Linda E. Brody, James S. Coleman, Lee J. Cronbach, Michele Ennis, John F. Feldhusen, N. L. Gage, James J. Gallagher, Lynn W. Glass, Lloyd G. Humphreys, Arthur R. Jensen, Timothy Z. Keith, Herbert J. Klausmeier, David Lubinski, David T. Lykken, Matthew McGue, Lola L. Minor, Ellis B. Page, A. Harry Passow, Nancy M. Robinson, Arnold E. Ross, Richard E. Snow, Julian C. Stanley, Babette Suchy, Abraham J. Tannenbaum, Auke Tellegen, Joyce VanTassel-Baska, and Leroy Wolins.

Camilla Persson Benbow is distinguished professor and chair in the Department of Psychology at Iowa State University of Science and Technology.David Lubinski is associate professor of Psychology at Iowa State University of Science and Technology.