What is IQ?

IQ, short for intelligence quotient, is a score of intelligence that is determined by one of many standardised tests that are available today. These scores are mainly used as predictors of performance namely in educational and jobs. Do note that there are many forms of intelligence tests; some tests use a single type of item or question for one strength and some test more than one skill. Most of these tests yield both an overall score (e.g., the full scale IQ for the Wechsler's series) and individual subtest scores (for each of the subset in the test). Whichever way intelligence may be tested, it is noted that IQ tests attempt to measure the same general intelligence.

How to measure IQ?

The formula to measure IQ is:

Mental Age/Chronological Age x 100 = Intelligence Quotient

Chronological age is your age at the point a test is taken from birth. Mental age is the age that is a concept in relation to intelligence, expressed as the age at which a child is performing intellectually. For the majority of people, the mental age and the chronological age should be the same. This means, an IQ of 100 would indicate that a child is of average intellectual capacity. For a gifted child, the mental age is above the chronological age, and the IQ is higher than 130 (usually two standard deviation above the mean of 100). In the same way, for an intellectually challenged child, the mental age is below the chronological age, and the IQ is usually below 70 (two standard deviations below the mean of 100).

Till today, there have been many debates whether IQ tests are an accurate measure of intelligence and to what extent it may or may not be accurate. In essence, IQ scores represent a very specific type of intelligence, and depend on the test that is taken.

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