[sci.psychology] IQ Test Items

grady@Apple.COM (Grady Ward) (03/21/88)

The following items have been copied from an homemade untimed IQ test 
that is used for admittance to some of the highest IQ societies.  Please send 
me your responses and I will publish a summary of them (and any 
critiques):

Analogies

1. Night : Day :: Nocturnal : ?
2. Heel : Achilles :: Box : ?
3. Shoe : Cobbler :: Barrel : ?
4. Winter : Hibernate :: Summer : ?
5. Uncertainty : Heisenberg :: Undecideability : ?
6. Billion : Giga- :: Billionth : ?
7. 1/2 : Semi- :: 1 1/2 : ?
8. Lenin : Pseudonymous :: Leningrad : ?
9. Teeth : Hen :: Nest : ?
10. Pain : Rue :: Bread : ?
11. Feel : Palpate :: Listen : ?
12. Water : Aqueous :: Snow : ?
13. Sea : Littoral :: River : ?
14. Thither : Hither :: Trans- : ?
15. Wide : Narrow :: Brachy- : ?
16. Civil : Papal :: Ambassador : ?
17. Black : Yellow :: Melancholic : ?
18. 4-sided polyhedron : Tetrahedron :: 4-dimensional hypercube : ?
19. God : Theology :: Why, if god exists, there is evil : ?
20. 100 : Percentile :: 9 : ?
21. Logic : Sophistical :: Feast : ?
22. Ruthless : Myrmidon :: Imitative : ?
23. Is : Ought :: Ontology : ?
24. 60 : 59 : Neo- : ?

Numerical

37.  If the sum of the infinite series 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + ... is 1, what is the 
sum of the series 1/3 + 1/9 + 1/27 + ... ?

38. There exists a scale for weighing objects.  It consists of a lever resting 
on a fulcrum with weighing pans on each end, equidistant from the fulcrum.  
Suppose the objects to be weighed range in weight from one pound to one 
hundred pounds at one-pound intervals: 1, 2, 3, ... 100.  After placing one 
of these objects in either of the two weighing pans, one or more of a set of 
precalibrated weights are then placed in either or both of the pans until a 
balance is achieved, thus determining the weight of the object.  If the 
relative positions of the lever, fulcrum, and pans may not be changed and if 
one may not employ any but the initial set of precalibrated weights to 
balance an object, what is the minimum number of such precalibrated 
weights sufficient to bring into balance and of the objects to be weighed?

39.  A certain crystal consists of 100,000,000 layers of atoms such that 
there is one atom in the first layer, 3 in the second, 6 in the third, 10 in the 
fourth, and so forth.  Precisely how many atoms are in the entire crystal?  
Do not give an approximate answer, and do not give a formula.

40. To the nearest percent the probability that any one person selected at 
random was born on Monday is 14%.  What is the probability to the nearest 
percent that any of seven persons chosen at random exactly one was born 
on Monday?

Series  (which number should come next?)

43. 15 52 99 144 175 180 147 ?
44. 3 23 229 2869 43531 ?
45. 0 5 8 8 2 3 5 2 9 4 ?
46. 14 21 13 2 5 18 0 19 5 18 9 5 ?
47. 6 8 5 8 4 0 7 3 4 6 ?
48. 1 3 8 22 65 209 732 2780 ?

hollombe@ttidca.TTI.COM (The Polymath) (03/24/88)

In article <7743@apple.Apple.Com> grady@apple.UUCP (Grady Ward) writes:
>The following items have been copied from an homemade untimed IQ test 
>that is used for admittance to some of the highest IQ societies.  Please send 
>me your responses and I will publish a summary of them (and any 
>critiques):

There's no such thing as a home made IQ test.  What you've presented is a
collection of puzzles.  They may be of interest and/or amusing to some
people, but that's all they are.

IQs are measured with respect to the general population.  For a test to
accomplish this it must be carefully normed on a representative subset of
the general population.  This process is long, complex, and very
expensive.  It is not a cottage industry.

What you've presented represents only someone's opinion of what might be
used to measure intelligence.  There's no reason to assume it actually
measures any aspect of intelligence at all.  Even were that not the case,
without a rigorous norming process it can't be said to measure anything
with respect to the general population.

-- 
The Polymath (aka: Jerry Hollombe, hollombe@TTI.COM)   Illegitimati Nil
Citicorp(+)TTI                                           Carborundum
3100 Ocean Park Blvd.   (213) 452-9191, x2483
Santa Monica, CA  90405 {csun|philabs|psivax|trwrb}!ttidca!hollombe

gjh@otter.hple.hp.com (Graham Higgins) (03/31/88)

The test doesn't attempt to assess spatial reasoning abilities, and is
culture-biased.

Cheers,

Graham
======

------------------------------------------------------------------
Graham Higgins @ HP Labs        | Phone: (0272) 799910 x 24060
Information Systems Centre      | gray@hplb.lp.hp.co.uk
Bristol                         | gray%hplb.uucp@ukc.ac.uk
U.K.                            | gjh%otter@hplabs