interesting article about raising kids IQ

This is a very interesting article about raising kids IQ:)

http://www.parentdish.com/2009/04/20/how-to-raise-your-kids-i-q/

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Published: April 16, 2009



Poor people have I.Q.'s significantly lower than those of rich people, and the awkward conventional wisdom has been that this is in large part a function of genetics.

After all, a series of studies seemed to indicate that I.Q. is largely inherited. Identical twins raised apart, for example, have I.Q.'s that are remarkably similar. They are even closer on average than those of fraternal twins who grow up together.

If intelligence were deeply encoded in our genes, that would lead to the depressing conclusion that neither schooling nor antipoverty programs can accomplish much. Yet while this view of I.Q. as overwhelmingly inherited has been widely held, the evidence is growing that it is, at a practical level, profoundly wrong. Richard Nisbett, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, has just demolished this view in a superb new book, "Intelligence and How to Get It," which also offers terrific advice for addressing poverty and inequality in America.

Professor Nisbett provides suggestions for transforming your own urchins into geniuses - praise effort more than achievement, teach delayed gratification, limit reprimands and use praise to stimulate curiosity - but focuses on how to raise America's collective I.Q. That's important, because while I.Q. doesn't measure pure intellect - we're not certain exactly what it does measure - differences do matter, and a higher I.Q. correlates to greater success in life.

Intelligence does seem to be highly inherited in middle-class households, and that's the reason for the findings of the twins studies: very few impoverished kids were included in those studies. But Eric Turkheimer of the University of Virginia has conducted further research demonstrating that in poor and chaotic households, I.Q. is minimally the result of genetics - because everybody is held back.

"Bad environments suppress children's I.Q.'s," Professor Turkheimer said.