The importance of spatial ability in educational pursuits and the world of work was examined, with particular attention devoted to STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) domains.
Participants were drawn from a stratified random sample of US high schools (Grades 9–12, n = 400,000) and were tracked for 11+ years; their longitudinal findings were aligned with pre-1957 findings and with contemporary data from the Graduate Record Examination and the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth.
For decades, spatial ability assessed during adolescence has surfaced as a salient psychological attribute among those adolescents who subsequently go on to achieve advanced educational credentials and occupations in STEM.
Results: solidify the generalization that spatial ability plays a critical role in developing expertise in STEM and suggest, among other things, that including spatial ability in modern talent searches would identify many adolescents with potential for STEM who are currently being missed.
[Keywords: spatial ability, talent searches, longitudinal study, STEM, constructive replication]
![Figure B1: ✱ For education and business, masters and doctorates were combined because the doctorate samples for these groups were too small to obtain stability (n 30). For the specific n for each degree by sex that composed the major groupings, see Appendix A. Average z scores of participants on spatial, mathematical, and verbal ability for bachelor’s degrees, master’s degrees, and PhDs are plotted by field in Figure B1. The groups are plotted in rank order of their normative standing on g (verbal [V] + spatial [S] + mathematical [M]) along the x-axis, and each arrow indicates on the continuous scale where each field lies on general mental ability. All x-axis values are based on the weighted means across each degree grouping. This figure is standardized in relation to all participants with complete ability data at the time of initial testing. Respective ns for each group (males + females) were as follows (for bachelor’s, master’s, and doctorates, respectively): engineering (1,143, 339, 71), physical science (633, 182, 202), math/computer science (877, 266, 57), biological science (740, 182, 79), humanities (3,226, 695, 82), social science (2,609, 484, 158), arts (615, masters + doctorates = 171), business (2,386, masters + doctorates = 191), and education (3,403, masters + doctorates = 1,505).](/doc/iq/high/smpy/2009-wai-figureb1-meanintelligencescoresbycollegemajorfield.jpg)
[The graph is based on data from Project TALENT, a study of a representative sample of about 400,000 high school students in the 1960s and which continued for 11 years after their high school graduations. The students were divided into 9 groups according to the field in which they earned a college or graduate degree. These fields are arranged (from left to right) in order of the average overall IQ for degree earners in each field. They are education, business, arts, social science, humanities, biological science, math and computer science, physical science, and engineering. The overall IQ (“General Ability Level”) is listed as z-scores, which means that every 0.1-unit increment in the graph is equal to 1.5 IQ points.
Therefore, the average IQ for a person who earned an education degree was about 108. In the social sciences, it was 112. In physical sciences and engineering, the average IQ is about 119. Because most of these students self-selected into college majors, it seems that some areas of study are attracting very smart students and others… are not so much.
But overall IQ is not the whole story. (It rarely is in education.) The 3 dots connected by lines within each group indicate the pattern of broad abilities: verbal, spatial, and mathematical ability. Notice how different disciplines have different patterns of ability. Education, social sciences, and humanities tend to attract people with spatial abilities that are much lower compared to their verbal and math abilities. For math and computer science, physical science, and engineering, mathematical abilities tend to be highest and verbal abilities are lowest (though still well above the general population’s average).]