VOA标准英语2012--Study: More Education Increases IQ Score（在线收听）

Study: More Education Increases IQ Score

挪威研究表明额外教育有助于智商增加

Staying in school really can make you smarter. A new study from Norway finds that students who remain in school longer than their counterparts have higher IQ scores.

呆在学校真的能让你变得更聪明。挪威一项新的研究发现在校学生相比其他人有更高的智商。

In the mid-1950s, the Norwegian government began requiring students to attend school until they were 16 years old, rather than allowing them to drop out at 14.

在20世纪50年代中期,挪威政府开始要求学生进入学校,直到他们16岁才可以毕业,而不是允许他们在14岁的时候毕业。

Communities had until 1972 to phase in the compulsory education reform, which meant that, for nearly 20 years, youngsters in some municipalities went to school for seven years and others attended classes for at least nine years.

直到1972年委员会进入义务教育改革阶段,这就意味着,近20年,一些地方的年轻人需要上7年学而其他人则至少需要九年。

That gave Taryn Ann Galloway a unique opportunity to see what impact the extra two years of education had on the intellectual development of students. Galloway, a researcher at the University of Oslo, explains that all young men in Norway are required to undergo a cognitive assessment, or IQ, test for the military draft at age 19.

这给了塔林•安•加洛维一个独特机会看看额外两年的教育如何影响学生的智力发育。加洛维是奥斯陆大学的研究员,她解释了挪威所有的年轻人在19岁都必须为军队征兵经历一次认知评估或智商测试。

So, she and her colleagues were able to sift through data on 107,000 draft-age young men, correlating their years of education with their IQ scores obtained by the military.

所以,她和她的同事们能够在107000名年轻人的资料中筛选数据,军队需要他们多年的教育获得的IQ分数。
　

Young men who stayed in school two years longer have higher IQs than their counterparts.

“The young men who were forced to stay in school for two years longer actually did have higher IQs," Galloway says. "So, based on that, we were able to say that increasing compulsory schooling did actually have an effect on their cognitive abilities as measured at 19 years of age.”

“年轻人被迫待在学校学习额外的两年的确让他们拥有更高的智商,” 加洛维说道。“那么,在此基础上,我们能够说,增加义务教育实际上确实影响他们19岁的认知能力。”

The average IQ score on the intelligence test is 100, with most of the population falling somewhere between 85 and 115 on the scale.

平均的智力测验分数是100,大部分人都在85至115。

According to Galloway, students who got a full two years of extra schooling showed an IQ gain of more than 7 points. Those with just one additional year of compulsory education during the phase in period gained approximately 3.7 IQ points.

按照加洛维的说法，学生整整两年的额外教育显示智商不只增加7点。那些仅用一年的义务教育获得大约3.7点。

“So, that’s still quite large," she says. "They’re going from about average to well above average if they were affected by reform.”

“所以,结论显而易见,”她说道。“如果受到改革影响,他们一般都要高于平均水平。”

For years, there’s been vigorous debate among psychologists about whether a person’s intelligence is the result of “smart” genes or a nurturing environment in infancy. Galloway’s results seem to support the nurturing side of the nature versus nurture argument.

多年来, 心理学家已经针对智商的高低是否跟“聪明”的基因或者婴儿时期的营养有关系进行过激烈的辩论。加洛维的结论看起来似乎支持营养的论点认为自然发展战胜营养培育。

She suggests getting two extra years of academic practice during the middle teenage years may also help boost IQ scores.

她建议在十几岁的时候进行额外两年的学术实践也有助于推动智商的提高。

“I think it’s because you do learn general thinking skills at school and you are able to practice them, and you have lots of opportunity to practice them. So this is a two year extension of compulsory schooling for two years, so they were able to simply improve their skills.”

“我认为那是因为你在学校学习一般的思维技能,你能够实践它们,你有很多机会实践。所以义务教育延伸为两年,所以他们能够简单地提高他们的技能。”