The problem with admitting the top 10% of students to the university

[Politesse]

Being "heritable" does not mean that something is a biological trait. If I inherit from my parents a propensity to go cross-eyed when at rest, I will do poorly in business settings as people will routinely be put off by my appearance whenever we are in a meeting. The crossed eyes are a biological trait. The resulting easily measurable difference between cross-eyed and non-cross-eyed salesmen is absolutely heritable. But "success in business" is not therefore a biological trait. It's a social response to biological traits, sure. But that doesn't oblige society to continue making the same decision about how to relate to people who go cross-eyed. The pandemic might actually erase the heritability of that trait by driving more business online and into Zoom meetings where a barely noticeable crossing of eyes is no longer obvious to a manager. That's partially why genetic studies attach a probability factor rather than making a vague categorical generalization, but that still only gives you an estimate of how much variability within an observed trait can be directly attributed to genetic variation, not the degree to which that trait is truly deterministic as you have proposed by implication of saying we should accept that certain students cannot excel. The only thing you could really show scientifically is whether or not students are likely to excel within an educational environment identical to those in the test conditions. Twin studies are interesting, but frequently deceptive in what they seem to show. The media loves them because they are evocative, but their results can't be interpreted as though they appeared in a contextual vaccuum, and certainly education policy-makers should not be making critical allocation decisions based on data that weren't even generated within their own system.

Yes, twin studies are interesting but adoption studies more so. You want to blame social factors - I get that, you’re a leftist - but adoption studies show that adopted children take after their biological parents and not their adopted ones. Environment/social factors have a limited role here.

My political bias has nothing to do with your misunderstanding of how genetic studies work. Your last two sentences are too vague and confused to even evaluate. I guess you meant to say "in matters of academic attainment", but that is manifestly and obviously untrue even by the evidence presented in the article we're discussing, so I still don't know what you're going for there.

 

[Trausti]

We have families where some kids are top students, high achieving professionals...and their full blooded siblings are drop outs.

But they shared the same home environment!

 

[barbos]

"Achievement" is a subjective judgment, not a "trait" in the sense that a biologist means that term. You might as well try to inherit "goodness" or "charm" or "piety".

Actually this was also measured and found to be highly heritable.

And yet.....somehow, we have more people going to college, becoming doctors, lawyers, engineers, biochemists, etc. than we did 100 years ago.

And your point is......

We have families where some kids are top students, high achieving professionals...and their full blooded siblings are drop outs.

You must have sucked at biology at school.

 

[barbos]

We have families where some kids are top students, high achieving professionals...and their full blooded siblings are drop outs.

But they shared the same home environment!

Exactly!!!!

 

[Toni]

If a child performs at a low level, you look at the biological parents. If the biological parents are also low achieving, there ya go. All traits are heritable.

How much is academic achievement shaped by genes?

Researchers have found that a child’s genes significantly influence their long-term performance in school – beyond even intelligence. How can this information be used to help students?

I'm not sure of your point.

My grandparents did not go to college. Most did not finish high school. My grandfather actively tried to convince my father to drop out of high school at 16. My father graduated just to spite his father.

My siblings and I all were top students, graduating at the top of our class in high school, graduating with honors from college, even though some of us were also working full time while attending. Some of us went to grad school. Some of us went to professional schools.

No one is adopted.

You seem to believe that people who do not do well in school are not intelligent and/or are not motivated.

You seem totally ignorant of the fact that many people live with tremendous personal and economic pressures that make it hard to figure out how to stay in school and keep a roof over your head---which a lot of kids are not able to do.

 

[Trausti]

Being "heritable" does not mean that something is a biological trait. If I inherit from my parents a propensity to go cross-eyed when at rest, I will do poorly in business settings as people will routinely be put off by my appearance whenever we are in a meeting. The crossed eyes are a biological trait. The resulting easily measurable difference between cross-eyed and non-cross-eyed salesmen is absolutely heritable. But "success in business" is not therefore a biological trait. It's a social response to biological traits, sure. But that doesn't oblige society to continue making the same decision about how to relate to people who go cross-eyed. The pandemic might actually erase the heritability of that trait by driving more business online and into Zoom meetings where a barely noticeable crossing of eyes is no longer obvious to a manager. That's partially why genetic studies attach a probability factor rather than making a vague categorical generalization, but that still only gives you an estimate of how much variability within an observed trait can be directly attributed to genetic variation, not the degree to which that trait is truly deterministic as you have proposed by implication of saying we should accept that certain students cannot excel. The only thing you could really show scientifically is whether or not students are likely to excel within an educational environment identical to those in the test conditions. Twin studies are interesting, but frequently deceptive in what they seem to show. The media loves them because they are evocative, but their results can't be interpreted as though they appeared in a contextual vaccuum, and certainly education policy-makers should not be making critical allocation decisions based on data that weren't even generated within their own system.

Yes, twin studies are interesting but adoption studies more so. You want to blame social factors - I get that, you’re a leftist - but adoption studies show that adopted children take after their biological parents and not their adopted ones. Environment/social factors have a limited role here.

My political bias has nothing to do with your misunderstanding of how genetic studies work. Your last two sentences are too vague and confused to even evaluate. I guess you meant to say "in matters of academic attainment", but that is manifestly and obviously untrue even by the evidence presented in the article we're discussing, so I still don't know what you're going for there.

Huh? How was noting that adopted children take after their biological parents confusing to you? Do you just not like the implication?

 

[untermensche]

The blank slate is just too beautiful to let go.

I am not advocating for a "blank slate" approach. We know for a fact that certain students are advantaged or disadvantaged by hundreds of social factors for years before they even see the inside of a public classroom. A person's family background and yes, even perceived phenotype, play an enormous role in their likelihood of success within educational institutions. But pre-scientific biases about biological determinism do nothing to address those issue, and indeed are more likely to depress than improve outcomes for all but a small class of socially privileged students.

The BBC article I cited suggested that

We could use DNA tests at birth to identify children at genetic risk for developing reading problems and give them early intervention

Any two parents could have such a child.

 

[Politesse]

My political bias has nothing to do with your misunderstanding of how genetic studies work. Your last two sentences are too vague and confused to even evaluate. I guess you meant to say "in matters of academic attainment", but that is manifestly and obviously untrue even by the evidence presented in the article we're discussing, so I still don't know what you're going for there.

Huh? How was noting that adopted children take after their biological parents confusing to you? Do you just not like the implication?

If taken as a very general statement, that's been known to be untrue for more than 120 years of study; this was a major factor in why the effects of"culture" and "race" started to be treated separately by social scientists in the first place. We were doing twin studies long before anyone knew about genetics, and there is a massive body of data connected to them. If in reference to the specific article we're discussing, you're misrepresenting the results thereof; even if there were an exact, one-to-one relationship between those traits which are heritable and those which are intrinsically limiting to the individual (which as discussed above is not true anyway), that still would only account for 75% of variablity within student populations, making a blanket statement like "children take after x, not y" inaccurate.

 

[laughing dog]

My limited understanding is that genetics and environment play a role in intellectual development but that we really don't have a good idea how of all of it works.

Moreover, none of it is relevant to the OP. The OP is presents an argument that is based on a rather naive interpretation of one point (a mean GPA of one year). The naive interpretation makes untested and unrealistic assumptions about the shape of a one year HS GPA distribution for one school district to make a case about "success" at college of the top 10% of students by GPA without any information about those students or their success at college. A charitable interpretation is that the OP argument lacks sufficient evidence and logic to be taken seriously.

 

[Toni]

Everyone goes to college nowadays.

Not hardly.

Besides, we're all boomers. College, grad school, and professional school was all a long time ago.

Nah, he’s right. There’s just too much money to be made. Anyone can go to college.

It’s still absolutly non-responsive to what I wrote.

My parents and grandparents did not do well in school and either left school as soon as possible or graduated from high school, at best.

My siblings and I graduated at the top of our classes, graduated from college with honors and a couple of us were National Merit semi-finalists. We attended university on academic scholarships. Some of us went on to graduate school or professional school (i.e. law school, Med school, pharmacy school). All degrees are in math/science fields.

The theory some are putting forth seems to be that some high school students—especially those in inner cities ( that is, black students) are not good students because of some not yet defined inherited ability or lack thereof.

Either students who do not do well in school lack the intelligence, which is inherited (postulated) or lack the motivation, which is social/poor parenting, according to some in this thread.

Whether or not anyone posting here went to school is entirely irrelevant—they would have learned to eat with utensils, read, do math, learn calculus and Latin and aerospace engineering and how to wipe their own asses all on their own. The fact that they did actually learn some of these things demonstrates the fact that no student in any school in a city with a large black population is smart enough or motivated enough to do well at universities although anyone can go to college these days.

Or so seems to be the prevailing thought because no matter what else anyone here has or has not learned, most are smart enough not to say the racist part out loud in plain English. It helps to keep up the self delusion that all of us learned/earned everything we know/have, all on our own and none of us has a prejudiced bone in our bodies.

 

[barbos]

Toni, you must be smart. So how much DNA siblings share?

 

[Toni]

And yet.....somehow, we have more people going to college, becoming doctors, lawyers, engineers, biochemists, etc. than we did 100 years ago.

And your point is......I

We have families where some kids are top students, high achieving professionals...and their full blooded siblings are drop outs.

You must have sucked at biology at school.

Actually I graduated with honors.

 

[Toni]

We have families where some kids are top students, high achieving professionals...and their full blooded siblings are drop outs.

But they shared the same home environment!

Exactly!!!!

Yes, exactly. Individuals with the same genetics and the same home environment can have vastly different interests, talents, motivations, drives, aspirations, health, etc.

 

[Trausti]

My political bias has nothing to do with your misunderstanding of how genetic studies work. Your last two sentences are too vague and confused to even evaluate. I guess you meant to say "in matters of academic attainment", but that is manifestly and obviously untrue even by the evidence presented in the article we're discussing, so I still don't know what you're going for there.

Huh? How was noting that adopted children take after their biological parents confusing to you? Do you just not like the implication?

If taken as a very general statement, that's been known to be untrue for more than 120 years of study;

Wut???

Family environment and the malleability of cognitive ability: A Swedish national home-reared and adopted-away cosibling control study

In contrast to the reliably positive effects of adoption on the mean IQ of children, when adoption studies are analyzed in terms of correlations between adopted children’s IQs and those of their biological and adoptive parents, the correlations with biological parents are invariably higher, indicative of strong genetic effects on cognitive ability (12, 13). Indeed, the two apparently contradictory findings—stronger correlations with biological parents than adoptive parents, but changes in the mean consistent with environmental effects—are often reported in the same study. In Skodak and Skeels’ studies, for example, the correlation of children’s IQ with their biological parents’ IQ was 0.31 at the final testing, whereas the correlation with adoptive-parent IQ did not differ significantly from zero. Reanalysis of the Schiff et al. adoption data showed that the IQ scores of the adopted children were actually more highly correlated with the occupational status of their biological parents than their adoptive parents, despite the significant environmental effect on the mean.

 

[Trausti]

Exactly!!!!

Yes, exactly. Individuals with the same genetics and the same home environment can have vastly different interests, talents, motivations, drives, aspirations, health, etc.

But unless they’re identical twins, siblings are not genetically identical. With the same home environment, that leaves genes as the distinguishing characteristic.

 

[Trausti]

And your point is......I

You must have sucked at biology at school.

Actually I graduated with honors.

I’m sure you did. And you learned that unlike bacteria, animals cannot grab genes floating in the environment. Animals inherit them from their parents; with a little variation, of course.

 

[Toni]

Exactly!!!!

Yes, exactly. Individuals with the same genetics and the same home environment can have vastly different interests, talents, motivations, drives, aspirations, health, etc.

But unless they’re identical twins, siblings are not genetically identical. With the same home environment, that leaves genes as the distinguishing characteristic.

That assumes that children growing up in the same home are treated exactly the same and experience the same economic conditions.

And all of it assumes that everything is determined by factors out if the control of the individual: their genetic make up, their home environment, family expectations and attitudes towards education and the individual’s talents and abilities and health, etc. it further assumes that teachers play no actual role in education, nor does community or school administration, school environment, pollution, safety and violence, or a host of other factors that all have impact on education and achievement.

 

[Trausti]

But unless they’re identical twins, siblings are not genetically identical. With the same home environment, that leaves genes as the distinguishing characteristic.

That assumes that children growing up in the same home are treated exactly the same and experience the same economic conditions.

And all of it assumes that everything is determined by factors out if the control of the individual: their genetic make up, their home environment, family expectations and attitudes towards education and the individual’s talents and abilities and health, etc. it further assumes that teachers play no actual role in education, nor does community or school administration, school environment, pollution, safety and violence, or a host of other factors that all have impact on education and achievement.

That might all very well be true. But the predominant factor is your genes. It’s why, again, adopted children are more similar to the biological parents they may have never met than the adopted parents who raised them.

 

[Politesse]

If taken as a very general statement, that's been known to be untrue for more than 120 years of study;

Wut???

Family environment and the malleability of cognitive ability: A Swedish national home-reared and adopted-away cosibling control study

In contrast to the reliably positive effects of adoption on the mean IQ of children, when adoption studies are analyzed in terms of correlations between adopted children’s IQs and those of their biological and adoptive parents, the correlations with biological parents are invariably higher, indicative of strong genetic effects on cognitive ability (12, 13). Indeed, the two apparently contradictory findings—stronger correlations with biological parents than adoptive parents, but changes in the mean consistent with environmental effects—are often reported in the same study. In Skodak and Skeels’ studies, for example, the correlation of children’s IQ with their biological parents’ IQ was 0.31 at the final testing, whereas the correlation with adoptive-parent IQ did not differ significantly from zero. Reanalysis of the Schiff et al. adoption data showed that the IQ scores of the adopted children were actually more highly correlated with the occupational status of their biological parents than their adoptive parents, despite the significant environmental effect on the mean.

I am baffled by your continued habit of citing as evidence studies that seem to directly contradict your point.... Did you even read the abstract? It specifically and directly concludes the opposite of what you are claiming:

In a large population-based sample of separated siblings from Sweden, we demonstrate that adoption into improved socioeconomic circumstances is associated with a significant advantage in IQ at age 18.

Also, when did we start talking about IQ results rather than educational attainment? I suspect you are being intentionally vague about what traits you are or aren't discussing, but you should know that doing so makes your point appear weaker, not stronger.

 

[Trausti]

Wut???

Family environment and the malleability of cognitive ability: A Swedish national home-reared and adopted-away cosibling control study

I am baffled by your continued habit of citing as evidence studies that seem to directly contradict your point.... Did you even read the abstract? It specifically and directly concludes the opposite of what you are claiming:

In a large population-based sample of separated siblings from Sweden, we demonstrate that adoption into improved socioeconomic circumstances is associated with a significant advantage in IQ at age 18.

Also, when did we start talking about IQ results rather than educational attainment? I suspect you are being intentionally vague about what traits you are or aren't discussing, but you should know that doing so makes your point appear weaker, not stronger.

Dude, the paper clearly recites that adopted children take after their biological parents. Did you see the bolded part? That adopted children may have better outcomes with their adopted parents is not that surprising. And IQ is robustly correlated with life outcomes. In the recent psychological replication crisis, IQ stood out as the exception. All traits are heritable.

The intelligence of Korean children adopted in Belgium

Several studies have found that Oriental populations tend to have high mean IQs, strong visuo-spatial abilities but relatively weaker verbal abilities, as compared with Caucasian populations in the United States and Europe. The present paper reports data on these claims for 19 Korean infants adopted by families in Belgium. The children were tested with the WISC at a mean age of 10 yr. Their mean IQ was 118.7, the verbal IQ was 110.6 and the performance IQ 123.5. The results are interpreted as confirming those obtained from other Oriental populations.