How Scientifically Reliable Are Online IQ tests?
Online IQ tests may not be as reliable as you think. Ever come across a website asking you to click a button.
You clicked it, to your surprise, it’s an IQ test starting for you just online. If you have fallen into this, you would notice the summary and brevity of this kind of IQ test. They usually take less than 30 minutes to finish.
However, the major beauty of a test [of intelligence] doesn’t have to be on its brevity or how quick the respondents can provide the answers to them.
Rather, it should be on how ‘dependable’ or ‘reliable’ such tests are, in order to provide the figure [Intelligence Quotient] we are really looking for.
Many tests of intelligence online are designed by a programmer or coder who understands HTML and Javascript.
The end result would be a plugin or widget that can be placed somewhere on a website or blog. This widget has humanly readable contents when it is decoded and what we see are intelligence questions.
Once upon a time I took an online test of this nature and was surprised to see myself score 124.
Whether I would score higher or lower on Mensa or some other advanced measures like Wechsler, Raven’s Progressive Matrices etc. is questionable, since various conditions determine what one’s IQ would be from one time to the other- environmental factors.
In fact, internal factors like mental state, depression may cause poor performance on IQ test, at least hypothetically speaking.
We shall consider some reasons online intelligence tests may be a waste of time on the ground of reliability versus non-reliability.
Online intelligence tests are a waste of time. Why?
1. They are stereotypical
Stereotypical? Yes, they are. Test yourself on six different IQ tests. After finishing that, test yourself again on the same Intelligence tests for the second round. You would notice that the questions have not changed.
For example, Mr. IQ Freak tested himself on a site called Qwertyasdftest, just online. If he goes through the same test of intelligence again, question #1 would still be the same even if he repeats this same test 100 times.
How reliable and valid can that be when you consider the fact that IQ is not static for life? Our brain is actually neuroplastic for goodness sake.
2. A tendency to be flawed with experimental bias
Bias may arise from the experimenter or the coder of the online test. How? He might have erroneously thought that some particular questions should be in an intelligence test and put them there.
To him, it doesn’t matter whether the questions are culturally or linguistically biased. A good IQ test won’t include ‘Hamburger and Pizza’ in its contents for Nigerians. Are you kidding me? But a gross percentage won’t understand what these mean.
3. Online tests may lack content validity
What this means? A 15-minutes test may not have covered the whole types of intelligence.
According to Howard Gardner, there are eight types of intelligence [mathematical, linguistic, kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, emotional and musical].
Less-than-15-minutes test may not have the content validity sufficient to prove something reliable and correct. Many of the tests are being hyped and with much intent to be just fun quizzes. Go look at 123test website and you would get the picture.
After finishing the test, summary IQ score would be given so that you congratulate or grin at yourself. It is just a takeaway that can be shared on Facebook, Twitter, Google plus and other social media. They can be as promotional as that. I myself have scored 124 on this type of test.
Yes, that’s what Memorado said I belong among a range of IQers in the world, it even gave the summary that ‘6% of the world population has higher intelligence score than 124’.
This made me want to laugh. Should I be happy? I am not sure whether I can score as much as that on pencil and paper intelligence tests.
Lol! Why should I rely on this as a long time infallible assurance of my IQ either 124 or even 150+ [that’s incorrect]? They are not worth your time, forget the junks. If you want to know your intelligence score, go for Mensa or Progressive Matrices.
4. They hide something
If a system tells you something like this, “I know your score but would never reveal to you how it is being derived all the time, you just don’t need to worry about the calculations, we’ve got everything covered”, is yet another reason to abandon online tests.
Why? Their algorithms might be flawed and after you finish the test, you have no idea how your score was derived. This is not too good.
5. They welcome you with self-promotional stuff
Have you clicked the start button to start an IQ test and discovered a big hovering ad and affiliate link inside the question? This may vex you, hit the back button right that instance on your computer screen.
6. Many fake ones have masked the genuine ones
The counterfeits are rampant in ratio to the originals but how can we tell if we see the few good ones?
You can never tell and this is why: only psychologist and psychometrists can tell. Why? They know how a good test should have passed reliability and validity criteria.
7. Online IQ tests are mostly stereotypical
Apparently, online IQ tests are stereotypical (the questions don't change at every reload of the test web page), which means their users often get biased results since they know what to expect as they get better at acing each question.
For online IQ tests to be successful, it has to be well coded dynamically by a qualified psychometrist. Otherwise, it just won't make any sense.
You clicked it, to your surprise, it’s an IQ test starting for you just online. If you have fallen into this, you would notice the summary and brevity of this kind of IQ test. They usually take less than 30 minutes to finish.
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| Are they reliable? |
Rather, it should be on how ‘dependable’ or ‘reliable’ such tests are, in order to provide the figure [Intelligence Quotient] we are really looking for.
Many tests of intelligence online are designed by a programmer or coder who understands HTML and Javascript.
The end result would be a plugin or widget that can be placed somewhere on a website or blog. This widget has humanly readable contents when it is decoded and what we see are intelligence questions.
Once upon a time I took an online test of this nature and was surprised to see myself score 124.
Whether I would score higher or lower on Mensa or some other advanced measures like Wechsler, Raven’s Progressive Matrices etc. is questionable, since various conditions determine what one’s IQ would be from one time to the other- environmental factors.
In fact, internal factors like mental state, depression may cause poor performance on IQ test, at least hypothetically speaking.
We shall consider some reasons online intelligence tests may be a waste of time on the ground of reliability versus non-reliability.
Online intelligence tests are a waste of time. Why?
1. They are stereotypical
Stereotypical? Yes, they are. Test yourself on six different IQ tests. After finishing that, test yourself again on the same Intelligence tests for the second round. You would notice that the questions have not changed.
For example, Mr. IQ Freak tested himself on a site called Qwertyasdftest, just online. If he goes through the same test of intelligence again, question #1 would still be the same even if he repeats this same test 100 times.
How reliable and valid can that be when you consider the fact that IQ is not static for life? Our brain is actually neuroplastic for goodness sake.
2. A tendency to be flawed with experimental bias
Bias may arise from the experimenter or the coder of the online test. How? He might have erroneously thought that some particular questions should be in an intelligence test and put them there.
To him, it doesn’t matter whether the questions are culturally or linguistically biased. A good IQ test won’t include ‘Hamburger and Pizza’ in its contents for Nigerians. Are you kidding me? But a gross percentage won’t understand what these mean.
3. Online tests may lack content validity
What this means? A 15-minutes test may not have covered the whole types of intelligence.
According to Howard Gardner, there are eight types of intelligence [mathematical, linguistic, kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, emotional and musical].
Less-than-15-minutes test may not have the content validity sufficient to prove something reliable and correct. Many of the tests are being hyped and with much intent to be just fun quizzes. Go look at 123test website and you would get the picture.
After finishing the test, summary IQ score would be given so that you congratulate or grin at yourself. It is just a takeaway that can be shared on Facebook, Twitter, Google plus and other social media. They can be as promotional as that. I myself have scored 124 on this type of test.
Yes, that’s what Memorado said I belong among a range of IQers in the world, it even gave the summary that ‘6% of the world population has higher intelligence score than 124’.
This made me want to laugh. Should I be happy? I am not sure whether I can score as much as that on pencil and paper intelligence tests.
Lol! Why should I rely on this as a long time infallible assurance of my IQ either 124 or even 150+ [that’s incorrect]? They are not worth your time, forget the junks. If you want to know your intelligence score, go for Mensa or Progressive Matrices.
4. They hide something
If a system tells you something like this, “I know your score but would never reveal to you how it is being derived all the time, you just don’t need to worry about the calculations, we’ve got everything covered”, is yet another reason to abandon online tests.
Why? Their algorithms might be flawed and after you finish the test, you have no idea how your score was derived. This is not too good.
5. They welcome you with self-promotional stuff
Have you clicked the start button to start an IQ test and discovered a big hovering ad and affiliate link inside the question? This may vex you, hit the back button right that instance on your computer screen.
6. Many fake ones have masked the genuine ones
The counterfeits are rampant in ratio to the originals but how can we tell if we see the few good ones?
You can never tell and this is why: only psychologist and psychometrists can tell. Why? They know how a good test should have passed reliability and validity criteria.
7. Online IQ tests are mostly stereotypical
Apparently, online IQ tests are stereotypical (the questions don't change at every reload of the test web page), which means their users often get biased results since they know what to expect as they get better at acing each question.
For online IQ tests to be successful, it has to be well coded dynamically by a qualified psychometrist. Otherwise, it just won't make any sense.
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