“100年以来，心理学界都一致认为人在智力上没有性别差异。”加拿大西安大略湖大学的心理学家J.Philippe Rushton说。然而，最近的研究却对这个理论的正确性提出了质疑，在对人的体型做了校正之后比较发现，男性的大脑比女性更重，这个差异在100克左右。在智力上，男性要比女性平均高出3.6分。但是IQ的差异并不会在人们每天的行动中表现出来。在谈到诺贝尔奖获得者时，男性远多于女性，数字达到10比1。“只有在这个分布的末端差异才会表现出来。”Rushton说。 -psytopic.com

根据最近的一项新的有争议的研究表示，男性比女性聪明。此项研究在是否性别影响智力的过热争论中又添了一把柴。

“100年以来，心理学界都一致认为人在智力上没有性别差异。”加拿大西安大略湖大学的心理学家J.Philippe Rushton说。然而，最近的研究却对这个理论的正确性提出了质疑。最近的一个相关研究表明，在对人的体型做了校正之后比较发现，男性的大脑比女性更重，这个差异在100克左右。Rushton在性别与大脑尺寸方面也发现了类似的结论。

为了确定是否性别与智力有联系，或者是否大脑尺寸与智力有联系，Rushton和他的同事分析了1000,000名17至18岁学生的SAT测试成绩。

G因子

Rushton和他的同事们对每个SAT测试问题进行权重分析，并进行加权，建立一个普通智力因子叫G因子。之后他们发现，在智力上，男性要比女性平均高出3.6分。

Rushton解释到，G因子这样工作：“如果我告诉你我的电话的后四位数，然后要求你重复一次并反馈给我，那是低G因子负荷的记忆测试，但是如果接下来我要求你把顺序倒过来反馈给我这四个数字，这个突然事件就要进行数量巨大的高级认知加工，这就是高G因子负荷的题目。”

“所以G因子在这个测试中是一个有效因素。”Rushton说，“它是这个测试中单精度性最好，最具有预测性的一部分。”

Rushton推测这个结果是由于平均上男性比女性有更多的大脑组织。“这是一个非常合理的假设，现在只是需要更多的大脑组织专门用于处理高度的G因子信息。”

这项研究是由Rushton和西安大略湖大学另一位研究人员Douglas Jackson共同写作完成，并把详细的研究结果发表于期刊《智力》。

理论的瑕疵

维吉尼亚威廉期堡的威廉玛丽大学的心理学家Bruce Bracken，他并没有参与这项新研究，但他认为Rushton和Jackson只是为他们选用的样本找到了令人信服的证据。

“这种差异看起来似乎是真的。”Bracken说，但是他怀疑这个团队的结论。“我相信这个差异可能是来自于他们没有考虑到的变量。”

一个似乎可能的解释就是，比男性更多的女性决定去上大学并参加SAT测试。事实也是如此，这个研究中，女性比男性要多出大约10000名。

“这使人联想到许多男性决定去做其它的事情。”Bracken说，“也许那些在SAT测试中不能够得到高分的男性不会选择参加SAT测试，而是选择其它的渠道。”

他说：“一个更可信的研究应该是，为每一个男性都匹配一个与他同质的女性，然后再对他们的结果进行比较。”

争论在继续

这个发现为由哈佛大学前校长Lawrence Summers所提出的至今仍然争论不休的问题增添了砝码。去年早期他就说从自然科学和工程学的角度来看，男性本身拥有更高的智能。

在他的争议性问题发表后的暑假，在他的一段文字中写道：“尽管在报告矛盾的东西，但我不会说，我也不会相信，女性在智力上要低于男生，或者说女生缺乏在高级科学领域取得成功的能力。许多有卓越成就的职业女性科学家开辟了新的领域，人类在科学专长方面的潜能不是设法以性别来区分学术领域。”

当Rushton在叫嚣他的研究结果有着多么重大的意义的时候，他没有想到他是在动摇着现有教育领域的基础。他说：“我并不认为这会对教育政策或者学校工作有着多少真正的影响，事实上，女性比男性取得了更好的成绩。”

另外，他并不认为IQ的差异会在人们每天的行动中表现出来。“大量的人做着大量的工作，他们真的不会表现出多大的差异。”他说。

但是，当谈到诺贝尔奖获得者时，他说男性就远多于女性，数字达到10比1。“只有在这个分布的末端差异才会表现出来。”Rushton说。

Rushton为那些可能同他的新研究相矛盾的反方观点以及发现开了门户。

“我并不是说这就是最后的定论，在我们能够最终完全形成定论之前我们应该进行更多的研究。”Rushton说。

附原文：

Men Smarter than Women, Scientist Claims

Men are smarter than women, according to a controversial new study that adds another cinder to the fiery debate over whether gender impacts general intelligence.

“For 100 years there’s been a consensus among psychologists that there is no sex difference in intelligence,” said J. Philippe Rushton, a psychologist at the University of Western Ontario, Canada.

Recent studies, however, have raised questions about the validity of this claim, he said. One such study showed that men have larger brains than women, a 100 gram difference after correcting for body size. Rushton found similar results in a study of gender and brain size.

To determine if there was a link between gender and intelligence, and perhaps between brain size and intelligence, Rushton and a colleague analyzed the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores from 100,000 17- and 18-year-olds.

G-factor

When Rushton and colleagues weighted each SAT question by an established general intelligence factor called the g-factor, they discovered that males surpassed females by an average of 3.6 IQ points.

The g-factor works like this. “If I tell you the last four digits of my telephone number and ask you to repeat them back to me, that’s a low g-loaded memory test,” Rushton explained. “But if I then ask you to repeat them back to me in the reverse order, that suddenly requires a tremendous amount more cognitive processing. It is a very high loaded g-item.”

So the g-factor “is really the active ingredient of the test,” Rushton said. “It’s the single best, most predictive part of the test.”

Rushton suspects that the results are due to males having more brain tissue than females on average. “It’s a very reasonable hypothesis that you just need more brain tissue dedicated to processing high ‘g’ information,” Rushton said.

The study, which Rushton co-wrote with Douglas Jackson, also of the University of Western Ontario, is detailed in the current issue of the journal Intelligence.

Flawed conclusion

Bruce Bracken, a psychologist at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, who was not involved in the new study, said he thinks Rushton and Jackson make a convincing argument for the sample they used.

“The difference appears to be real,” Bracken said.

But he questions the team’s conclusions. “I believe that the differences probably lie in the variables they hadn’t considered,” Bracken said.

One plausible explanation is that more females than males decide to go to college and thus take the SAT test. The study did in fact include about 10,000 more females than males.

“This suggests that more males are deciding to do something else,” Bracken said. “It may be that the males who would not have scored as high on the SAT chose not to take it, and they chose another route.”

A more reliable study, he said, would be to match each male with a very similar female and then compare the results.

The debate goes on

The findings add fuel to a still smoldering debate ignited by former Harvard President Lawrence Summers, who stated early last year that males have a higher intrinsic aptitude in science and engineering.

In a letter from Summers days after his controversial statements, he wrote: “Despite reports to the contrary, I did not say, and I do not believe, that girls are intellectually less able than boys, or that women lack the ability to succeed at the highest levels of science. As the careers of a great many distinguished women scientists make plain, the human potential to excel in science is not somehow the province of one gender or another.”

While Rushton called his results significant, he doesn’t think they are a basis for uprooting the field of education.

“I don’t think it has any real implications for education policy or schoolwork,” he said. “In fact, females actually get better grades than males.”

Plus, he doesn’t think the IQ difference would show up in everyday activities. “For the vast majority of people in the vast majority of jobs, it really doesn’t translate into very much,” he said.

But when it comes to Nobel Prize winners, he said that men could outnumber women 10-to-1. “Where it will really show up is at the very high end of the distribution,” Rushton said.

Rushton has left the door open for opposing views and findings that might contradict his new study.

“I wouldn’t say it’s the last word. We really do need more research on it before we can be absolutely certain,” Rushton said.

By Jeanna Bryner
LiveScience Staff Writer

翻译：罗禹(Roger)
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