Reaction time and movement time relationships with intelligence in three different simple tasks

Abstract

The purposes of the present study were 1. (a) to investigate the MT/IQ relationship in a task involving a more complex movement than is typically required 2. (b) to compare RT/IQ and MT/IQ relationships across three different types of tasks. Forty-one adult subjects were administered the Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test and three tasks at different speeds: 1. (1) a computer-administered Hick paradigm task at five levels of task complexity, 2. (2) a simple target-striking task that allows for a complex movement, and 3. (3) a paper-and-pencil copying task. Results were: 1. (a) the direction of RT/IQ and MT/IQ correlations were as expected for the Hick paradigm task, but the sizes of correlations were low; 2. (b) no significant relationships with IQ were found for the RT or MT components of the target-striking task; 3. (c) significant correlations with RT but not MT were found for the copying task; 4. (d) little evidence for inter-task similarity was found; 5. (e) relationships were stronger for the non-verbal than the verbal part of the intelligence test.