Advanced Progressive Matrices Research Articles

The composite complex span: French validation of a short working memory task.

Most studies in individual differences in the field of working memory research use complex span tasks to measure working memory capacity. Various complex span tasks based on different materials have been developed, and these tasks have proven both reliable and valid; several complex span tasks are often combined to provide a domain-general estimate of working memory capacity with even better psychometric properties. The present work sought to address two issues. Firstly, having participants perform several full-length complex span tasks in succession makes for a long and tedious procedure. Secondly, few complex span tasks have been translated and validated in French. We constructed a French working memory task labeled the Composite Complex Span (CCS). The CCS includes shortened versions of three classic complex span tasks: the reading span, symmetry span, and operation span. We assessed the psychometric properties of the CCS, including test-retest reliability and convergent validity, with Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices and with an alpha span task; the CCS demonstrated satisfying qualities in a sample of 1,093 participants. This work provides evidence that shorter versions of classic complex span tasks can yield valid working memory estimates. The materials and normative data for the CCS are also included.

Reading Comprehension Testing Techniques and Cognitive Fatigue: A Study on Construct Irrelevant Factors

The aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of different reading comprehension testing techniques on the arousal of cognitive fatigue in test takers. Additionally, the researchers investigated whether cognitive fatigue might be affected by the test takers’ IQ and cognitive styles. Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices and Group Embedded Figures Test were used for mea suring test takers’ IQ and cognitive style, respectively. Two groups of 15 students were asked to answer the MC passage comprehension and MC rational cloze test in 90 minutes. Subsequently, both groups were asked to perform the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and Continuous Performance Test used to measure cognitive fatigue. The findings showed no significant difference between the two reading groups in terms of their cognitive fatigue. Moreover, no significant differences were

Beyond fluid intelligence and personality traits in social support: the role of ability based emotional intelligence.

Social support represents an important individual resource that has been associated with multiple indices of adaptive functioning and resiliency. Existing research has also identified an association between emotional intelligence (EI) and social support. The present study builds on prior research by investigating the contributions of ability based EI to social support, beyond the effects of fluid intelligence and personality traits. The Advanced Progressive Matrices, the Big Five Questionnaire, the Mayer Salovey Caruso EI test (MSCEIT), and the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support were administered to 149 Italian high school students. The results showed that ability based EI added significant incremental variance in explaining perceived social support, beyond the variance due to fluid intelligence and personality traits. The results underline the role of ability based EI in relation to perceived social support. Since ability based EI can be increased through specific training, the results of the present study highlight new possibilities for research and intervention in a preventive framework.

The impact of different aetiologies on the cognitive performance of frontal patients

Neuropsychological group study methodology is considered one of the primary methods to further understanding of the organisation of frontal ‘executive’ functions. Typically, patients with frontal lesions caused by stroke or tumours have been grouped together to obtain sufficient power. However, it has been debated whether it is methodologically appropriate to group together patients with neurological lesions of different aetiologies. Despite this debate, very few studies have directly compared the performance of patients with different neurological aetiologies on neuropsychological measures. The few that did included patients with both anterior and posterior lesions.We present the first comprehensive retrospective comparison of the impact of lesions of different aetiologies on neuropsychological performance in a large number of patients whose lesion solely affects the frontal cortex. We investigated patients who had a cerebrovascular accident (CVA), high (HGT) or low grade (LGT) tumour, or meningioma, all at the post-operative stage. The same frontal ‘executive’ (Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices, Stroop Colour-Word Test, Letter Fluency-S; Trail Making Test Part B) and nominal (Graded Naming Test) tasks were compared. Patients' performance was compared across aetiologies controlling for age and NART IQ scores. Assessments of focal frontal lesion location, lesion volume, global brain atrophy and non-specific white matter (WM) changes were undertaken and compared across the four aetiology.We found no significant difference in performance between the four aetiology subgroups on the ‘frontal’ executive and nominal tasks. However, we found strong effects of premorbid IQ on all cognitive tasks and robust effects of age only on the frontal tasks. We also compared specific aetiology subgroups directly, as previously reported in the literature. Overall we found no significant differences in the performance of CVA and tumour patients, or LGT and HGT patients or LGT, HGT and meningioma's on our four frontal tests. No difference was found with respect to the location of frontal lesions, lesion volume, global brain atrophy and non-specific WM changes between the subgroups.Our results suggest that the grouping of frontal patients caused by different aetiologies is a pragmatic, justified methodological approach that can help to further understanding of the organisation of frontal executive functions.

Incremental validity of emotional intelligence ability in predicting academic achievement.

We tested the incremental validity of an ability measure of emotional intelligence (El) in predicting academic achievement in undergraduate students, controlling for cognitive abilities and personality traits. Academic achievement has been conceptualized in terms of the number of exams, grade point average, and study time taken to prepare for each exam. Additionally, gender differences were taken into account in these relationships. Participants filled in the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT), the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices, the reduced version of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, and academic achievement measures. Results showed that El abilities were positively related to academic achievement indices, such as the number of exams and grade point average; total El ability and the Perceiving branch were negatively associated with the study time spent preparing for exams. Furthermore, El ability adds a percentage of incremental variance with respect to cognitive ability and personality variables in explaining scholastic success. The magnitude of the associations between El abilities and academic achievement measures was generally higher for men than for women. Jointly considered, the present findings support the incremental validity of the MSCEIT and provide positive indications of the importance of El in students' academic development. The helpfulness of El training in the context of academic institutions is discussed.

Do we really become smarter when our fluid-intelligence test scores improve?

Recent reports of training-induced gains on fluid intelligence tests have fueled an explosion of interest in cognitive training—now a billion-dollar industry. The interpretation of these results is questionable because score gains can be dominated by factors that play marginal roles in the scores themselves, and because intelligence gain is not the only possible explanation for the observed control-adjusted far transfer across tasks. Here we present novel evidence that the test score gains used to measure the efficacy of cognitive training may reflect strategy refinement instead of intelligence gains. A novel scanpath analysis of eye movement data from 35 participants solving Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices on two separate sessions indicated that one-third of the variance of score gains could be attributed to test-taking strategy alone, as revealed by characteristic changes in eye-fixation patterns. When the strategic contaminant was partialled out, the residual score gains were no longer significant. These results are compatible with established theories of skill acquisition suggesting that procedural knowledge tacitly acquired during training can later be utilized at posttest. Our novel method and result both underline a reason to be wary of purported intelligence gains, but also provide a way forward for testing for them in the future.

Mental ability and information processing during discrimination of auditory motion patterns: Effects on P3 and mismatch negativity

The relation between mental ability (MA), indexed by scores on Raven Advanced Progressive Matrices (RAPM), and the ability to detect auditory motion patterns was examined using P300 and mismatch negativity (MMN) measures of the ERPs. Forty-nine female volunteers were presented with two blocks of binaural sound stimuli each containing identical standards (90%), creating an immobile sound image located along the midline of the head, and deviants (10%) modeling movement of the midline sound image towards the left ear. Sound stimuli were presented in passive (ignore) and then active response conditions. Task difficulty was manipulated by introducing two moving sound sequences into the deviant stimuli, one in which the inter-aural delay (IAD) varied linearly from 0 to 0.8 ms (long-IAD), and the other in which IAD varied from 0 to 0.4 ms (short-IAD). In the active moving sound discrimination condition, the greater difficulty for the short-IAD was confirmed by reduced accuracy, longer response times, and greater variability in response times than those for long-IAD. Predominantly in the active more difficult condition, higher ability (HA) was associated with greater response accuracy, shorter response times, and shorter P300 latency, while the association with P300 amplitude was not significant. These effects are indicative of the greater speed in stimulus processing and greater facility in discrimination of simulated auditory motion patterns for HA than for lower ability (LA) individuals. In the passive condition HA was associated with shorter MMN latency and larger MMN amplitude to the deviant sounds in the long-IAD condition (higher deviance magnitude). These effects not only demonstrate the importance of both mental speed and discrimination ability for MA, but also indicate that higher order discrimination, as that requiredforsimulatedauditory motion,develops prior toconsciousness, andcannot be attributed to conscious processes like focused attention.

Individual differences in category learning: Memorization versus rule abstraction

Although individual differences in category-learning tasks have been explored, the observed differences have tended to represent different instantiations of general processes (e.g., learners rely upon different cues to develop a rule) and their consequent representations. Additionally, studies have focused largely on participants' categorizations of transfer items to determine the representations that they formed. In the present studies, we used a convergent-measures approach to examine participants' categorizations of transfer items in addition to their self-reported learning orientations and response times on transfer items, and in doing so, we garnered evidence that qualitatively distinct approaches in explicit strategies for category learning (i.e., memorization vs. abstracting an articulable rule) and consequent representations might emerge in a single task. Participants categorized instances that followed a categorization rule (in Study1, we used a relational rule; in Study2, an additional task with a single-feature rule). Critically, for both tasks,some transfer items differed from trained instances on only one attribute (but otherwise were perceptually similar), rendering the item a member of the opposing category on the basis of the rule (i.e., termed ambiguous items). Some learners categorized ambiguous items on the basis of perceptual similarity, whereas others categorized them on the basis of an abstracted rule. Self-reported learning orientation (i.e., memorization vs. rule abstraction) predicted categorizations and response times on transfer items. Differences in learning orientations were not associated with performance on other cognitive measures (i.e., working memory capacity and Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices). This work suggests that individuals may have different predispositions toward memorization versus rule abstraction in a single categorization task.

Individual differences in fluid intelligence predicts inattentional blindness in a sample of older adults: a preliminary study.

Previous research has shown that aging increases susceptibility to inattentional blindness (Graham and Burke, Psychol Aging 26:162, 2011) as well as individual differences in cognitive ability related to working memory and executive functions in separate studies. Therefore, the present study was conducted in an attempt to bridge a gap that involved investigating 'age-sensitive' cognitive abilities that may predict inattentional blindness in a sample of older adults. We investigated whether individual differences in general fluid intelligence and speed of processing would predict inattentional blindness in our sample of older adults. Thirty-six healthy older adults took part in the study. Using the inattentional blindness paradigm developed by Most et al. (Psychol Rev 112:217, 2005), we investigated whether rates of inattentional blindness could be predicted by participant's performance on the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices and a choice-reaction time task. A Mann-Whitney U test revealed that a higher score on the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices was significantly associated with lower incidences of inattentional blindness. However, a t test revealed that choice-reaction times were not significantly associated with inattentional blindness. Preliminary results from the present study suggest that individual differences in general fluid intelligence are predictive of inattentional blindness in older adults but not speed of processing. Moreover, our findings are consistent with previous studies that have suggested executive attention control may be the source of these individual differences. These findings also highlight the association between attention and general fluid intelligence and how it may impact environmental awareness. Future research would benefit from repeating these analyses in a larger sample and also including a younger comparison group.

Comparing ability and self-report trait emotional intelligence, fluid intelligence, and personality traits in career decision

This study investigated the role of ability and trait emotional intelligence (EI), fluid intelligence, and personality traits in career decision-making self-efficacy, career indecision and indecisiveness. The Advanced Progressive Matrices, Big Five Questionnaire, Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, Bar-On Emotional Intelligence Inventory, Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire, Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale: Short Form, Career Decision-Making Difficulties Questionnaire, and Indecisiveness Scale were administered to 194 Italian high school students. These results highlighted the potentially important role of self-reported EI in career decisions.

The role of the core self-evaluation construct compared to fluid intelligence and personality traits in resilience

Introduction Regarding resilience a very promising area of research is the core self-evaluation construct. This study investigated the role of fluid intelligence, personality traits and core self-evaluation in relation to resilience. Method The Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM), the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ), the Core Self-Evaluation Scale (CSES), the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) were administered to 219 high school students. Results The study revealed that the core self-evaluation construct added a significant percentage of incremental variance compared to variances due to fluid intelligence and personality traits with respect to resilience. Conclusions These results highlight, in the Italian context, the role of the core self-evaluation construct and its relationship with resilience thereby offering new research and intervention opportunities in a preventive perspective.

Estudio psicometrico del test de matrices progresivas de Raven. Forma avanzada en estudiantes universitarios

Se analiza la adecuación psicométrica de los itemes del Test de Matrices Progresivas Avanzadas de Raven en estudiantes de la U.N.M.S.M. de las 5 especialidades profesionales, Se tuvieron 501 participantes, quienes conformaban una muestra representativa de los ingresantes a la universidad. El análisis de la confiabilidad indica que la prueba es confiable. Se estudió la validez de construcción del instrumento, encontrándose que la prueba posee validez de construcción. También se elaboraron los baremos para cada una de las áreas de especialidad a las que pertenecen los estudiantes de la U.N.M.S.M. Asimismo, se encontró que existen diferencias estadísticamente significativas en los niveles de inteligencia general entre algunas de las áreas de especialidad de los ingresantes de la U.N.M.S.M.. Por un lado, los alumnos del área “B” obtienen puntajes más altos que los de las áreas “A “, “C “, “D” Y “E “, De otro lado, los alumnos del área “C” obtuvieron puntuaciones mayores que los de las áreas “A “y “E “. Finalmente, los alumnos del área “D” tuvieron puntajes más altos que los de las áreas “A” Y “E “. Sin embargo, no se encontraron diferencias estadísticamente significativas en el nivel de inteligencia general entre los alumnos de las áreas “A “)’ “E” Y los de las áreas “C” y “D “.

COGNITIVE ABILITY OF PRESCHOOL, PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SCHOOL CHILDREN IN COSTA RICA

Cognitive abilities of children in Costa Rica and Austria were compared using three age groups (N = 385/366). Cognitive ability tests (mental speed, culture reduced/fluid intelligence, literacy/crystallized intelligence) were applied that differed in the extent to which they refer to school-related knowledge. Preschool children (kindergarten, 5-6 years old, N(CR) = 80, N(Au) = 51) were assessed with the Coloured Progressive Matrices (CPM), primary school children (4th grade, 9-11 years old, N(CR) = 71, N(Au) = 71) with ZVT (a trail-making test), Standard Progressive Matrices (SPM) and items from PIRLS-Reading and TIMSS-Mathematics, and secondary school students (15-16 years old, N(CR) = 48, N(Au) = 48) with ZVT, Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM) and items from PISA-Reading and PISA-Mathematics. Additionally, parents and pupils were given questionnaires covering family characteristics and instruction. Average cognitive abilities were higher in Austria (Greenwich-IQ M(CR) = 87 and M(Au) = 99, d(IQ) = 12 points) and differences were smaller in preschool than in secondary school (d(IQ) = 7 vs 20 points). Differences in crystallized intelligence were larger than in fluid intelligence (mental speed: d(IQ) = 12, Raven: d(IQ) = 10, student achievement tests: d(IQ) = 17 IQ points). Differences were larger in comparisons at the level of g-factors. Austrian children were also taller (6.80 cm, d = 1.07 SD), but had lower body mass index (BMI(CR) = 19.35 vs BMI(Au) = 17.59, d = -0.89 SD). Different causal hypotheses explaining these differences are compared.

Promoting individual resources: The challenge of trait emotional intelligence

This study investigated the role of fluid intelligence, personality traits and different models of emotional intelligence in relation to core self-evaluation, resilience and life satisfaction. The Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM), the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ), the Mayer Salovey Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT), the Bar-On Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Bar-On EQ-i), the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue), the Core Self-Evaluation Scale (CSES), the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC), and the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) were administered to 164 Italian high school students. These results highlighted the role of emotional intelligence and in particular of trait emotional intelligence in promoting individual resources and offering new research and intervention opportunities.

Circadian Cycle and Adolescentss Nonverbal Intelligence

‘Circadian Cycle’, the biological clock within the organism, is the cyclic changes in bodily process occurring within a single day basing on our conscious awareness which is generated endogenously by the anterior hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nuclei and modulated by exogenous factors. In other words, the state of activity and arousal level in the series of different cycles of sleep and wakefulness, in most of the cases, is generated, controlled, guided, and explained in terms of Circadian Cycle. This activating level of the mind has its origin from the very childhood stage of the organism and reaches its peak in adolescence, basing on different ecological, anthropological, sociological, and psychological points of view. An investigation was made on the effect of circadian cycle on the intelligence level of 100 urban and 100 tribal school children (age 10-14 of class IV and class VI) of Nayagarh District, different Govt. schools, ‘Sai Saraswati Sishumandiir School’, and from the KISS School of KIIT University, Bhubaneswar, Odisha. After being randomly selected the subjects were individually administered the Raven’s Advanced progressive matrices tests of intelligence in their natural environment. All of them were tested for four times a day: in morning, noon, evening and night; and accordingly their IQ scores were recorded. The analysis of results revealed that irrespective of culture, the IQ of the subjects was differentially affected by varying degrees of circadian cycles. It was more in noon than evening and morning and more in morning than night. The difference in intelligence scores between urban and tribal children, analyzed by Two Way ANOVA, was found to be statistically significant. The interaction of circadian cycle and culture was also found to have highly significant effect on intelligence scores of the subject. The most interesting part of the findings was, in night shifts, tribal adolescents were more active than their urban counterparts indicating their ecological and anthropological stand point of circadian cycle (t=3.62). The means of the intelligence scores of urban and tribal children were 9.81 (SD=1.62) and 9.56 (SD=1.75) respectively. This group difference was found to be statistically significant. In other words both urban and tribal children are more or less not equal with regard to their intelligence scores. The means of the intelligence scores of the subjects , at morning , noon , evening and night, irrespective of socio-cultural groups were 8.29 (SD=1.76), 11.59 (SD=1.72), 10.31 (SD=1.66) and 8.57 (SD=1.62), respectively. This mean difference was found to be statistically significant. In other words Circadian Rhythms have significant effects on the intelligence score of the subjects. More important is subsequent Newmann-Keuls post hoc test revealed significant differences among all possible group comparisons in favor of noon shift.

Relationship between errors on Raven’s Progressive Matrices (SPM plus and APM) and eductive ability

The aim of this study was to analyze the relationship between errors on Standard Progressive Matrices Plus (SPM Plus) and Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM) and eductive ability. A large sample (n = 4535) of secondary school pupils aged 11 to 19 was used. For both SPM Plus and APM, the two-parameter logistic model which includes item difficulty (b) and discrimination (a) parameters was used for the eductive ability estimation. At first, analysis of responses to SPM Plus and APM items (including such response options as “a subject omitted an item” and “a subject didn’t reach an item”) was conducted using the Classical Test Theory (CTT) difficulty and discrimination power indices as well as the Item Response Theory (IRT) Option Characteristic Curves (OCCs). The analysis has confirmed that response alternatives lacking only one correct feature are more likely in the middle range of ability and from this range upward, whereas subjects of low ability often choose alternatives that are incorrect on more than one and / or more salient features. It has also been found that higher ability subjects are prone to omit an item that is too difficult for them instead of guessing an answer as opposed to lower ability subjects who may use a random guessing as a RPM solving strategy. The analysis has also shown that higher-scoring subjects have no time enough to finish all the RPM items more often than lower-scoring individuals. This finding suggests that higher-ability subjects invest more time in solving RPM items, and therefore a time limit is not suitable for assessing a high eductive ability. Next, the APM types of error analysis has revealed that the type of errors made on APM is related to the ability level of the subjects. Errors due to failure to attend to all relevant aspects of the item, i.e. incomplete correlate errors, were made by subjects of higher ability as compared to errors due to the confluence of ideas or repetition. This finding suggests that an answer of incomplete correlate type shows a relatively high eductive ability (as compared to the confluence of ideas or repetition type answer) since it requires a correct, although incomplete, reasoning.

A learning-based account of fluid intelligence from the perspective of the position effect

The current study addresses the question of whether performance on fluid intelligence tests involves learning processes by employing an approach emanating from research into the position effect of psychometric scales. This approach enables the modeling of learning processes that may occur while completing the items of an intelligence test. We analyzed the data of Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices (Raven's Matrices) collected from a sample of 220 participants. Fixed-links models were applied for decomposing the variances and covariances of Raven's Matrices into a position component associated with the position effect, and a constant component independent of the item positions. These two components were linked to associative and complex learning. Results indicated that the two types of learning accounted for 66% of the latent variance of Raven's Matrices. Complex learning displayed an especially strong association with the position component. It is concluded that learning processes are an important ingredient of fluid intelligence.

The IPOO-model of creative learning and the students' information processing characteristics

The present study was designed to examine secondary school students' information processing characteristics during learning and their relationship with the students' academic averages, internal motivation for learning and cognitive abilities, such as intelligence and creativity. Although many studies have previously focused on this issue, we are now studying this topic from the perspective of the IPOO-model, which is a new theoretical approach to school learning (note: IPOO is an acronym of Input, Process, Output, Organizing). This study featured 815 participants (secondary school students) who completed the following tests and questionnaires: Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM) intelligence test, the 'Unusual Uses' creativity test (UUT), the 2 nd version of the Jupiterbolha-proba (Jupiter Flea test - JB2) to test the information processing method of learning, and the Learning Attitude Questionnaire (LAQ). In our analysis we took the gender, school grade and academic average of participants into account. According to our results, the quality of information-processing methods of learning is at a low level, and there are no significant strong correlational relationships among the tests and questionnaire results (except in the cases of fluency, originality, and flexibility). There were no significant differences between genders or classes. These findings are consistent with the findings of previous studies.

Finding Workers, Offenders, or Students Most at-Risk for Violence: Actuarial Tests save Lives and Resources

147 adults (107 men, 40 women) and 89 adolescents (61 boys, 28 girls), selected randomly from referrals and volunteers, were given the Ammons Quick Test (QT), the Beck Suicide Scale (BSS), the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory Second (MMPI-2) or Adolescent Versions (MMPI-A), the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices, and the Standard Predictor (SP) of Violence Potential Adult or Adolescent Versions. The goals were to: (a) demonstrate computer and paper-and-pencil tests correlated; (b) validate tests to identify at-risk for violence; (c) show that identifying at-risk saves lives and resources; and (d) find which industries benefited from testing at-risk. Paper-and-pencil vs. computer test correlations (.83-.99), sensitivity (.97-.98), and specificity (.50-.97) were computed. Testing at-risk saves lives and resources. Critical industries for testing at-risk individuals may include airlines, energy generating industries, insurance, military, nonprofit-religious, prisoners, trucking or port workers, and veterans.

A spiking neural model applied to the study of human performance and cognitive decline on Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices

We present a spiking neural model capable of solving a popular test of intelligence, Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices (RPM). The central features of this model are its ability to dynamically generate the rules needed to solve the RPM and its biologically detailed implementation in spiking neurons. We describe the rule generation processes, and demonstrate the model's ability to use the resulting rules to solve the RPM with similar performance and error patterns to human subjects. Investigating the rules in more detail, we show that they successfully capture abstract patterns in the data, enabling them to generalize to novel matrices. We also show that the same model can be used to solve a separate reasoning task, and demonstrates the expected positive correlation in performance across tasks. Finally, we demonstrate the advantages of the biologically detailed implementation by using the model to connect behavioral and neurophysiological data. Specifically, we investigate two neurophysiological explanations of cognitive decline in aging: neuron loss and representational “dedifferentiation”. We show that manipulations to the model that reflect these neurophysiological hypotheses result in performance changes that match observed human behavioral data.