IQ and socio-economic development across local authorities of the UK

Publication type

Journal Article

Author

Publication date

March 15, 2016

Summary:

Cross-regional correlations between average IQ and socio-economic development have been reported for many different countries. This paper analyses data on average IQ and a range of socio-economic variables at the local authority level in the UK. Local authorities are administrative bodies in local government; there are over 400 in the UK, and they contain anywhere from tens of thousands to more than a million people. The paper finds that local authority IQ is positively related to indicators of health, socio-economic status and tertiary industrial activity; and is negatively related to indicators of disability, unemployment and single parenthood. A general socio-economic factor is correlated with local authority IQ at r = .56. This correlation increases to r = .65 when correcting for measurement error in the estimates of IQ.

Published in

Intelligence

Volume and page numbers

Volume: 55 , p.90 -94

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intell.2016.02.001

ISSN

1602896

Subjects

#524033

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