METHODOLOGY OF THE STUDY OF 

 INTELLIGENCE AND EMOTION IN AGEING* 



Irving Lorge 



I'eachers College, Columbia University, New York 



As more and more information about ageing becomes 

 available, it becomes clearer and clearer that the interpreta- 

 tion of the evidence depends upon the methodology utilized 

 and upon the assumptions underlying it. The appraisal of 

 cognitive functions and temperamental traits depends upon at 

 least three major considerations: (1) the means for measuring 

 and evaluating intellectual behaviour and emotion; (2) the 

 sampling of the populations to be tested or studied; and (3) the 

 methods for obtaining the measures of abilities and traits 

 at different chronological, physiological or biological ages. 

 These factors, of course, are not independent since the kinds 

 of tests, the sorts of people and the successive chronologies 

 interact. 



Despite the fact that the major concern of this paper is with 

 the measurement of intelligence and emotion in ageing, the 

 first topic will be that of the different methodologies for 

 obtaining data about traits, functions or processes as related 

 to age. In the study of humans, it is difficult to keep separate 

 the relative contributions of heredity, environment and 

 maturation, whether it be growth from infancy or decline 

 toward senescence. In studies of physiological or anatomical 

 traits, the researcher may be able to maintain close control of 

 the environment; not so in behavioural studies of animals or 

 of humans. The appraisal of the contribution of heredity to 

 the learning ability of dogs gives some indication of the com- 

 plexities involved in maintaining a stable and controlled 



* This paper is primarily concerned with aspects of methodology. The sub- 

 stantive findings have been reviewed recently (Lorge, 1956 a and b). 



170 



