Brains and Social Status 



267 



decide whether these differences in level 

 of intelligence are due to differences in 

 heredity or in home training and sur- 

 roundings. They do say, "The superi- 

 ority of the better classes is most 

 evident in tests that involve higher 

 mental processes like analysis and 

 abstraction; but it is also shown to a 

 lesser extent in sensory-motor func- 

 tions." 



"If mental age rather than chrono- 

 logical age were used to determine the 

 time for beginning school," they add, 

 "the children of the professional group, 

 for example, would begin school two 

 years earlier than the children of the 

 unskilled labor group; for the former 

 mature intellectually much earlier than 

 the latter." In fact, if the children of 

 unskilled laborers were judged by the 

 standard of the professional group, a 

 majority of them would have to be 

 called feebleminded. This, however, the 

 authors say, is not a fair standard by 

 which to judge them : they should rather 

 be judged by the standard of their own 

 group. 



CONCLUSION 



9. In conclusion, it appears that there 

 are very considerable differences in the 

 natural intelligence of children, de- 

 pending on the social and economic 

 status of their parents. These dif- 



ferences might be due to home training, 

 surroundings, association with superior 

 people, etc.; or they might be due to 

 actual differences in inheritance of 

 intelligence, which training and educa- 

 tion cannot obliterate. There is a good 

 deal of evidence, which need not be 

 reviewed here, to prove that the latter 

 supposition accounts for a large part of 

 the differences. 



Eugenics seeks to increase the repro- 

 ductive rate of the superior part of the 

 nation, and decrease that of the inferior 

 part. It is of great importance that 

 more studies like the above be made, 

 which will show just what parts of the 

 population are, intellectually, superior, 

 and that it be definitely determined to 

 what extent these differences are innate. 



But even in advance of this, eugenic 

 effort is not at all premature. It is 

 probably safe to say that those who are 

 successful in life are, on the average, 

 eugenically superior to those who are 

 unsuccessful: that is it better to en- 

 courage those who are able to support 

 themselves than those who, because of 

 some physical or mental defect, are 

 unable to support themselves and are a 

 burden on the community. This dis- 

 tinction alone is sufficient to justify the 

 proper kind of eugenics ■ propaganda, 

 and will furnish ample occupation for 

 eugenists for some time to come. 



Methods of Investigation in Applied Sociology 



Eugenists have frequently had occa- 

 sion to condemn much of the evidence by 

 which students of public health, social 

 betterment and euthenics support their 

 conclusions. Faulty logic and incor- 

 rect statistical methods vitiate a great 

 deal of it and have led too frequently 

 to the ignoring of the biological founda- 

 tions. In recent years more trained 

 men have been going into the work of 

 organized charity, and have done much 

 to reform the methods of investigation. 

 But the need for more care, and the 

 ways in which it can be applied, are still 

 too little recognized, and the Russell 

 Sage Foimdation (130 E. 22d St., New 

 York) has done a service in publishing a 



pamphlet (price 20 cents) containing 

 papers by Donald B. Armstrong, Franz 

 Schneider, Jr., and Louis I. Dublin, 

 with the general title "Methods of 

 Investigation in Social and Health Prob- 

 lems." A study of this pamphlet is 

 recommended to everyone who is inter- 

 ested in intelligent social betterment; it 

 will shake his faith in much of the work 

 that has hitherto been done by euthen- 

 ists, but will give him an understanding 

 of the exact methods by which such 

 investigations must be conducted, if 

 they are to furnish the basis for effective 

 reform. Eugenists, too, can learn much 

 which will make their own worlf 

 stronger. 



