Lewis Terman
American psychologist at Stanford and author of the Stanford-Binet
American psychologist at Stanford who published the Stanford revision of the Binet-Simon test in 1916 and began the Genetic Studies of Genius in 1921. He was also a prominent eugenicist who wrote about racial differences in test scores.
Why this person matters
Terman's Stanford-Binet made the IQ ratio standard in the United States, and his long-running study followed gifted children through their lives. Collaborators including Melita Oden and Robert Sears carried it on. His views on heredity and race are now criticised, and the study has known limits.
Main contributions
Stanford-Binet test
In 1916 he published the Stanford revision of the Binet-Simon scale, adopting William Stern's suggestion that IQ be mental age divided by chronological age, times 100. Revisions followed in 1937 and 1960.
Genetic Studies of Genius
Begun in 1921 with Commonwealth Fund money, it selected children nominated by teachers from about 160,000 tested, starting with 661 and later 1,528. The first volume appeared in 1925 and there were five. Melita Oden completed the fifth and Robert Sears continued the study.
Army testing
He worked on the First World War military group tests, Army Alpha and Army Beta.
Context and limits
Terman belonged to the Human Betterment Foundation, the American Eugenics Society and the Eugenics Research Association. In 1916 he wrote that dullness among Spanish-Indian, Mexican and Black families seemed racial or inherent in family stocks. Historian Alexandra Minna Stern argues his conclusions supported segregation of Mexican Americans in California, and Stephen Jay Gould criticised his scoring for rewarding cultural knowledge. The gifted sample rested on teacher nominations. Palo Alto renamed Terman Middle School in 2018.
In your introductory course
Thinking, language and intelligence.He appears in intelligence chapters for the Stanford-Binet and IQ, and in discussions of how testing has been misused.
Related course reading: Psychology 2e, section 7.5. This is course context rather than a biographical source.
Years of active work
- 1916
He published the Stanford revision of the Binet-Simon test.
- 1921
He began the long-term study of gifted children.
- 1922
He became chairman of Stanford's psychology department, a post he held to 1945.
- 1923
He served as president of the American Psychological Association.
Sources
- Arizona State University Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Lewis Madison Terman (1877 to 1956)University. Reference article inspected.
- Wikipedia, Lewis TermanReference work. Reference article inspected.