AP Psychology — intelligence and achievement

Intelligence closes Unit 2 of AP Psychology, and the course framework treats it as a topic about measurement and its limits as much as about the mind. You are expected to know the competing views of what intelligence is, how it has been measured, what makes any psychological test sound, and how test scores have been interpreted, and misused, in the world outside the lab.

This material covers that ground. It starts with the long-running debate over whether intelligence is one general ability, called g, or a set of multiple abilities. It then works through measurement: the historical intelligence quotient computed from mental age and chronological age, standardization, predictive and construct validity, and test-retest and split-half reliability. The questions on these points ask you to identify the concept at work in a short invented case, and one asks you to calculate a historical IQ.

The course framework also asks you to reason carefully about scores and society, and so does this material: the Flynn effect and the societal factors behind it; why scores vary more within groups than between them, and why a gap in averages says little about any individual; how poverty, discrimination and unequal education can depress scores; stereotype threat and stereotype lift; and the historical use of scores to limit access to jobs, military ranks, education and immigration to the United States. It closes with achievement and aptitude tests, fixed and growth mindsets, and the difference between crystallized intelligence, which stays relatively stable through adulthood, and fluid intelligence, which tends to wane.

The questions handle group differences with the same care the framework asks for: each describes invented data and asks what can and cannot be concluded from it.

Four formats are offered. The quiz has twelve questions with explanations that name the neighboring concept each wrong option represents. The flashcards cover the testing vocabulary. The oral exam starts with the rise in test scores over the twentieth century and continues one question at a time through measurement, bias and mindsets, ending with brief feedback. The written work is a printable sheet of eight open questions, from computing and criticizing a ratio IQ to explaining why a test can be reliable without being valid.

The material is based on the published AP Psychology course framework, Unit 2, topic 2.8, with the part of topic 3.4 on fluid and crystallized intelligence. The framework's exclusion of labels for cognitive abilities and disabilities is respected.

• Describe the debate between general intelligence (g) and multiple abilities
• Calculate a historical ratio IQ and explain standardization, validity and reliability
• Explain the Flynn effect and why scores vary more within groups than between them
• Explain stereotype threat, stereotype lift and the historical misuse of intelligence scores
• Distinguish achievement from aptitude tests, fixed from growth mindsets, and fluid from crystallized intelligence

Practice material written by Zestly, based on the College Board AP Psychology Course and Exam Description (effective fall 2024, with the October 2025 clarifications), Unit 2, topic 2.8 Intelligence and Achievement, and Unit 3, topic 3.4 (fluid and crystallized intelligence). All cases and data sets are invented.