“Abnormally Intelligent” Pupils
SOME STUDIES ON SO-CALLED “ABNORMALLY INTELLIGENT” PUPILS.1
On “Abnormally Intelligent” Pupils.
- Author:
Yasusaburo Sasaki,
Imperial Education Department, and Professor of Psychiatry at the Imperial University, Tokyo, Japan
By “abnormally intelligent” pupils, those pupils are meant who are distinctly in advance of the rest of their class, as regards both mentality and personal characteristics. They are above the average and must therefore be regarded as abnormal children. In using this term we do not wish to imply that the children are necessarily pathological. Some of these abnormally advanced children maintain their high level throughout development, but others drop down to the average, or even below it, later on. The causes of this advanced mentality differ greatly and may be classified as follows:
Group I. The actual genius, gifted with an innate and early matured intelligence of a high order, this superiority being stable throughout life.
Group II. Children of a less abnormal intelligence, but gifted with a good memory and the power of concentration; indus- trious and persevering by nature; healthy in body and not easily fatigued. This may be taken to be the true abnormally intelligent type.
Group III. Children who correspond to Group II in all respects but bodily health. In this respect they more nearly resemble the “nervous” type of child.
Group IV. Children whose intelligence is in no degree above the normal standard, but who are stimulated to mental exertion by environmental influences. Group V. Children of the “precocious” type. Group VI. So-called “nervous” children. These are easily stimulated by the spirit of competition and are readily intimidated by teachers or parents, being very sensitive to adverse criticism. This group is usually pathological, and the children generally have a “nervous” family history. They are frequently weak and anaemic. 1 Translated from Int. Archiv fur Schulhygiene, by William A. Stecher, Director of Physical Education, Philadelphia, Pa.
Group VII. Children who are not well-balanced mentally and psychically. They sometimes show moral deficiency combined with a high degree of mental intelligence. This classification is quite arbitrary, but it has often struck me that the study of pedagogy has never taken sufficient count of this large class of hyper-intelligent children, while the literature dealing with defective children is so ample as almost to be exhaustive.
Considering now in detail the above seven groups, we will first refer to the “young genius”. It is very difficult to define a genius, but we may say that the famous geniuses of the world’s history are, as a rule, individuals who have accomplished some original and inventive work. The claims of genius are, however, nQt recognized before manhood is attained, and sometimes not during life at all, so that one may not rightly call any child a genius. Many geniuses have not been conspicuous for unusual gifts during childhood, for example, :persons: Newton, Helmholtz, and many others; but other great men have shown unusual gifts at an early age, including Mozart and Raphael. Some very promising children, however, do not carry out their early promise of great mental gifts. Some geniuses, again, have some extraordinary gifts and faculties for which the age in which they live has apparently no use, and they are therefore unappreciated by society.
There seems to be some very intimate connection between genius and mental disease. According to Lowenfeld, geniuses come within two categories, the true genius and the pathological genius. Those in the former are healthy and their gifts may be termed “heaven-sent,” as for instance, Washington, Confucius, Titian and Rubens. But the second order of genius is the more common and many examples could be quoted, Rousseau, De Quincey, who was an opium-eater, and Nietzsche, who died of mental disease. Napoleon, Mirabeau, Alexander the Great, Csesar and St. Paul were all said to have been epileptics, and Goethe and Shakespeare to have suffered from some form of mental disease. Hereditary insanity and mental degeneracy can frequently be discovered in the family histories of geniuses. They themselves may escape any taint of this order, but their descendants are not always equally fortunate.
It would be superfluous to suggest any special method of education for prospective geniuses, as they are difficult to differentiate at an early stage of growth, and their number must Necessarily be very limited. Precocious childen have certain points in common with geniuses during childhood, indeed many geniuses have been precocious children. On the other hand, many precocious children fall back as they grow older and some become nervous or psychopathic during adolescence, while at best few of them maintain a place above the average.
Precocity may be either inborn or acquired, general or specialized. Inborn precocity is generally due to hereditary influences. Such subjects are frequently descended from families displaying nervous instability. Subjects showing acquired precocity vary according to environmental influences. Where the influences are harmful the effects of such precocity are very difficult to eradicate, particularly when it takes the form of sexual precocity. The term specialized precocity we apply to children of the “Wunder-kinder” type?musical infant prodigies, marvelous budding poets and painters, etc. Such children frequently run themselves out during childhood and sink back into mediocrity on attaining maturity. It is not infrequent to find cases of early suicide among this class. They are mostly of a melancholy, introspective and unsociable type. If mental disease attacks them it generally takes the form of dementia praecox with its manifold range of symptoms. Others suffer from a high degree of neurasthenia or hysteria. All the above groups of abnormally intelligent children except Group II and Group IV show more or less strong hereditary influences, the most pronounced being the “nervous” children. Strictly speaking, it is only the second group which may be regarded as absolutely free from nervous instability. It is therefore of great importance that all abnormally intelligent children should receive as careful attention and be as closely studied as mentally deficient ones.
The question arises whether all the children, normal and abnormal, should be educated together, or whether each class should be educated separately. But the abnormally intelligent children differ among themselves so greatly in type that to educate them all together by one special method would be highly inappropriate. The most critical cases from a pathological point of view are the precocious children, and they likewise constitute a danger to their normal classmates, who may be drawn to imitate them and to expend undue mental power on hopeless tasks. Among the nervous children are often to be found hysterical subjects and children suffering from constitutional debility calling for curative measures. Moral perverts should be weeded out and sent to suitable institutions. Those children who respond to external stimulation may safely consort with the normal pupils, while those belonging to Group II are likely to have a very good influence on the rest of the class and contribute to raise its standard of mental attainment.
B. Some Results of Experimental Research Dealing with the So-called Abnormally Intelligent Pupils. By Y. Sasaki, Professor of Psychiatry at the Imperial University, Tokyo, Japan, and T. Tomono, Teacher at the Fukuolca Normal School.
For purposes of research 79 pupils showing a quality of intelligence and deportment markedly above the average class level were selected out of 332 pupils who were distributed in 7 classes, (the entrants being excluded as unsuitable for experimental purposes). In conjunction with the teachers a very careful selection was made, special attention being paid to the individual data and domiciliary conditions.
The following pupils were the selected subjects: High School 2nd year 7 girls 1st ” 6 ” Elementary School 5th & 6th years 13 boys 4th year 14 girls 4th ” 13 pupils 3rd ” 16 ” 2nd ” 10 “
The tests applied were as follows: 1. Memory test 2. Test of synthetical power 3. Pilling in blanks 4. Addition method 5. Proof-correcting 6. Observation
Further information secured was as follows: Pupil’s Schedule. Address: Class: Age: Domiciliary data: Parents: if living, age and occupation: if dead, cause of death: Character and relation with pupil: 22 THE PSYCHOLOGICAL CLINIC. Bodily and mental condition: Alcoholic: Brothers and sisters: Bodily and mental condition: Social status: Other members, grandparents, etc.: Servants: Locality of home and character of neighborhood: Physical development: Age at closure of fontanelle: Age when teeth appeared: Age when speech began: Age when walking began: Amount and nature of sleep: State of nutrition: Physical examination: date: Height: Weight: Chest measurement, ordinary: deep inspiration: forcible expiration: Muscular development: Spine: Eyes: Ears: Teeth: Past diseases or injuries, date, duration, effect, etc.: Temperament:
Conclusions: ———–Our experiments have convinced us that so-called abnormally intelligent pupils vary considerably in degrees of attainment and development, and that their training urgently calls for distinctive treatment on the part of the teaching body. It is only by careful examination that the children can be correctly diagnosed and classified:
Treatment: ——–Our researches have led us to the conclusion that each group requires different handling, and that the appropriate method can be arrived at only after intimate knowledge of the typical characteristics of each class. We have found the following qualities to be fairly typical of each respective group:? Group II. The children are remarkable for their sound mental development, their good physique, and their low degree of fatigue. They possess aptitude for learning, keen intuitions and good memories. They delight in active games and are of a bright temperament. They are often favorites with their classmates and loved and respected by their teachers. Unfortunately, too much success of an easy kind sometimes acts deleteriously and they become arrogant and easily contented with the results of their efforts. This is partly the outcome of the pernicious system of class teaching, which makes it difficult for teachers to individualize the characters and aptitudes of their pupils. Present-day textbooks also leave much to be desired as they presuppose a rigid standard of attainment for all the children in one class. Another type of child in this group is less lovable. He is apt to be aggressive and to take nothing on trust. He adopts a critical and unbending attitude towards his masters and teachers and a repellent and unsociable one towards his classmates. This type of child is exceedingly difficult to manage, and the excellent material that is in him will have no chance of developing in the hands of a weak or irritable teacher. It means everything to such a pupil that the teacher should succeed in gaining his respect and confidence, and in establishing friendly personal relations with him.
Group III. These are children who have better mental than physical development. Such children require judicious handling both from parents and teachers owing to the want of harmony in their development.
They have an active mental capacity and are often ambitious and keenly interested in their studies. Their physical disability is therefore apt to prey on their minds, entailing in many cases serious, if not fatal, consequences. They should not be overstimulated and over-driven or spurred on to increased exertions by unheeding teachers, but rather retarded in their studies while everything should be done to improve their general health. They are often anaemic and undersized and languid in their movements. They are generally gentle of disposition and popular with their teachers and their classmates.
Group IV. These children are essentially normal children, but re-act to urging and stimulating on the part of parents and teachers. They cannot, however, long maintain the higher level due to the stimulus applied. It is a very grave mistake to adopt forcing methods of education for such children, as such methods are likely to be productive of morbid results both to body and mind. Unfortunately, this mistake is very often committed both by parents and teachers who little realize the harm they are doing. Group V. These are the precocious children. The precocity may be either innate or the result of environment. It may be general or directed into some special channel. It appears to us that precocity in the majority of cases is the result of early social environment. Generally speaking, precocious children have their reasoning faculty and their will prematurely developed. They are advanced in action, speech and thought and are not childlike in manner. Frequently, the cause lies in early association with adults and in the lack of playfellows of their own age. Precocity is to be deplored and by no means to be fostered. Unfortunately there is a tendency to encourage it, both in the home and in the school. Such children are often brought into prominent notice and shown off with pride to neighbors and acquaintances as miniature men and women. The contrast between the child who enters the school straight from home and the child who comes to the school from the kindergarten is often very marked. When precocity is discovered every effort should be made to counteract it, particularly when the children approach the age of puberty.
Group VI. This group includes, in addition to the pathologically “nervous” child, the constitutionally timid child, and those of wild and daring temperaments. All these exhibit a strain of mental disease, either inborn or acquired. With such children environmental conditions are of profound importance, and no class stands in greater need of discriminative handling and teaching if their degree of morbidness is to be diminished instead of augmented.
Group VII. Children with unequal mental and physical development are often well-developed from the purely scholastic point of view but are deficient in feeling and in will. They are often of a cruel, heartless disposition, quarrelsome and tricky. They have been known to steal for the love of stealing, and, though not deliberately wicked, to commit sins on the impulse of the moment, regretting the action immediately but employing falsehood in order to escape unpleasant consequences. Such children should be very carefully and gently dealt with, but it is not wise to allow them to associate with other children, to whom their example may be a source of danger.
From all the foregoing it would appear that urgent necessity exists for the study of the characters and mental qualities of the individual children comprising a school class. It is only by individualization that the best in each child can be brought out, the evil tendencies repressed, and the weaknesses counteracted; and to do the best for each individual child, taking all factors into consideration, is the aim of all true education. Summary:
While much has been written about the physically defective and the mentally deficient school child, the abnormally intelligent child has had little attention devoted to his special education. I have endeavored to arrive at some trustworthy data as to the causes and varieties of abnormal intelligence in children and to draw from these data some conclusions as to the treatment appropriate to each type. With this purpose in view, I examined all the children in the large normal school at Fukuoka in Japan, in which work I was assisted by Mr. Tomoziro Tomono, who is attached to the school in question. All the children showing an advanced degree of intelligence were set apart for special investigation. We found their number to be 79 out of 332. These selected children were classified according to definite types into seven groups and were made the subjects of a series of tests for mental capacity, and the results were tabulated. The normal children were also tested in the same manner and the results compared with those derived from the abnormal children. We found that only one class of abnormally intelligent children was perfectly free from any pathological taint, and that these were the only children who possessed stability of nerve-power and who exhibited a uniformly progressive mental and physical development. These we have called the true cases of abnormal intelligence, the others being children of the “nervous” type, precocious children, children mentally advanced but deficient in physique, children who can be spurred to mental attainments above the average through external stimulation, but who are not able to maintain this level for any length of time, and, finally children with remarkably good mental capacity who are lacking in feeling and in will. Our experiments and their results served to convince us that there is urgent need for reform in the present system of class-making, for this system renders it difficult to differentiate individual children and consequently those who stand most in need of judicious and expert handling are neither recognized as such nor likely to receive the training and education adapted to their special requirements.
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