It is obvious that some people are more successful in different intellectual domains than others. Gardner's Multiple Intelligences suggests eight different domains of intellectual skill people can identify with. The domains consist of the following, in which people can score any level in all categories: linguistic, logico-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal and naturalistic. Although his model is impossible to falsify, this idea is important because it serves as a good starting point in which scientists can begin distinguishing what qualifies as an "intelligence" versus a talent. However, it is possible that talents and intelligence are actually the same, when intelligence is defined among Gardner's approach. It is impossible to say Einstein had a talent in math yet didn't identify with that intelligence. A causation approach seems to be inapplicable because research points towards intelligence being considerably stable, while talents can be improved... yet those talents remain in the same realm as its partnering intelligence. This article talks about how there is a controversy on the misuse of his idea into new teaching methods. However, who said that just because someone is intelligent in music means that they will all of a sudden learn geography classes significantly better based on singing the information? They would simply just excel in the musical part of tasks, further concluding their continued talent/intelligence. As suggested in the text, I prefer to conclude I have an intelligence in humor, but one could beg to differ. Overall, I now wonder if someones IQ could actually be the degree in which every arguable intelligence is taken into consideration, then somehow calculated. The WAIS test seems to imply there are different areas of intelligence, so why not add them all...? Oh, how psychology is incredibly ambiguous.
Multiple Intelligences: possibly interchangeable with talent?
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