I've heard that Albanian/Bosniak IQ is low because of brain drain, just a long while ago and for a long period of time. This is also why Irish/Scottish IQ is a bit lower than English IQ (used to be? Or was this always just a product of bad studies?). Albanians basically became the administrative elites of the Ottoman Empire and a huge amount of the intelligent and capable ones were sent to Anatolia or the Middle East. I'm pretty sure Albanians are still high-status in former Ottoman areas today. Muslim effect (let's be honest -- polygamy) can definitely not explain the severity of this
'Nordic' (largely northwest) mental age is 13.8% higher than that of the 'Alpine' (central to east) mental age—the 'Nordic' mental age is 16.2% higher than that of the Mediterranean. In general Northern Europe is as much as 21% higher than Southern Europe, and Western Europe as much as 23% higher than Eeastern Europe, regarding mental age. This is according to results in Carl Brigham's study of American Intelligence, 1923.
According to your estimations of IQ, Northern Europe appears to be at least 6% higher than Southern Europe.
In 'Comparison of cognitive and physical functioning of Europeans in 2004-05 and 2013', Northern European cognitive function is 19.6% higher than that of Southern Europe. The same study finds Northern European grip strength to be 13.8% higher than Southern European grip strength; https://akarlin.com/strength/ A. Karlin collected data illustrating a great gap in strength between North and South.
Lactose intolerance is 37-56% higher in Southern Europe than Northern Europe. Eastern Europe is 32-51% more lactose intolerant than Western Europe, studies like from the Lancet compilation show this. In most cases it can be found that chronic conditions are more common in Eastern Euros than Western Euros as well.
Overall the divide has been consistent for quite a while and is evidently largely constitutional, while brain drain and dysgenics reinforce the differences.
Any IQ study from 1923 will almost certainly be invalid by now. For one, these studies will obviously not take into account the Flynn effect that has since occurred. Also, we have current academic scores, and the differences are either much smaller than that or basically non-existent. For some groups like Northern Italians, Poles, Czechs and Slovenes, their scores are mostly in line with NW Europeans scores, for other groups such as Balts and Spaniards the difference with NW Europeans appears to be small and decreasing, and Finns and Estonians tend to score slightly higher than NW Europeans.
The 1923 study is not invalid as the third paragraph, a study between 2000-2015, shows Southern European cognitive function is 19.6% lower than Northern European cognitive function. This verifies a clear and wide gap in the mind. As for current academic scores: the UK, Germany, France, Netherlands and Ireland are 20-40% foreign, foreigners from overwhelmingly less intelligent countries who then skew the overall performance of the host. On Finns and Estonians, Finno-Ugrics in general, they have great academic performance but very little historical and current accomplishment comparatively (difference in character and content of strengths).
Good article. Just something to consider: Italy has an extreme North-South divide in IQ (from above 100 in Veneto and Friuli to 85 in the South). Some can be attributed to brain drain, but most (from our perspective) is due to levantine admixture in the south dating back to imperial Rome, or even the Neolithic according to some studies.
The hypothesis about the influence of mixing with the Moors is not confirmed if we look at the genetics of the affected peoples. Foreigners left a minor mark on the genetics of Iberia/Balkans (in the most polluted places, such as island Greece 5% or so)
I think southern Europeans simply had less severe selection for intelligence at one time. This can be seen even within the same ethnic group. If we look at Russians, there is an obvious difference in intelligence depending on latitude. If not for the greater brain drain, Ukraine would be roughly on par with the southern regions of Russia, populated by ethnic Russians.
Having briefly lived in Hungary (wonderful country), I can't help but laugh thinking of how happy they would be to throw this map in the faces of Slovaks and Romanians.
Humm. Interesting analysis. What are we (USA) experiencing in national IQ decline wrt our millions upon millions of new residents curtesy of illegal immigration? This influx is rarely seen to be of high caliber, but rather, in the main, of the poorest of the poor fleeing from their countries of origin. Higher (somewhat) quality immigrants enter legally and that number is about 1.5M in and of itself. Can a 1st world country add 1-2% immigrants *yearly* from the 3rd world and remain a 1st world country—assuming Lynn is correct wrt IQ and national wealth and progress?
Romanian IQ *is* explicable with reference to intermixture. Since end of communism there has been hugely accelerated intermarriage with Gypsies (I've no stats). This and the high Gypsy birthrate probably explains dysgenic fertility too.
Surrounding countries like Hungary also have significant gypsy populations and presumably differential birth rates and intermarriage brought about by post-communist integration.
Yes Hungary has (maybe; hard to know for sure) a similar per capita Gypsy population and its birthrate is high. But intermarriage prevalence doesn't necessarily have anything to do with size or fertility of Gypsy population. Hungarians are statistically more 'racist' than Romanians, which would tend to inhibit intermarriage.
"Hungarians are statistically more 'racist' than Romanians" -- How did you come to this conclusion?
Intermarriage or lack thereof doesn't explain the supposed IQ gap. If anything more intermarriage brings the birth rate closer to RO levels among mixed couples which would slow the overall cognitive decline.
I saw a map somewhere with negative ratings of dark faces or similar. I can't find it now. Italy was peak, Hungary somewhere between Italy and Romania, Serbia near the bottom...
I'm afraid I don't follow the remainder. I'm saying introgression of Gypsy genes due to intermarriage in Romania, as well as high 'pureblood' Gypsy fertility, are possible causes of dysgenic fertility.
Emigration to the west of huge number of professionals is probably important too.
I live in Ukraine and know many Russians. The Ukrainians were considered the brainier of the two peoples when they were united in the Soviet Union. Read Homo Sovieticus.
Last I looked, Lynn/Vanhanen and David Becker based their assessment of Ukrainian IQ on only about two tests administered a couple of decades ago. Unless you can convince yourself that the figures you see are reliable, I would suggest that you go back to your original premise. The eastern Slavic peoples - Poles, Belarussians, Ukrainians, Russians and Baltics - don't vary all that much.
PISA and TIMMS measure attainment, not intelligence. Mathematical performance is a pretty good proxy for intelligence (viz, SATs, ACTs), but a proxy nonetheless. Last TIMMS I see is 2019. PISA was affected by the war.
Still and all, probably not bad proxies. Achievement is of course reflective of what the students were taught. I'm impressed with what my kids are getting, but at the same time have to acknowledge that their schools are not typical.
My son is entering the 8th grade. It will be interesting to see if his school gives the PISA test. Also how it will be interpreted. The standard is 15-year-olds. He will turn 13 in the 8th grade.
Unfortunately true. Those with the best preparation headed west. Upside is that they see the corruption in the west, the bad schools and the indoctrination. The flow has reversed - some are coming back.
This is a fairytale. Ukraine will be a terrible place, regardless of the outcome of the war. Even when the war ends, the risk of war will remain (and if Russia completely occupies it - guerrilla war). No constructive reforms can be expected, and Ukrainians generally no longer expect them. Many people are tired of insecurity, hate their government and feel like they are treating them like cannon fodder. Even if the economy grows at the rate of China's best years (which it won't), Ukraine will take too long to catch up even with its neighbors such as Poland or even Romania.
The Ukrainian government, like the Russian government, will solve the problem of demography by importing foreigners. Who will go to Ukraine? Obviously, it won't be the French. And not even Vietnamese.
This is enough to say that no significant voluntary remigration of talented Ukrainians can be expected.
My 7th grade son is in Russanovsky Lycee, one of the better schools in Kyiv. FWIW he is studying geometry, algebra and physics. Subjects I didn't get until I attended El Cerrito High School alongside many kids from the UC Berkeley faculty. It strikes me he is getting the real stuff - not watered down.
In my 17 years here I have never heard mention of kids taking standardized intelligence tests. If his school participates in PISA/TIMSS, I have not heard about that either. They have their own competitions. As an example, I graduated ΦΒΚ in math from Berkeley decades back and had a hard time with the problems they gave us in a parent vs. student math battle.
My caution would be not to assume the comparability of different systems. Consider other factors as well. Not for nothing is Ukraine a burgeoning center for outsourced programming services.
There is a disproportionate number of well-performing Jews coming from Ukraine (see their inventors list), much like Germans and Scandinavians dominate the list of the Baltics, Poland, and Russia). Could be a factor.
The Jewish population of modern Ukraine is quite small, one percent or so. Hard to count, and there is a lot of mixed blood. True that a number of American inventors and entrepreneurs emigrated from Ukraine and Belarus, beyond the pale of settlement. Sarnoff, Louis B Mayer...
>The Ukrainians were considered the brainier of the two peoples
Considered by whom? By Ukrainians themselves, I assume. In Russia the general notion that goes back at the very least to the 18th century is that Ukranians are pretty much the least intelligent people around, at least among the European population of the Russian Empire/Soviet Union. There are literally countless jokes, funny stories, TV shows and skits on that matter.
I've heard that Albanian/Bosniak IQ is low because of brain drain, just a long while ago and for a long period of time. This is also why Irish/Scottish IQ is a bit lower than English IQ (used to be? Or was this always just a product of bad studies?). Albanians basically became the administrative elites of the Ottoman Empire and a huge amount of the intelligent and capable ones were sent to Anatolia or the Middle East. I'm pretty sure Albanians are still high-status in former Ottoman areas today. Muslim effect (let's be honest -- polygamy) can definitely not explain the severity of this
there’s a big bosniak diaspora in the middle east actually, and many of them are quite prominent (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushnak)
'Nordic' (largely northwest) mental age is 13.8% higher than that of the 'Alpine' (central to east) mental age—the 'Nordic' mental age is 16.2% higher than that of the Mediterranean. In general Northern Europe is as much as 21% higher than Southern Europe, and Western Europe as much as 23% higher than Eeastern Europe, regarding mental age. This is according to results in Carl Brigham's study of American Intelligence, 1923.
According to your estimations of IQ, Northern Europe appears to be at least 6% higher than Southern Europe.
In 'Comparison of cognitive and physical functioning of Europeans in 2004-05 and 2013', Northern European cognitive function is 19.6% higher than that of Southern Europe. The same study finds Northern European grip strength to be 13.8% higher than Southern European grip strength; https://akarlin.com/strength/ A. Karlin collected data illustrating a great gap in strength between North and South.
Lactose intolerance is 37-56% higher in Southern Europe than Northern Europe. Eastern Europe is 32-51% more lactose intolerant than Western Europe, studies like from the Lancet compilation show this. In most cases it can be found that chronic conditions are more common in Eastern Euros than Western Euros as well.
Overall the divide has been consistent for quite a while and is evidently largely constitutional, while brain drain and dysgenics reinforce the differences.
Any IQ study from 1923 will almost certainly be invalid by now. For one, these studies will obviously not take into account the Flynn effect that has since occurred. Also, we have current academic scores, and the differences are either much smaller than that or basically non-existent. For some groups like Northern Italians, Poles, Czechs and Slovenes, their scores are mostly in line with NW Europeans scores, for other groups such as Balts and Spaniards the difference with NW Europeans appears to be small and decreasing, and Finns and Estonians tend to score slightly higher than NW Europeans.
The 1923 study is not invalid as the third paragraph, a study between 2000-2015, shows Southern European cognitive function is 19.6% lower than Northern European cognitive function. This verifies a clear and wide gap in the mind. As for current academic scores: the UK, Germany, France, Netherlands and Ireland are 20-40% foreign, foreigners from overwhelmingly less intelligent countries who then skew the overall performance of the host. On Finns and Estonians, Finno-Ugrics in general, they have great academic performance but very little historical and current accomplishment comparatively (difference in character and content of strengths).
Good article. Just something to consider: Italy has an extreme North-South divide in IQ (from above 100 in Veneto and Friuli to 85 in the South). Some can be attributed to brain drain, but most (from our perspective) is due to levantine admixture in the south dating back to imperial Rome, or even the Neolithic according to some studies.
The hypothesis about the influence of mixing with the Moors is not confirmed if we look at the genetics of the affected peoples. Foreigners left a minor mark on the genetics of Iberia/Balkans (in the most polluted places, such as island Greece 5% or so)
I think southern Europeans simply had less severe selection for intelligence at one time. This can be seen even within the same ethnic group. If we look at Russians, there is an obvious difference in intelligence depending on latitude. If not for the greater brain drain, Ukraine would be roughly on par with the southern regions of Russia, populated by ethnic Russians.
Having briefly lived in Hungary (wonderful country), I can't help but laugh thinking of how happy they would be to throw this map in the faces of Slovaks and Romanians.
Humm. Interesting analysis. What are we (USA) experiencing in national IQ decline wrt our millions upon millions of new residents curtesy of illegal immigration? This influx is rarely seen to be of high caliber, but rather, in the main, of the poorest of the poor fleeing from their countries of origin. Higher (somewhat) quality immigrants enter legally and that number is about 1.5M in and of itself. Can a 1st world country add 1-2% immigrants *yearly* from the 3rd world and remain a 1st world country—assuming Lynn is correct wrt IQ and national wealth and progress?
Romanian IQ *is* explicable with reference to intermixture. Since end of communism there has been hugely accelerated intermarriage with Gypsies (I've no stats). This and the high Gypsy birthrate probably explains dysgenic fertility too.
Surrounding countries like Hungary also have significant gypsy populations and presumably differential birth rates and intermarriage brought about by post-communist integration.
Yes Hungary has (maybe; hard to know for sure) a similar per capita Gypsy population and its birthrate is high. But intermarriage prevalence doesn't necessarily have anything to do with size or fertility of Gypsy population. Hungarians are statistically more 'racist' than Romanians, which would tend to inhibit intermarriage.
"Hungarians are statistically more 'racist' than Romanians" -- How did you come to this conclusion?
Intermarriage or lack thereof doesn't explain the supposed IQ gap. If anything more intermarriage brings the birth rate closer to RO levels among mixed couples which would slow the overall cognitive decline.
It's not merely supposed...
I saw a map somewhere with negative ratings of dark faces or similar. I can't find it now. Italy was peak, Hungary somewhere between Italy and Romania, Serbia near the bottom...
I'm afraid I don't follow the remainder. I'm saying introgression of Gypsy genes due to intermarriage in Romania, as well as high 'pureblood' Gypsy fertility, are possible causes of dysgenic fertility.
Emigration to the west of huge number of professionals is probably important too.
I live in Ukraine and know many Russians. The Ukrainians were considered the brainier of the two peoples when they were united in the Soviet Union. Read Homo Sovieticus.
http://www.grahamseibert.com/Reviews/Russia-Ukraine/Homo%20Sovieticus.pdf
Last I looked, Lynn/Vanhanen and David Becker based their assessment of Ukrainian IQ on only about two tests administered a couple of decades ago. Unless you can convince yourself that the figures you see are reliable, I would suggest that you go back to your original premise. The eastern Slavic peoples - Poles, Belarussians, Ukrainians, Russians and Baltics - don't vary all that much.
These figures are based on PISA/TIMSS performance as well.
Interesting that Ukrainians have been historically considered more intelligent nonwithstanding.
PISA and TIMMS measure attainment, not intelligence. Mathematical performance is a pretty good proxy for intelligence (viz, SATs, ACTs), but a proxy nonetheless. Last TIMMS I see is 2019. PISA was affected by the war.
Still and all, probably not bad proxies. Achievement is of course reflective of what the students were taught. I'm impressed with what my kids are getting, but at the same time have to acknowledge that their schools are not typical.
My son is entering the 8th grade. It will be interesting to see if his school gives the PISA test. Also how it will be interpreted. The standard is 15-year-olds. He will turn 13 in the 8th grade.
Ukrainians may still benefit from a Flynn effect, although the harm from brain drain may be much greater.
Unfortunately true. Those with the best preparation headed west. Upside is that they see the corruption in the west, the bad schools and the indoctrination. The flow has reversed - some are coming back.
This is a fairytale. Ukraine will be a terrible place, regardless of the outcome of the war. Even when the war ends, the risk of war will remain (and if Russia completely occupies it - guerrilla war). No constructive reforms can be expected, and Ukrainians generally no longer expect them. Many people are tired of insecurity, hate their government and feel like they are treating them like cannon fodder. Even if the economy grows at the rate of China's best years (which it won't), Ukraine will take too long to catch up even with its neighbors such as Poland or even Romania.
The Ukrainian government, like the Russian government, will solve the problem of demography by importing foreigners. Who will go to Ukraine? Obviously, it won't be the French. And not even Vietnamese.
This is enough to say that no significant voluntary remigration of talented Ukrainians can be expected.
That's terribly depressing.
My 7th grade son is in Russanovsky Lycee, one of the better schools in Kyiv. FWIW he is studying geometry, algebra and physics. Subjects I didn't get until I attended El Cerrito High School alongside many kids from the UC Berkeley faculty. It strikes me he is getting the real stuff - not watered down.
In my 17 years here I have never heard mention of kids taking standardized intelligence tests. If his school participates in PISA/TIMSS, I have not heard about that either. They have their own competitions. As an example, I graduated ΦΒΚ in math from Berkeley decades back and had a hard time with the problems they gave us in a parent vs. student math battle.
My caution would be not to assume the comparability of different systems. Consider other factors as well. Not for nothing is Ukraine a burgeoning center for outsourced programming services.
There is a disproportionate number of well-performing Jews coming from Ukraine (see their inventors list), much like Germans and Scandinavians dominate the list of the Baltics, Poland, and Russia). Could be a factor.
The Jewish population of modern Ukraine is quite small, one percent or so. Hard to count, and there is a lot of mixed blood. True that a number of American inventors and entrepreneurs emigrated from Ukraine and Belarus, beyond the pale of settlement. Sarnoff, Louis B Mayer...
>The Ukrainians were considered the brainier of the two peoples
Considered by whom? By Ukrainians themselves, I assume. In Russia the general notion that goes back at the very least to the 18th century is that Ukranians are pretty much the least intelligent people around, at least among the European population of the Russian Empire/Soviet Union. There are literally countless jokes, funny stories, TV shows and skits on that matter.
Question about the Muslim effect: Would this mostly be due to the dysgenic impact of cousin marriage?