Consider this situation: you have rescued a feral child from the wilderness, whom you name Tarzan. He appears to be in good health, but he speaks no language. How might Tarzan's intelligence be assessed? What aspects of IQ testing will be useful, and which will be useless?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Tarzan's lack of language is a major complication for his IQ testing, because most IQ tests for children of his age are heavily verbal in emphasis. Group tests, which require multiple-choice answers on paper, are entirely inappropriate. The Stanford-Binet test, given individually, is also based on language for its instructions and some of its exercises. The culture-fair tests, which minimize language and that contain content that is unfamiliar to all, would be feasible. Testing should be delayed for some months so that Tarzan's behaviors and preferences can be assessed. Interest in testing could be aroused by rewarding him for good effort. Sternberg's notion of practical intelligence could be a theoretical starting point; Tarzan's survival in the wild suggests that his practical intelligence may be well developed. Gardner's naturalist intelligence is probably impressive, because Tarzan has survived for years on edible materials found in the wild. Observations of Tarzan's adaptive self-help skills may be useful, as they are with intellectual assessments of severely and profoundly retarded individuals.