This article is garbage but it does get into a big debate in intelligence research. The IQ drop measured so far is small, but that there's an IQ drop at all is notable — IQ has been rising for as long as we've been measuring it.
Within psychology, over the few years there has been a debate whether the Flynn Effect (Wikipedia) has ended or even reversed. The Flynn Effect is the gradually but consistent increase in IQs over the 20th century. IQ is designed so that 100 is the mean of the population. As IQ scores have risen because of the Flynn Effect, they have been continually "re-normed" so that 100 is still in the middle. Over the 20th century, this is often a 10-20 IQ point increase on average, which is giant.
The general assumption is that IQ scores increased for a century because we live in a world that increasingly trains us better on the kind of skills that are tested on IQ tests. Think about the differences between farming, working in a factory, and office work. Additionally, formal education exploded during the 20th century, which not only increased skills like math and reading, but also familiarized and acclimatized people to tests similar to intelligence tests. Lastly, there were environmental biological reasons, mainly children (especially poor children) are getting much nutrition.
Since as early as 2004, there has been some debate about whether the Flynn Effect has stopped. These early article were all from Scandinavia: Sundet, Barlaug & Torjussen (2004) "The end of the Flynn effect?: A study of secular trends in mean intelligence test scores of Norwegian conscripts during half a century" about Norway obviously; Teasdale & Owen (2005) "A long-term rise and recent decline in intelligence test performance: The Flynn Effect in reverse" and Teasdale & Owen (2008) "Secular declines in cognitive test scores: A reversal of the Flynn Effect" about Denmark. These was some debate whether this was composition changes (basically, immigrants with lower IQ, quite possibly because they come from contexts where they didn't have the environmental like increased formal education that led to the Flynn Effect), but I think the authors of these studies all argued against compositional changes.
This started getting more attention in 2018, with Bratsberg & Rogeberg (2018) "Flynn effect and its reversal are both environmentally caused" published in PNAS which one of the bigger general scientific journals, especially for social sciences like psychology (which rarely get published in Nature or Science). This again uses Scandinavian data, but one thing they do is compare within families (matching fathers and sons; brothers and brothers) so that you cannot possibly argue this is a compositional change, or a genetic change. This got some popular press coverage. Here's a Time article from 2018: "IQ Scores Are Falling Due to Environmental Factors, Study Finds". Environment here, however, largely means "well it wasn't compositional or genetic".
Another influential article from that same year, Flynn and Shayer (2018) "IQ decline and Piaget: Does the rot start at the top?", written by James Flynn, the guy who the Flynn Effect is named after. It emphasizes that we see very different patterns across countries. 1995 is when average intelligence scores peaked in Scandinavia, but 2014 is when that seems to happen in the U.S. and the Netherland seems to possibly still be gaining. They argue that in some of the data (like Scandinavia), it seems like there's a general shift where everyone on average moves down, but in a lot of the data there seems to be a decline driven largely by a decline primarily among top performers (they present a theory for this).
This research seems to be gaining more traction as researchers look to more data sets. I think 2023-2025 several other articles have come out finding basically the same thing, in more countries (though sometimes there are subtleties, like here's Northwestern University's press release write up of one 2023 study with the headline "Americans’ IQ scores are lower in some areas, higher in one"). These have been using other data, including a lot of American data. Scandinavian countries had mandatory military conscription so everyone enters the armed forces and takes the armed forces test. The U.S. doesn't have population level intelligence testing like that, so some of researchers just have to pool a bunch of on-representative tests together. I think the paper that started this latest round of debate was Dworak, Revelle, and Condon (2023) "Looking for Flynn effects in a recent online U.S. adult sample: Examining shifts within the SAPA Project". This found the largest decline was for people with lower levels of education, against the Flynn and Shayer (2018) article above.
So the big debate now is why. Bratsberg & Rogeberg (2018) piece argued that IQ stopped going up for those born after 1975, so it's not as if one can easily blame "these dang internets" when one looks cross-nationally. Of course, a lot of pundits will mainly focus on imperfect U.S. data, which does match the timeline of smartphones while the Scandinavian data does not. Some argue that the test is less relevant today for some parts of the test (words that were common knowledge 50 years ago are more specialized knowledge now). Some argue that "test-taking abilities" have gotten worse, or that the specific motivation of test takers have changed (people aren't trying as hard). Some argue, very relatedly, its due to changes in school. Some argue, particularly with the American data, that it is media environment which features less things like reading and more than things like scrolling mindlessly. Some argue its related to declining attention spans (which we have independent data about, but the earliest data is the weakest so its hard to argue exactly how much attention spans have declined and starting when). Some argue that it might toxins or diets or something more biological. Of course, it's almost always several things at once — and different factors could be more important in different countries and time periods.
I think the biggest recent science journalism article was "A Theory of Dumb" in New York Magazine, which put this issue on a lot of people's radars, including mine. Here's an ungated, non-paywalled version. This is meant to be provocative, rather than a careful synthesis of the science. If I remember correctly, it argues that we have more instant access to information which hurts memory, concentration, and related tasks. But it's been a while since I read this. This article felt as much cultural critique as science journalism.*
But this is a real area of study and debate right now. I think most intelligence researchers agree that the Flynn Effect is stopping, with probably most even agreeing that their are (small) intelligence declines in most countries. There doesn't seem to be agreement on why this is happening, or even who is being most affected — is it across the board declines, declines in top scorers, or declines in the least educated? "Further research is required".
if it’s becomes more efficient to not retain the information ourselves (as ? as that may be), then should iq tests be instead measuring one’s ability to phrase the question and use those mechanisms to access the answer?
I'd push back slightly against some of this. London cab drivers, for instance, have to pass an incredibly difficult exam requiring massive amounts of memorization, studies show they have enlarged hippocampi, which is involved in memory storage and retrieval. But I don't think there's clear evidence that our brains are genuinely worse off because information is more readily accessible now by itself (medieval monks complained that the youth was getting dumb because of the printing press and books). It seems more about how we relate to information and how we consume it.
Intelligence is largely, if not mostly, genetic (plus good education, good nutrition, and so on). So if scores are going down that most likely has an environmental cause, as the person before me pointed out.
I'd also add that different types of intelligence are all highly correlated with each other. If you score lower on working memory, that's probably going to affect other types of tasks because you use working memory in basically all of them. You don't generally expect someone to score really badly on long-term memory and then extremely well on spatial reasoning. When that happens, it can be a sign of something else going on. Maybe neurodivergence of some kind, or neurological issues.
So I think you'd expect the Flynn effect to stabilize at some point because line can't go up forever. But studies suggesting it's actually reversing is quite worrying. It seems like a lot of the technology nowadays reverses the careful environmental optimization we've been doing (remember that all the tech CEOs are not giving their children iPads and stuff because they know all of this).
You're using fairly old sources and missing some rather relevant recent research, such as this meta-analysis from 2022: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289623000314
Their results are pretty much what one would expect:
> The FE appears to be stronger for middle-income countries, where it is likely that more critical improvements have affected IQ test performance. The FE was overall more prominent in younger generation cohorts, where perhaps environmental influences may have the most impact on mental functioning.
This is a terrible article. No sourcing of any objective data or evaluations. The cited scientist is an alarmist who doesn't appear to be able to justify any of these claims beyond paraphrasing data, as seen here (https://katu.com/amnw/am-northwest-books-authors/the-digital-delusion-author-dr-jared-cooney-horvath), dubious sourcing (indian centric mainstream media).
While overconsumption of digital media presents real issues, this is just lazy.
You may feel differently if you lived in a populated part of the US. No study is needed, it is very apparent when dealing with Gen Z. Not all, but most
This is so funny. Anybody on this thread who just pointed and laughed without checking the veracity of the study is adorable. The previous generation must always shit on the capability of the future generations.
Edit: please just go google the E meme from 7 years ago, or RawrxD or any other nonsense meme. The obsession with 67 has nothing to do with a certain generation or intelligence. Let these kids adapt to a rapidly changing world before shitting on them
I thought my generation was different given how much we went through that that ourselves (I'm a milennial), but i guess not. The amount of millennials I see hating on gen z trends, slang and behaviours makes me massively groan
At the end of the day we're all human. People like to think they're special whether it's because they're from a certain, country, state, religion, generation etc.
Millennials myself included were hated upon by the older generation. Now we're doing the same thing to Gen Z. Don't be surprised that Gen Z does the same thing to Gen Alpha.
Heck if you can go back and read about how the older generation of Romans thought Julius Caesar & the upcoming generation was effeminate and they dressed scandalously.
Majority of people don't think for themselves, they seek trusted sources and repeat it like a recorder without understanding what it is they are repeating. This is why some people struggle with making arguments outside of insults and fallacies. There is nothing wrong with this, there is also nothing wrong with not being intelligent, but idiots that need to cope will try to elevate their social status on traits that are valued. Sure, dipshit that is good with his hands is a valuable member of society, but we have had generations of raising emphasis on specifically intelligence being higher social status so everyone wants to pretend they're closer to that than average to feel important. Until we become more mature, I'm afraid the idiots will continue to read headlines and remember the ones that validates them or makes them sound more informed without knowing the context or meat behind the article.
Totally agree! I should have prefaced that, that IQ is worthless. We have to wait for Star Trek future before we can ever read a brain that well, and it will be used for evil no doubt lol
I am not saying IQ is worthless, it's not. It's important. IQ is essentially pattern recognition capabilities, which means you are better at learning in some instances.
There's the ability to hold knowledge, the ability to understand and process information, and the ability to organize and unlock new information with current information given. IQ, to over simplify, helps you with the latter.
Ed: To be more serious, the article is poor though, it has no real citations. I can buy the premise that humans are programmed to learn from each other, and not short-form videos and bullet points, nor have hundreds and thousands of relatively anonymous online friends over fewer, closer in-person relationships, but some actual data and not just “so-and-so says it’s true so it is” would go a long way.
O-4 | 16 hours ago
The article doesn't cite any studies or say how big the IQ drop is
yodatsracist | 14 hours ago
This article is garbage but it does get into a big debate in intelligence research. The IQ drop measured so far is small, but that there's an IQ drop at all is notable — IQ has been rising for as long as we've been measuring it.
Within psychology, over the few years there has been a debate whether the Flynn Effect (Wikipedia) has ended or even reversed. The Flynn Effect is the gradually but consistent increase in IQs over the 20th century. IQ is designed so that 100 is the mean of the population. As IQ scores have risen because of the Flynn Effect, they have been continually "re-normed" so that 100 is still in the middle. Over the 20th century, this is often a 10-20 IQ point increase on average, which is giant.
The general assumption is that IQ scores increased for a century because we live in a world that increasingly trains us better on the kind of skills that are tested on IQ tests. Think about the differences between farming, working in a factory, and office work. Additionally, formal education exploded during the 20th century, which not only increased skills like math and reading, but also familiarized and acclimatized people to tests similar to intelligence tests. Lastly, there were environmental biological reasons, mainly children (especially poor children) are getting much nutrition.
Since as early as 2004, there has been some debate about whether the Flynn Effect has stopped. These early article were all from Scandinavia: Sundet, Barlaug & Torjussen (2004) "The end of the Flynn effect?: A study of secular trends in mean intelligence test scores of Norwegian conscripts during half a century" about Norway obviously; Teasdale & Owen (2005) "A long-term rise and recent decline in intelligence test performance: The Flynn Effect in reverse" and Teasdale & Owen (2008) "Secular declines in cognitive test scores: A reversal of the Flynn Effect" about Denmark. These was some debate whether this was composition changes (basically, immigrants with lower IQ, quite possibly because they come from contexts where they didn't have the environmental like increased formal education that led to the Flynn Effect), but I think the authors of these studies all argued against compositional changes.
This started getting more attention in 2018, with Bratsberg & Rogeberg (2018) "Flynn effect and its reversal are both environmentally caused" published in PNAS which one of the bigger general scientific journals, especially for social sciences like psychology (which rarely get published in Nature or Science). This again uses Scandinavian data, but one thing they do is compare within families (matching fathers and sons; brothers and brothers) so that you cannot possibly argue this is a compositional change, or a genetic change. This got some popular press coverage. Here's a Time article from 2018: "IQ Scores Are Falling Due to Environmental Factors, Study Finds". Environment here, however, largely means "well it wasn't compositional or genetic".
Another influential article from that same year, Flynn and Shayer (2018) "IQ decline and Piaget: Does the rot start at the top?", written by James Flynn, the guy who the Flynn Effect is named after. It emphasizes that we see very different patterns across countries. 1995 is when average intelligence scores peaked in Scandinavia, but 2014 is when that seems to happen in the U.S. and the Netherland seems to possibly still be gaining. They argue that in some of the data (like Scandinavia), it seems like there's a general shift where everyone on average moves down, but in a lot of the data there seems to be a decline driven largely by a decline primarily among top performers (they present a theory for this).
(comment continued below)
yodatsracist | 14 hours ago
(continued from above)
This research seems to be gaining more traction as researchers look to more data sets. I think 2023-2025 several other articles have come out finding basically the same thing, in more countries (though sometimes there are subtleties, like here's Northwestern University's press release write up of one 2023 study with the headline "Americans’ IQ scores are lower in some areas, higher in one"). These have been using other data, including a lot of American data. Scandinavian countries had mandatory military conscription so everyone enters the armed forces and takes the armed forces test. The U.S. doesn't have population level intelligence testing like that, so some of researchers just have to pool a bunch of on-representative tests together. I think the paper that started this latest round of debate was Dworak, Revelle, and Condon (2023) "Looking for Flynn effects in a recent online U.S. adult sample: Examining shifts within the SAPA Project". This found the largest decline was for people with lower levels of education, against the Flynn and Shayer (2018) article above.
So the big debate now is why. Bratsberg & Rogeberg (2018) piece argued that IQ stopped going up for those born after 1975, so it's not as if one can easily blame "these dang internets" when one looks cross-nationally. Of course, a lot of pundits will mainly focus on imperfect U.S. data, which does match the timeline of smartphones while the Scandinavian data does not. Some argue that the test is less relevant today for some parts of the test (words that were common knowledge 50 years ago are more specialized knowledge now). Some argue that "test-taking abilities" have gotten worse, or that the specific motivation of test takers have changed (people aren't trying as hard). Some argue, very relatedly, its due to changes in school. Some argue, particularly with the American data, that it is media environment which features less things like reading and more than things like scrolling mindlessly. Some argue its related to declining attention spans (which we have independent data about, but the earliest data is the weakest so its hard to argue exactly how much attention spans have declined and starting when). Some argue that it might toxins or diets or something more biological. Of course, it's almost always several things at once — and different factors could be more important in different countries and time periods.
I think the biggest recent science journalism article was "A Theory of Dumb" in New York Magazine, which put this issue on a lot of people's radars, including mine. Here's an ungated, non-paywalled version. This is meant to be provocative, rather than a careful synthesis of the science. If I remember correctly, it argues that we have more instant access to information which hurts memory, concentration, and related tasks. But it's been a while since I read this. This article felt as much cultural critique as science journalism.*
But this is a real area of study and debate right now. I think most intelligence researchers agree that the Flynn Effect is stopping, with probably most even agreeing that their are (small) intelligence declines in most countries. There doesn't seem to be agreement on why this is happening, or even who is being most affected — is it across the board declines, declines in top scorers, or declines in the least educated? "Further research is required".
nickersb83 | 13 hours ago
That makes a lot of sense to me.
if it’s becomes more efficient to not retain the information ourselves (as ? as that may be), then should iq tests be instead measuring one’s ability to phrase the question and use those mechanisms to access the answer?
Adonidis | 10 hours ago
I'd push back slightly against some of this. London cab drivers, for instance, have to pass an incredibly difficult exam requiring massive amounts of memorization, studies show they have enlarged hippocampi, which is involved in memory storage and retrieval. But I don't think there's clear evidence that our brains are genuinely worse off because information is more readily accessible now by itself (medieval monks complained that the youth was getting dumb because of the printing press and books). It seems more about how we relate to information and how we consume it.
Intelligence is largely, if not mostly, genetic (plus good education, good nutrition, and so on). So if scores are going down that most likely has an environmental cause, as the person before me pointed out.
I'd also add that different types of intelligence are all highly correlated with each other. If you score lower on working memory, that's probably going to affect other types of tasks because you use working memory in basically all of them. You don't generally expect someone to score really badly on long-term memory and then extremely well on spatial reasoning. When that happens, it can be a sign of something else going on. Maybe neurodivergence of some kind, or neurological issues.
So I think you'd expect the Flynn effect to stabilize at some point because line can't go up forever. But studies suggesting it's actually reversing is quite worrying. It seems like a lot of the technology nowadays reverses the careful environmental optimization we've been doing (remember that all the tech CEOs are not giving their children iPads and stuff because they know all of this).
ARoyaleWithCheese | 7 hours ago
You're using fairly old sources and missing some rather relevant recent research, such as this meta-analysis from 2022: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289623000314
Their results are pretty much what one would expect:
> The FE appears to be stronger for middle-income countries, where it is likely that more critical improvements have affected IQ test performance. The FE was overall more prominent in younger generation cohorts, where perhaps environmental influences may have the most impact on mental functioning.
Vondi | 11 hours ago
Maybe the real IQ drop was the articles all along.
Ebonyks | 16 hours ago
This is a terrible article. No sourcing of any objective data or evaluations. The cited scientist is an alarmist who doesn't appear to be able to justify any of these claims beyond paraphrasing data, as seen here (https://katu.com/amnw/am-northwest-books-authors/the-digital-delusion-author-dr-jared-cooney-horvath), dubious sourcing (indian centric mainstream media).
While overconsumption of digital media presents real issues, this is just lazy.
trixtah | 16 hours ago
Yeah the article is bullshit but Gen Z as a whole is also dumb as hell
urielrocks5676 | 15 hours ago
Older gen z here, counter argument, humans are dumb as shit
timshel42 | 16 hours ago
short form content and a diet consisting exclusively of brainrot has meant that they cant even sit through normal movies, let alone read a book.
just wait until the next generation matures having been raised on AI slop.
ResolutionOwn4933 | 16 hours ago
It's got electrolytes, it's what plants crave.
Confident_Lawyer6276 | 15 hours ago
Shit, as long as we get a president as competent as Camacho I'll be happy
Sk0ds | 16 hours ago
Lol i was also immediately thinking of Idiocracy
phalluss | 16 hours ago
Go away with this divisive idiocy. How can you even measure this?
As a millennial, I say we should know better than to fall into this same intergenerational bs that we copped for so long.
suspicious_hyperlink | 15 hours ago
You may feel differently if you lived in a populated part of the US. No study is needed, it is very apparent when dealing with Gen Z. Not all, but most
phalluss | 15 hours ago
I dont give a shit about the US.
kyleh092 | 16 hours ago
This is so funny. Anybody on this thread who just pointed and laughed without checking the veracity of the study is adorable. The previous generation must always shit on the capability of the future generations.
Edit: please just go google the E meme from 7 years ago, or RawrxD or any other nonsense meme. The obsession with 67 has nothing to do with a certain generation or intelligence. Let these kids adapt to a rapidly changing world before shitting on them
frezz | 16 hours ago
I thought my generation was different given how much we went through that that ourselves (I'm a milennial), but i guess not. The amount of millennials I see hating on gen z trends, slang and behaviours makes me massively groan
Angry_Pelican | 15 hours ago
At the end of the day we're all human. People like to think they're special whether it's because they're from a certain, country, state, religion, generation etc.
Millennials myself included were hated upon by the older generation. Now we're doing the same thing to Gen Z. Don't be surprised that Gen Z does the same thing to Gen Alpha.
Heck if you can go back and read about how the older generation of Romans thought Julius Caesar & the upcoming generation was effeminate and they dressed scandalously.
RexDraco | 15 hours ago
Majority of people don't think for themselves, they seek trusted sources and repeat it like a recorder without understanding what it is they are repeating. This is why some people struggle with making arguments outside of insults and fallacies. There is nothing wrong with this, there is also nothing wrong with not being intelligent, but idiots that need to cope will try to elevate their social status on traits that are valued. Sure, dipshit that is good with his hands is a valuable member of society, but we have had generations of raising emphasis on specifically intelligence being higher social status so everyone wants to pretend they're closer to that than average to feel important. Until we become more mature, I'm afraid the idiots will continue to read headlines and remember the ones that validates them or makes them sound more informed without knowing the context or meat behind the article.
RexDraco | 15 hours ago
You don't need to read the article, anything implying IQ is intelligence is wrong by default, article invalidated.
kyleh092 | 14 hours ago
Totally agree! I should have prefaced that, that IQ is worthless. We have to wait for Star Trek future before we can ever read a brain that well, and it will be used for evil no doubt lol
RexDraco | 2 hours ago
I am not saying IQ is worthless, it's not. It's important. IQ is essentially pattern recognition capabilities, which means you are better at learning in some instances.
There's the ability to hold knowledge, the ability to understand and process information, and the ability to organize and unlock new information with current information given. IQ, to over simplify, helps you with the latter.
BuffaloSufficient758 | 14 hours ago
Some universities are only reading selected chapters instead of whole novel analysis
Ell2509 | 16 hours ago
As a millenial i have to say that it feels like an unfair comparison. They might be late bloomers as a generation.
Philyboyz | 15 hours ago
Minted and agreed, also Millenial.
no-snoots-unbooped | 16 hours ago
r/Idiocracy
Ed: To be more serious, the article is poor though, it has no real citations. I can buy the premise that humans are programmed to learn from each other, and not short-form videos and bullet points, nor have hundreds and thousands of relatively anonymous online friends over fewer, closer in-person relationships, but some actual data and not just “so-and-so says it’s true so it is” would go a long way.
CapitalCourse | 16 hours ago
No wonder why there are so many conservatives in that generation…
Brief-Translator1370 | 15 hours ago
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/04/09/age-generational-cohorts-and-party-identification/
Genuinely stupid thing to say. The article itself is not great science anyways.
Girafferage | 15 hours ago
Millenials - The peak of human intellect.
Rick-D-99 | 16 hours ago
6 7 6 7 mid ngl no cap
PM_ME_UR_CC_NUMBER | 12 hours ago
That sure is litfam
Smile_lifeisgood | 15 hours ago
Garbage article that relies on sourceless rehash of some comments from one person to the US legislature.
We've had a health professional tell the US legislature about how covid vaccines magnetized her body.
cornyleone | 15 hours ago
Gen Z tears all over this post
zamari101 | 13 hours ago
Another post hating on the newer generation?
mudslags | 16 hours ago
We’re living in a world of Idiocracy
Jack-of-Hearts-7 | 16 hours ago
Not surprised
Weirdingyeoman | 16 hours ago
I KNEW IT!
TrontRaznik | 16 hours ago
The only people who didn't realize this were gen z. Even alpha figured that shit out pretty quick.
monkeyghosts | 15 hours ago
Nah fuck this, I'm not fighting with my Gen Z brothers and sisters. There is no war but the class war.
OsakaWilson | 15 hours ago
Old people these days...don't even know what a citation is.