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Does an IQ Test Really Measure Intelligence?

            Many people throughout the years have struggled with the concept of how to measure the intelligence of one person versus another person.  Using everything from standardized tests to overall work, school, or life performance, people like to be able to quantify how they rank against their neighbor.  The IQ Test is one of the more popular methods for determining if you are smarter than the average person, but does it really measure intelligence?

            The way that the IQ Test is scored (for official IQ Tests at least) is very scientific.  It literally ranks you against your peers in the same age group and will tell you if you performed better or worse than them on the test.  From this point of view, the IQ Test is a very good indicator of how well you answered the questions compared to the other test takers.  However, the real issue for debate is whether the questions are a good indicator of intelligence level.

            The questions on an IQ Test are generally designed to test logical and reasoning ability as well as spacial deduction skills.  If you consider logic and reasoning to be the same as intelligence, then the IQ Test definitely is a good measure of how intelligent a person is.  However, many people argue that the IQ Tests discriminate against other types of intelligence, such as creativity, while others discount the test results because of cultural biases that are perceived within the questions.  Whatever your take on the IQ Test and whether or not it really measures intelligence lies in how you define intelligence in the first place.