Week 13: post 2

This week we read chapter 21. As I was taking the quiz this week, I seemed to struggle with identifying what is considered to be fluid intelligence. This is the reason that I decided to research an article regarding types of intelligence. In an article entitle "Complementary Cognitive Capabilities, Economic Decision Making, and Aging," the researchers sought to find a reason for why fluid intelligence decreases with age and economic decision making remains consistent through all adult age groups. They also noticed that crystallized intelligence in adulthood was stronger than fluid intelligence. The researchers made it a point to hypothesize that the crystallized intelligence provided strength for financial and debt literacy and temporal discounting. According to this study, crystallized intelligence is knowledge gained over time which increases until 60 years of age. Fluid intelligence is the "ability to generate, transform, manipulate information which declines with age. Fluid intelligence is critical to decision-making, but through a series of surveys sent out to participants, they concluded that strong crystallized intelligence offsets the the declining fluid intelligence to continue to make wise decisions.  (Li, Baldassi, Johnson, Weber, 2013).

From the text and the study listed above my understanding of crystallized intelligence and fluid intelligence increased slightly. I am still unsure of a good example to test fluid intelligence. I understand that fluid intelligence is the ability to think quickly and incorporate the known with  the unknown to figure something not known out. This also uses abstract thought and short-term memory. So, I guess to test this, one would ask something that incorporates terms learned and from there the person being quizzed would use inductive and deductive reasoning to figure out the answer.

Li, Y., Baldassi, M., Johnson, E. J., & Weber, E. U. (2013). Complementary cognitive capabilities, economic decision making, and aging. Psychology And Aging, 28(3), 595-613. doi:10.1037/a0034172