Section 2. Task 1. What is a Koto? Part 1.
Ever since you started to school, and perhaps before, you have been given tests.
One type of test you have probably taken is an intelligence test, a test designed to determine your ability to learn or your ability to change behaviour on the basis of experience.
It is not just test-givers who make judgements about intelligence, however.
Most of us make educated guesses or inferences about how smart or intelligent a person is from the way he does certain things.
We usually call people intelligent if they learn quickly, know answers to a lot of questions, and can solve difficult problems.
When a psychologist studies intelligence, there are many questions that he wants to answer.
But the first question he must ask is, What is intelligence? Most people think of intelligence as one ability.
We say, Ann is smart. But is intelligence really that simple? Is it only one ability?
In trying to understand these questions, it might be helpful to look at athletic ability.
If Mitch is a good basketball player, do we say that he is a good athlete? What if he is poor at baseball?
What if he can't play football? Even if a person is good at sports, is he equally good in all of them?
This is the same kind of problem we have when we ask, What is intelligence?
What if Estelle is very good in math, but very poor in spelling? Is she intelligent or unintelligent?
Maybe there is not just one kind of intelligence, but several different kinds.
You probably know people who are very good in some subjects, but not good in others, and it is likely that you are the same way.