El Podcast

E176: College Student IQ Has Collapsed: Researcher Breaks Down His New Meta-Analysis - Dr. Bob Uttl

Episode Summary

Dr. Bob Uttl, a cognitive psychologist, explains why the average IQ of college students has fallen to about 102, a shift that is mathematically inevitable as university attendance expands. He also shows how outdated testing norms and student-satisfaction incentives distort clinical judgments and academic standards, weakening the college degree as a signal of ability. This creates real-world harm in hiring, disability determinations, and high-stakes psychological evaluations.

Episode Notes

A cognitive psychologist explains why college student IQ now averages about 102, why that shift is mathematically inevitable as enrollment expands, and how outdated testing norms and student-evals can quietly wreck both education and clinical decisions.

GUEST BIO
Dr. Bob Uttl is a cognitive psychologist and professor at Mount Royal University (Canada) who researches psychometrics, assessment, and how intelligence tests are interpreted and misused in real-world settings.

TOPICS DISCUSSED (IN ORDER)

• What IQ is, how it’s measured, and why scores are standardized (mean 100, SD 15)
• The Flynn Effect and why “raw ability” rose over the last century
• Why expanding university enrollment mathematically lowers the average IQ of undergrads
• The meta-analysis: how the team compiled WAIS results over time and what they found (down to ~102)
• The Frontiers controversy: accepted, posted, went viral, then “un-accepted” after social media blowback
• Clinical misuse: comparing modern test-takers to decades-old norms and the harms that follow
• Impacts inside universities: wider ability range, teaching to the lower tail, boredom at the top
• Grades + incentives: student evaluations as satisfaction metrics that push standards downward
• Employers adapting: degrees losing signaling value; rise of employer-run assessments/training
• Differences across majors and institutions: SAT/GRE as IQ-proxies; fields with feedback/standardized licensure
• “Reverse Flynn” talk: why some skills crater (speeded arithmetic, fluency) as tools replace practice
• AI and learning: hallucinations, the need for human judgment, and the possible return of oral exams
• European exam models vs North American incentives
• Final takeaways: fix misinformation about undergrad IQ; remove harmful incentives; reintroduce standards

MAIN POINTS

• IQ tests are periodically re-normed, so “100” always tracks the current population average even as raw performance changes.
• As a larger share of the population attends university, the average IQ of undergrads must move closer to the population mean—this is arithmetic, not an insult.
• Uttl’s meta-analysis argues today’s undergrads average around 102 IQ, far closer to “average” than older assumptions (e.g., 115+).
• Outdated norms and sloppy cross-era comparisons can shave ~20+ points off a person “on paper,” creating bogus diagnoses and high-stakes harm (disability decisions, fitness-for-duty, litigation).
• Universities now teach a wider spread of ability, which pressures instruction toward the lower end unless programs stratify or standardize outcomes.
• Student evaluations function like customer satisfaction scores; combined with adjunct/contract insecurity, they incentivize grade inflation and lower rigor.
• Employers respond by discounting degrees and building their own testing/training pipelines.
• Some “reverse Flynn” patterns may reflect skill/fluency loss (e.g., speeded arithmetic) as calculators/AI replace practice—not necessarily a uniform drop in reasoning.
• A plausible reform path: reduce reliance on student evals, adopt clearer standards, and consider more direct assessments (including oral exams) where appropriate.

BEST 3 QUOTES

• “The decrease in average IQ of university students is a necessary consequence of increased enrollment.”
• “Student evaluations of teaching are basically measures of satisfaction.”
• “We need to remove the misinformation about what is the IQ of undergraduate students.”