David Randall, research director for the National Association of Scholars, says more studies need to be conducted to verify the decline. But if substandard schooling is to blame, then that is likely the result of the softening effect of generations of progressive pedagogy.
"There may have been such horrible schooling in the last generation or two that it's actually managed to degrade even results in IQ tests," he submits.
Starting in 1932, average IQ scores were shown to increase roughly three to five points per decade, which means younger generations were expected to have higher IQ scores than the previous ones. But data from the sample of U.S. adults imply the reverse.
According to the study, from 2006 to 2018, the age groups measured generally saw declines in the IQ test used by the International Cognitive Ability Resource (ICAR).
Overall declines held true across age groups, after controlling for educational attainment and gender, but Campus Reform relays that the loss in cognitive abilities is steeper for younger participants.
"Scores were lower for more recent participants across all levels of education," the authors report.
Still, Randall says there is more to life than having a high IQ.
"At the end of the day, we are all equally God's children and all have equal dignity, regardless of intelligence," he tells AFN. "Our worth is not our intelligence as individuals or as a nation; it's in the moral choices we make."
