Verbal intelligence, operational thinking and environment in part-aboriginal children

Abstract

A test of verbal intelligence, and a test of classificatory ability based on Piaget's theory, were given to low-socioeconomic rural European children and to reserve- and town-dwelling rural part-Aboriginal children. On both tests, the Europeans performed best and the reserve part-Aboriginals worst. Rural part-Aboriginals are thus too heterogeneous to be considered as a single population in studies of cognitive development. Correlations between scores on the two tests were low.