The effects of repeated retesting: III. further experiments and general conclusions

This is the third of a series of papers dealing with the effects of repeated retesting on intelligence test scores. It comprises an account of two further experiments, and a discussion of the four so far performed, since each throws light on the results of the others and it is their joint interpretation which is thought to be of value.

The two earlier experiments consisted in repeated testing of a group of W.E.A. students and a group of mentally defective boys by an intelligence test (AH 4) designed for an unselected population. In the two later experiments, a group of Technical College students and a group of Naval Ratings were repeatedly tested on another intelligence test (AH 5), designed for a population of high-grade intelligence, such as university students. Examination of all the results confirms the artificiality of the “ceiling effect” which was suspected in the first experiment; it suggests that, given sufficient scope, subjects of all levels of intelligence would, with repeated trials on the same test, continue to improve their score up to and beyond 10 testing; and that, given comparable opportunity, subjects with initially higher scores will tend to improve more than those with initially lower scores. All these results concern short-term experiments with testing at weekly intervals.

The four sets of results considered jointly indicate that conclusions on these problems should be drawn only in terms of the relation between the level of the test and that of the group tested: this offers some resolution of the conflicting findings of earlier investigators.