In which the popular notion that college graduates are smarter than non-college graduates is conclusively proven to be outdated by Canadian researchers:
According to a widespread belief, the average IQ of university students is 115 to 130 IQ points, that is, substantially higher than the average IQ of the general population (M = 100, SD =15).
We traced the origin of this belief to obsolete intelligence data collected in 1940s and 1950s when university education was the privilege of a few. Examination of more recent IQ data indicate that IQ of university students and university graduates dropped to the average of the general population. The decline is a necessary consequence of increasing educational attainment.
Universities and professors need to realize that students are no longer extraordinary but merely average. Employers can no longer rely on applicants with university degrees to be more capable or smarter than those without degrees. Students need to realize that acceptance into university is no longer an invitation to join an elite group.
The myth of brilliant undergraduate students in scientific and popular literature needs to be dispelled. Estimating premorbid IQ based on educational attainment is vastly inaccurate, obsolete, not evidence based, and mere speculations.
This isn’t the only outdated intelligence claim. In fact, pretty much every claim of a group that is supposed to have unusually high intelligence is not only suspect, but outright and obvious nonsense based on small, unrepresentational, and cherry-picked sample sets.
It’s not surprising that corporations are beginning to eliminate college degrees as job requirements. Diversity and inclusion, combined with equality and expansion, have destroyed the value of a college degree.