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Campaigners call for debate on ‘intelligence gene’ research

A new pressure group has been formed to draw attention to the potentially damaging social and political effects of funding scientists to look for a genetic basis for IQ.

The group, called the Campaign for Real Intelligence, is asking the Medical Research Council not to support a search for ‘genes for intelligence’ without a full and open public debate on the issue.

The campaign has been formed in response to research proposed by Professor Robert Plomin of the Institute of Psychiatry in London, to take DNA samples from 5000 pairs of twins with the aim of identifying a specific gene for intelligence. It follows in the wake of the recent controversy over the views of so-called ‘scientific racists’ who argue that there is a genetic basis for the difference in IQ scores observed in black and white populations.

But the campaigners argue that IQ tests ‘do not measure real intelligence’ and that research which emphasises genetic causes runs the risk of encouraging new forms of eugenic social policy.

Julia Bard, a member of the campaign, said: ‘ Rather than fund research which can only lead to elitism, money should be put into the education system, so everyone can fulfill their potential.’

The group believes that Professor Plomin, who has recently moved to Britain from the US, would not have been able to obtain funding in that country in view of the extensive public debate which followed the publication of The bell curve, which purported to show a genetic basis to IQ test differences between ethnic groups, and argued that social and educational programmes to help children from low income families should therefore be withdrawn.

‘IQ tests do not measure real intelligence: they measure a particular set of abstract mental abilities and the ability and motivation to do well in tests’, according to the campaigners, who cite survey findings that significant numbers of people would abort a fetus belived to have a low IQ as evidence of the potential abuse to which genetic research into IQ might be put. ‘It is difficult to see social beneficial ways in which this research could be applied’, they argue.

Campaign for Real Intelligence, c/o 35 Allerton Road, London N16 5UF. 0181-690 3496.