The DOI matches its Crossref record; 186 of the 189 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Intelligence: is it the epidemiologists’ elusive “fundamental cause” of social class inequalities in health?
Abstract
Virtually all indicators of physical health and mental competence favor persons of higher socioeconomic status (SES). Conventional theories in the social sciences assume that the material disadvantages of lower SES are primarily responsible for these inequalities, either directly or by inducing psychosocial harm. These theories cannot explain, however, why the relation between SES and health outcomes (knowledge, behavior, morbidity, and mortality) is not only remarkably general across time, place, disease, and kind of health system but also so finely graded up the entire SES continuum. Epidemiologists have therefore posited, but not yet identified, a more general "fundamental cause" of health inequalities. This article concatenates various bodies of evidence to demonstrate that differences in general intelligence (g) may be that fundamental cause.
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“As children's intelligence predicts later socio-economic success better than parents' attributes (Gottfredson, 2004), Glazer and Konrads W nding is consistent with our claim that altruism and IQ are related.”
From Altruistic behavior as a costly signal of general intelligence (2007) · cites this paper as Gottfredson, 2004
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Functional connectome fingerprinting: Identifying individuals using patterns of brain connectivity
Finn, E. S., Shen, X., Scheinost, D., Rosenberg, M. D., Huang, J., Chun, M. M., Papademetris, X., & Constable, R. T. (2015) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.4135 · Cited by 2,747
Socioeconomic Disparities in Health Behaviors
Pampel, F. C., Krueger, P. M., & Denney, J. T. (2010) · Annual Review of Sociology · doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.012809.102529 · Cited by 1,944
“Gottfredson (2004) suggests that general intelligence rather than self-control and attraction to risk is crucial to the relationship between SES and health.”
BackgroundSchmitt, D. P., Realo, A., Voracek, M., & Allik, J. (2008) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.94.1.168 · Cited by 1,391
“This is perhaps the same reason why preexisting gaps between advantaged and less advantaged persons across different domains, including health and education, often widen when opportunities are made more equitable (Ceci & Papierno, 2005; Gottfredson, 2004).”
Why IQ is not a covariate in cognitive studies of neurodevelopmental disorders
DENNIS, M., FRANCIS, D. J., CIRINO, P. T., SCHACHAR, R., BARNES, M. A., & FLETCHER, J. M. (2009) · Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society · doi:10.1017/s1355617709090481 · Cited by 875
“The idea that g causes individual and group differences remains current, with recent arguments that g is the underlying cause of health inequalities among socioeconomic groups (Gottfredson, 2004 ).”
BackgroundConsequences of Age-Related Cognitive Declines
Salthouse, T. (2012) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100328 · Cited by 818
“…reviews of the relation of cognitive ability to occupational level have documented that higher average cognitive ability is associated with higher occupational level or income (e.g., Gottfredson 1998; 2004a,b; Nyborg & Jensen 2001; Schmidt & Hunter 2004; von Stumm et al. 2010; Zagorsky 2007).”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- Gottfredson, L. S.
- Affiliations
- University of Delaware (US)
- Corresponding author
- Gottfredson, Linda S.
- Venue
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
- Published
- 2004
- Volume
- 86
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 174-199
- ISSN
- 0022-3514 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1315
- OpenAlex
- W2141185279
- Cited by
- 580
- References
- 189
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 17 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 20 · 2021: 34 · 2020: 21 · 2019: 31 · 2018: 39 · 2017: 32 · 2016: 27 · 2015: 30 · 2014: 34 · 2013: 32 · 2012: 21
- FWCI
- 28.15
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Health › Health disparities and outcomes
- Social Sciences › Health › Public Health and Social Inequalities
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Keywords
- intelligence, socioeconomic status, health disparities, fundamental causes, psychosocial factors, material disadvantage
- MeSH terms
- Age Factors, Health Status, Humans, Intelligence, Social Class
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