Exploring educational psychologist's perceptions of the use and implications of standardised cognitive assessment and IQ

In May 1913, Cyril Burt was employed by London County Council to make use of standardised cognitive testing for the assessment of ‘Feeble minded’ children under the Mental Deficiency Act of the same year. One hundred years later educational psychologists still draw on standardised cognitive assessment and IQ as a tool for their applied psychology. Based on Moore’s (2005) proposed application of social constructionism as a meta-theory, enabling research into how other theories are developed and applied in EP practice, a discursive psychology method is employed to examine this use. First, the paper identifies and analyses various discourses, from a small group of educational psychologists working in the West Midlands, England, concerning the use of standardised cognitive assessment and IQ. It then seeks to look at how the participant’s perceptions of standardised cognitive assessment and IQ are constructed through this discourse, how these perceptions guide responses to the use of standardised cognitive assessment and IQ, and what options are generated for them as educational psychologists.