|
~
~
|
Innate talents: Reality or myth?
by
Michael J. A. Howe, et al.
Abstract
Talents that selectively facilitate the acquisition of high levels of
skill are said to be present in some children but not others.
The
evidence for this includes biological correlates of specific abilities,
certain rare abilities in autistic savants, and the seemingly
spontaneous emergence of exceptional abilities in young children, but
there is also contrary evidence indicating an absence of early
precursors for high skill levels in young people.
An
analysis of positive and negative evidence and arguments suggests that
differences in early experiences, preferences, opportunities, habits,
training and practice are the real determinants of excellence.
1. INTRODUCTION
In many areas of expertise, ranging from music, dance, art and
literature to sports, chess, mathematics, science and foreign-language
acquisition, there is abundant evidence that young people differ from
one another in their attainments and in the apparent ease with which
they achieve them.
Even
within a family there may be marked differences: a child who struggles
at a musical instrument without much success may be overtaken by a
younger sibling, for example.
It is widely believed that the likelihood of becoming exceptionally
competent in certain fields depends upon the presence or absence of
inborn attributes variously labelled "talents" or "gifts" or, less
often, "natural aptitudes".
According
to an informal British survey, in music over three- quarters of the
educators who decide which young people are to receive instruction
believe that children cannot do well unless they have special innate
gifts (Davis, 1994).
The
judgement that someone is talented is believed to help explain (as
distinct from merely describing) their success. It is also widely
assumed that the innate talent that makes it possible for an individual
to excel can be detected in early childhood.
We
will refer to the view that exceptional accomplishments depend on a
special biological potential that can be identified in some young
children but not others as "the talent account". The purpose of this
target article is to examine the evidence and arguments for and against
this account.
This issue has important social implications. A consequence of the
belief that innate gifts are a precondition for high achievement is
that young people who are not identified as having innate talents in a
particular domain are likely to be denied the help and encouragement
they would need in order to reach high levels of competence.
Children's
progress can be affected negatively as well as positively by adults'
expectations (Brophy & Good, 1973).
1.1
Agreeing on a definition of innate talent
Before considering evidence for and against the talent account, we
should be as clear as possible about what is meant by "talent".
In
everyday life people are rarely precise about what they mean by this
term: users do not specify what form an innate talent takes or how it
might exert its influence.
Certain pitfalls have to be avoided in settling on a definition of
talent. A very restrictive definition could make it impossible for any
conceivable evidence to demonstrate talent. For example, some people
believe that talent is based on an inborn ability that makes it certain
that its possessor will excel.
This
criterion is too strong. At the other extreme, it would be possible to
make the definition of talent so vague that its existence is trivially
ensured; talent might imply no more than that those who reach high
levels of achievement differ biologically from others in some undefined
way.
Yet
those who believe that innate talent exists also assume that early
signs of it can be used to predict future success.
For the purposes of this article we will take talent to have five
properties: (1) It originates in genetically transmitted structures and
hence is at least partly innate. (2) Its full effects may not be
evident at an early stage, but there will be some advance indications,
allowing trained people to identify the presence of talent before
exceptional levels of mature performance have been demonstrated. (3)
These early indications of talent provide a basis for predicting who is
likely to excel. (4) Only a minority are talented, for if all children
were, then there would be no way to predict or explain differential
success. Finally (5), talents are relatively domain-specific.
In principle, it is desirable be precise about the indicators of
talent, but in practice some imprecision is unavoidable, as in the
phrase "relatively domain-specific" in (5).
We
would have preferred to be able to specify the boundaries between
domains, but this is not currently possible. Nor can one specify just
how much a trait should facilitate the acquisition of special abilities
to qualify as a talent: the available empirical evidence is too coarse.
We
allow the possibility that an innate talent can take different forms;
so saying that each of two children have "a talent for music" need not
imply that both are advantaged in precisely the same way. A domain may
draw on many different skills, and individuals' competence levels on
them may not be highly intercorrelated (Sloboda, 1985; 1991).
1.2
The talent concept in researchers' explanations
Our five properties are meant to provide a working definition that is
acceptable to researchers and captures lay intuitions. Like laymen,
researchers typically believe that when they introduce the term talent
they are predicting or explaining someone's performance, not just
describing it.
For
example, Feldman (1988), writing about child prodigies, remarks that
"it is not obvious what their talents will lead to" (p. 281): he
insists that "the child must possess talent, and it must be very
powerful" (p. 280).
For
Feldman, talents cannot be acquired; they must be "possessed" innately
by prodigies. He believes that they demonstrate "exceptional pretuning
to an already existing body of knowledge, one that countless others had
spent time and energy developing and refining" (p. 278).
Similarly,
Gardner (1993a) equates talent with early potential, noting that "a
poignant state of affairs results when an individual of high talent and
promise ends up failing to achieve that potential" (p. 176).
For
Gardner, talent is defined as a sign of precocious biopsychological
potential in a particular domain (Gardner, 1984; 1993b). The possession
of "a strong gift in a specific domain, be it dance, chess or
mathematics" is recognised by Gardner when there is a coincidence of
factors, the first of which is "native talent" (p. 51).
According
to him, individuals who accomplish a great deal are people who were "at
promise" in relevant areas from early in life.
For Heller (1993 p. 139) "scientific giftedness" "can be defined as
scientific thinking potential or as a special talent to excel in
[natural sciences]". Detterman (1993 p. 234) likewise suggests that
"innate ability is what you are talking about when you are talking
about talent."
Eysenck
claims a strong genetic basis underlies all the variables associated
with giftedness (Eysenck & Barrett, 1993): he insists on the
existence of genetically transmitted talents, which he regards as
necessary but not sufficient for the emergence of genius (Eysenck,
1995).
Benbow
and Lubinski (1993) agree that talent is explicitly biological: they
claim that "people are born into this world with some biological
predispositions" (p. 65). Based on a survey of the use of terms like
"aptitude," "giftedness" and "talent" by experts and lay persons,
Gagné (1993) concludes that a special ability must have a
genetic basis for it to be defined as a gift or aptitude.
Winner
(1996; Winner & Martino, 1993) regards talents as unlearned
domain-specific traits which may develop or "come to fruition" in
favourable circumstances but cannot be manufactured. Talents are likely
to be identified by parents or teachers or they may be discovered
fortuitously (Winner & Martino, 1993, p. 259), but many gifted
children go unrecognised.
The above quotations make it clear that researchers and experts do make
extensive use of the concept of talent to predict exceptional abilities
and to explain their causes. Researchers as well as educators rely upon
the talent account, making it important to examine its validity.
Some previous challenges to the talent account have concentrated on the
field of music. Sloboda, Davidson & Howe (1994a; 1994b) raised
objections to the view that musical expertise arises from talent.
They
noted, for example, that in some non-Western cultures musical
achievements are considerably more widespread than in our own (see
Section 3.3), that there are often no early signs of unusual excellence
in outstanding adult instrumentalists (Sosniak, 1985), and that very
early experiences may be the real cause of what is interpreted to be
talent (Hepper, 1991; Parncutt, 1993).
Others
have challenged this analysis, arguing that the evidence of strong
cultural influences on musicality can be reconciled with the existence
of innate talent (Davies, 1994; see also Radford, 1994; Torff &
Winner, 1994; Hargreaves, 1994).
Criticisms of the talent account in other domains have been raised by
Ericsson and Charness (1995a; 1995b), who provide substantial evidence
that the effects of extended deliberate practice are more decisive than
is commonly believed.
They
argue that although children undoubtedly differ in the ease with which
they perform various skills (a fact to which Gardner, 1995, has drawn
attention in challenging their conclusions), no early predictors of
adult performance have been found.
2.
EVIDENCE IN SUPPORT OF THE TALENT ACCOUNT
Several kinds of findings appear to favour the talent account. (1)
There are many reports of children acquiring impressive skills very
early in life, in the apparent absence of opportunities for the kinds
of learning experiences that would normally be considered necessary.
(2) Certain relatively rare capacities which could have an innate basis
(e.g., "perfect" pitch perception) appear to emerge spontaneously in a
few children and may increase the likelihood of their excelling in
music. (3) Biological correlates of certain skills and abilities have
been reported. (4) Some especially compelling data comes from the case
histories of autistic, mentally handicapped people classified as
"idiots savants."
2.1
Evidence of skills emerging unusually early
The literature on child prodigies (see, e.g., Feldman, 1980, 1986;
Fowler, 1981; Freeman, 1990; Goldsmith, 1990; Gross, 1993a; 1993b;
Hollingworth, 1942; Howe, 1982; 1990a; 1993; 1995; Radford, 1990)
abounds with accounts of extraordinarily precocious development in the
earliest years. Very early language skills are described by Fowler
(1981) in a boy who was said to have begun speaking at five months of
age, with a 50-word vocabulary a month later, and a speaking knowledge
of five languages before the age of three.
Feldman
(1986) describes a boy whose parents said he began to speak in
sentences at three months, to engage in conversations at six months,
and to read simple books by his first birthday. Hollingworth (1942)
writes that Francis Galton was reputed to be reading in his third year.
In none of these cases, however, was the very early explosion of
language skills observed directly by the investigator, and all the
early studies were retrospective and anecdotal. Even the more recent
studies have some of these limitations.
The
boy described by Feldman (1986), for example, was not actually
encountered by Feldman himself until he had reached the age of three.
Although the boy's parents claimed to be surprised by his swift
progress, Feldman was astounded by their absolute dedication and
"unending quest for stimulating and supportive environments" (Feldman,
1986, p. 36).
Fowler (1981) notes that the professed passivity of some parents is
belied by their very detailed accounts. One pair of parents insisted
that their daughter learned to read entirely unaided and claimed that
they only realized this on discovering her reading Heidi. It turned
out, however, that they had kept elaborate records of the child's
accomplishments. Parents who do that cannot avoid becoming actively
involved in the child's early learning.
Accounts of the early lives of musicians provide further anecdotes of
the apparently spontaneous flowering of impressive abilities at
remarkably early ages (Hargreaves, 1986; Radford, 1990; Shuter-Dyson
& Gabriel, 1981; Sloboda, 1985; Winner & Martino, 1993).
A
number of prominent composers were regarded as prodigies when they were
young, and in some cases there are reports of unusual musical
competence in their earliest years. Mozart's early feats are widely
known.
It is
reported that the Hungarian music prodigy Erwin Nyiregyhazi was able to
reproduce simple songs at the age of two and play tunes on a mouth
organ at four (Revesz, 1925). Again, however, most of the reports are
based upon anecdotes reported many years after the early childhood
events in question.
Some
of the accounts are autobiographical, such as Stravinsky's description
of having amazed his parents by imitating local singers as a
two-year-old (Gardner, 1984) or Arthur Rubenstein's claim to have
mastered the piano before he could speak. The accuracy of such
autobiographical reports is questionable considering that childhood
memories of the first three years are not at all reliable (e.g., see
Usher & Neisser, 1993).
The
early biographies of prominent composers have revealed that they all
received intensive and regular supervised practice sessions over a
period of several years (Lehmann, 1995). The emergence of unusual
skills typically followed rather than preceded a period during which
unusual opportunities were provided, often combined with a strong
expectation that the child would do well.
There are also some descriptions of precocious ability in the visual
arts, and Winner (1996) has collected a number of drawings by two- and
three-year-olds that are considerably more realistic than those of
average children.
Amongst
major artists, however, few are known to have produced drawings or
paintings that display exceptional promise prior to the age of eight or
so (Winner & Martino, 1993).
2.2
Evidence of special capacities that facilitate acquisition of specific
abilities
Some individuals acquire ability more smoothly and effortlessly than
ordinary people, but that fact does not confirm the talent account.
Differences between people in the ease in which a particular skill is
acquired may be caused by any of a number of contributing factors.
These include various motivational and personality influences as well
as previous learning experiences that equip a person with knowledge,
attitudes, skills, and self-confidence. Facility is often the outcome
rather than the cause of unusual capabilities (Perkins, 1981).
Perhaps the clearest indication of a special capacity that is displayed
by a minority early in life in the apparent absence of deliberate
efforts to acquire it and that makes further advances likely, is
encountered in the field of music. A number of young children have
"perfect" or "absolute" pitch perception.
A
child thus endowed can both name and sing specified pitches without
being given a reference pitch (Takeuchi & Hulse, 1993). Structural
differences in brain morphology related to absolute pitch have been
observed. Musicians who have absolute pitch show stronger leftward
planum temporale asymmetry than non-musicians and musicians without
perfect pitch (Schlaug, Jänke, Huang & Steinmetz, 1995).
It is
not clear, however, whether these differences are the cause of absolute
pitch or the outcomes of differences in learning or experience.
One might expect musicians who have absolute pitch to be more
successful than those who do not, but that is not always true. Perfect
pitch perception has circumscribed utility. It makes no contribution to
an individual's interpretative ability, for example.
Moreover,
there is evidence that it can be learned. It is relatively common in
young musicians who are given extensive musical training prior to the
age of five or six, perhaps because a young child pays more attention
to individual notes before coming to perceive sounds as parts of larger
musical structures (Ericsson & Faivre, 1988).
Contrary
to the view that absolute pitch provides clear evidence of a talent, it
is sometimes found in individuals who begin their training late
(Sergent & Roche, 1973), and can even be acquired by adults,
although only with considerable effort (Brady, 1970; Sloboda, 1985;
Takeuchi & Hulse, 1993).
Eidetic imagery has likewise been taken to be a talent. Like absolute
pitch, it is observed in some young children but not others, and it
appears in the absence of deliberate learning. Eidetic imagery seems to
make young children capable of recalling visual information in some
detail, but the phenomenon is somewhat fleeting and hard to verify with
certainty; and it conveys few practical benefits, if any.
Although
the phenomenon seems genuine as a subjective experience, evidence that
eidetic imagery is correlated with above average remembering has proved
elusive (Haber, 1979; Haber & Haber, 1988). There is accordingly
little justification for believing that eidetic imagery conveys an
advantage.
2.3
Evidence of biological involvement in exceptional skills
There is a large body of mainly correlational research on the
relationship between various measures of brain structure, function and
activity and behavioural data. Performance has been linked to (a)
electrocortical measures such as evoked potentials (Hendrikson &
Hendrikson, 1980; Benbow & Lubinski (1993) and their components
(McCarthy & Donchin, 1981), (b) hemispheric laterality data
(Gazzaniga, 1985), (c) brain images (see Eysenck & Barrett, 1993),
and (d) saccadic eye movements (Charlton, Bakan, & Moretti, 1989).
A number of correlates of high ability have been identified, including
left-handedness, immune disorders, myopia (see Benbow & Lubinski,
1993), blood flow measures (Horn, 1986), neurohistology (Scheibel &
Paul, 1985), prenatal exposure to high levels of testosterone
(Geschwind & Behan, 1982), allergy, uric-acid levels, and glucose
metabolism rates (see Storfer, 1990), and laterality (Eysenck &
Barrett, 1993; Fischer, Hunt & Randhawa, 1982).
Sex differences in spatial abilities (Vandenberg, 1966; Humphreys,
Lubinski & Yao, 1993) appear to contribute to sex differences in
mathematical performance and are probably based on biological
differences (Lytton & Romney, 1991; Collaer and Hines, 1995).
Information-processing parameters involved in a number of human
abilities, such as response speed, are at least moderately heritable
(Bouchard, Lykken, McGue, Segal and Tellegen, 1990).
Hereditary
factors underlie various other individual differences in competence,
such as working memory (Dark & Benbow, 1991). Enhanced ability to
manipulate information in short-term memory has been observed in young
people who are unusually successful in mathematics (Dark & Benbow,
1990). Moreover, since there are modest positive correlations between
measures of special skills and heritable basic abilities such as
general intelligence (Ackerman, 1988; Howe, 1989b), it is likely that
some of the innate influences that contribute to variability in
intelligence test scores also contribute to individual differences in
special skills.
In general, the correlational evidence linking performance to brain
characteristics suggests that innately determined biological
differences do contribute to the variability of expertise in specific
areas of competence. However, there is a large gulf between identifying
neural correlates of behavioural differences and finding a neural
predictor of talent. The relations between neural and performance
measures are too weak to warrant conclusions about talent, and
correlations diminish as tasks become more complex (Sternberg, 1993).
To provide support for the talent account, neural correlates of
exceptional skills would have to be accompanied by (1) clarity about
the direction of causality and evidence that the neural measure is (2)
innately determined (rather than the outcome of differences in
experience), (3) specific to an ability, and (4) selectively
facilitates expertise in a minority of individuals. We are unaware of
any neural measures that even come close to meeting these criteria. Nor
has firm alternative evidence of early physical precursors of specific
abilities emerged from studies of either pre-natal capacities or
post-natal cognition (Hepper, 1993; Lecanuet, 1995; Papousek, 1995;
Trehub, 1990).
Ericsson (1990; Ericsson & Crutcher, 1988) has argued that apparent
indicators of structural precursors of ability may need to be
interpreted with caution. He points out that individual differences in
the composition of certain muscles are reliable predictors of
differences in athletic performance, and that this fact has been widely
held to demonstrate genetic determinants of athletic excellence.
Ericsson
notes, however, that differences in the proportion of the slow-twitch
muscle fibres that are essential for success in long-distance running
are largely the result of extended practice in running, rather than the
initial cause of diferential ability. Differences between athletes and
others in their proportions of particular kinds of muscle fibres are
specific to those muscles that are most fully exercised in athletes'
training for their specific specialisation (Howald, 1982).
Some individual differences in brain structure and function are the
outcome of differences in experiences rather than being a primary
cause. Experience can lead to changes in various parts of the mammalian
brain, including the somatosensory, visual, and auditory systems
(Elbert, Pantev, Wienbruch, Rockstroh & Taub, 1995). In violinists
and other string players the cortical representation of the digits of
the left hand (which is involved in fingering the strings) is larger
than in control subjects. The magnitude of the difference is correlated
with the age at which string players began instruction. Differences in
early musical learning experiences may also account for the atypical
brain asymmetries observed in musicians by Schlaug et al. (1995).
Although the evidence of a genetic contribution to human intelligence
is consistent with the talent account, the correlations between general
intelligence and various specific abilities are small (Ceci, 1990; Ceci
& Liker, 1986, Howe, 1989c; 1990b; Keating, 1984). General
intelligence need not limit final levels of achievement (Ackerman,
1988) and general intelligence may have little or no direct influence
on specific abilities (Brynnner & Romney, 1986; Horn, 1986; Howe,
1989c).
Moreover,
there is no evidence of specific gene systems affecting high-level
performance at special skills in the predictive and selective manner
required by the talent account. Psychological traits are more likely to
be influenced indirectly by genes in a probabilistic way (Plomin &
Thompson, 1993). Even in the case of general intelligence, most of the
research addresses the aetiology of individual differences in the
normal range of ability. Relatively little is known about the genetic
origins of high-level ability.
Knowledge about the genetic basis of specific high-level abilities is
particularly limited (Plomin, 1988, Thompson & Plomin, 1993). In
the Minnesota Study of twins reared apart self-ratings of musical
talent correlated .44 among monozygotic twins reared apart,
considerably less than the correlation of .69 for monozygotic twins
reared together (Lykken, in press), suggesting that family experience
makes a substantial contribution to self-ratings of musical ability.
Similarly,
in a study of musical abilities in twins, Coon & Carey (1989)
concluded that among young adults musical ablility was influenced more
by shared family environment than by shared genes. On a number of
measures the correlations between dizygotic twins, which ranged from
.34 to .83, were not much lower than those between monozygotic twins
(.44 to .90).
The importance of general processing constraints diminishes as levels
of expertise increase (Ackerman, 1988; Krampe & Ericsson, 1996),
and some differences in basic skills are predictive of unskilled
performance but less so of skilled performance (Ericsson, Krampe &
Tesch-Römer, 1993). In Coon & Carey's study all eight relevant
estimates of the heritability of musical ability were lower for
participants who had taken some music lessons than for those who took
no lessons at all; the average was less than .20 in the former group.
Genetic differences that are initially relevant to expertise may be
less important when large amounts of training and practice have been
provided.
2.4
Evidence of unusual capacities in autistic savants
In most case-histories of idiots savants it is apparent that the
emergence of special skills is accompanied by obsessive interest and
very high degrees of practice (see, for example Sloboda, Hermelin &
O'Connor, 1985; Howe & Smith, 1988; Howe, 1989a; 1989b). There a
few reports, however, of mentally handicapped children who display
remarkable specific skills that seem to have been acquired in the
absence of deliberate training or instruction. Among the
well-documented cases are those of two child artists and a young
musician; all three were described as being autistic.
From the age of four, one of the artists, a girl named Nadia, was
unusually slow, clumsy, and unresponsive, and spoke hardly at all, but
drew many remarkable pictures, usually of horses, birds and other
animals. These pictures used advanced techniques to represent
perspective, proportion, foreshortening and the illusion of movement;
they also showed impressive manual dexterity (Selfe, 1977). The drawing
skills of the other child artist, Stephen Wiltshire, are equally
impressive (O'Connor & Hermelin, 1987; Sacks, 1995).
A five-year-old autistic boy was described in Leon Miller's (1989)
study of musical abilities in the mentally handicapped. He too was
largely unresponsive to his physical environment and very severely
retarded in language development, with practically no speech. However,
when confronted with a piano keyboard he could not only reproduce a
heard melody but also transform the piece by transposing it to a
different key. He could improvise in ways that conformed to the
conventions of musical composition.
The abilities Miller observed seem to be based on a capacity to encode
the fundamental units quickly and efficiently and to represent musical
items in a complex knowledge system incorporating sensitivity to
harmonic relationships, scale or key constraints, melodic structure,
and stylistic norms.
The remarkable capacities of autistic musicians and artists may seem to
call for something close to the talent account. At least in the cases
of Nadia and the five-year-old boy described by Miller, their observed
level of performance was beyond anything encountered in nonautistic
children of comparable ages.
Exactly
why these children could do things that others cannot remains largely a
matter for speculation, although it is noteworthy that in many
documentated cases the individuals concerned spent many hours each day
concentrating on their special interest. There is no direct evidence
that the causes are innate, and if they do have an innate component its
main direct effect may be to augment the individuals' obsessionality
rather than their specific skills as such.
3.
EVIDENCE APPEARING TO CONTRADICT THE TALENT ACCOUNT
Following Section 2, which examined various kinds of evidence that
appears to be consistent with the talent account, this section cites a
variety of findings in the opposite direction. Other reasons for
questioning the innate talent viewpoint are also introduced.
3.1
Lack of early signs
As noted in Section 2.1, much of the evidence pointing to very early
indications of unusual abilities is either retrospective or based upon
records supplied by parents whose claims to have played no active role
in stimulating their child's progress are belied by other information.
Except in the case of a small number of autistic children mentioned in
Section 2.4, there is no firm evidence of exceptional early progress
without above- average degrees of parental support and encouragement.
This is not to say that parental support or special opportunities and
training account for all instances of excellence.
Innate influences might operate in ways that do not produce early
signs, but to predict progress early evidence of talent is necessary.
Unidentifiable early influences cannot be regarded as instances of
talent, for the reasons given in Section 1.1.
We will first consider some studies of whether children identified as
unusually able by midchildhood or later had displayed any early signs
of special qualities other than those induced by early parental
training or special encouragement.
It is important to keep in mind that early ability is not evidence of
talent unless it emerges in the absence of special opportunities to
learn. For example, it was once thought that the ability of infants in
certain parts of Africa to sit and walk appreciably earlier than
European children must have a genetic basis, but Super (1976) showed
that this inference was wrong.
Studying
infants in a Kenyan tribe, he confirmed that they did indeed display
motor capacities such as walking, standing and sitting without support
a month or so earlier than children in other continents, but he also
discovered that the only skills these infants acquired earlier than
others were those that their mothers deliberately taught them.
When
genetically similar infants from the same tribe were brought up in an
urban environment in which parents did not provide the special training
given in traditional villages, the infants displayed no motor
precocity. Super reported a correlation of -.9 between the age at which
a baby began to crawl and a measure of the extent to which parents
encouraged crawling. These findings do not rule out the possibility
that some early differences have biological bases (Rosser &
Randolph, 1989), but they do show that this cannot be automatically
assumed.
Retrospective interview studies of the early progress of individuals
who eventually excel have provided little evidence of early signs of
promise. Sosniak (1985; 1990) interviewed at length 21 outstanding
American pianists in their mid-thirties, on the brink of careers as
concert pianists. She also talked to their parents. There were few
indications of the musicians displaying signs of future excellence
while they were still very young. In most cases, unusually fast
progress followed rather than preceded a combination of good
opportunities and vigorous encouragement.
Even
by the time the young pianists had received around six years of
relatively intensive training, it would have been possible to make
confident predictions about their eventual success in only a minority
of the cases. Similarly, a biographical study of 165 professional
musicians in Poland produced very few reports of any preschool
behaviour predictive of unusual musicality (Manturzewska, 1986).
A
longitudinal study of elite German tennis players likewise found no
early capacities that predicted tennis performance in early adulthood
(Schneider, 1993; see also Monsaas, 1985). Interview studies of the
childhood progress of accomplished artists (Sloane & Sosniak,
1985), swimmers (Kalinowski, 1985) and mathematicians (Gustin, 1985)
reported very few early signs of exceptional promise prior to
deliberate parental encouragement being given.
Howe, Davidson, Moore & Sloboda (1995) studied the form and
frequency of early signs of musical ability in 257 children, only some
of whom made superior progress as performing musicians. The
investigators asked the parents to indicate whether or not specific
indicators of musical promise had occurred, and if so, when.
The
parents were asked when their child first sang, moved to music, showed
a liking for music, were attentive to music, or sought involvement in a
musical activity. Only with the first of these behaviours, early
singing, did those who were eventually most successful display
(slightly) earlier onset than the other children. In most of these
cases a parent regularly sang to the infant well before any singing by
the infant was observed. (See also Howe & Sloboda, 1991a; 1991b;
1991c; Sloboda & Howe, 1991.)
Some authors have suggested that interest and delight in musical sounds
may be the marks of innate musical potential (Miller, 1989; Winner
& Martino, 1993), but a questionnaire found that they failed as
predictors of later musical competence (Howe, Davidson, Moore &
Sloboda, 1995). In any case, the assumption that even very early
preferences must be innate rather than learned is questionable.
Small
differences in the amount of attention infants give (for any of a
number of reasons) to different kinds of stimuli may elicit
increasingly different actions and responses, which eventually produce
marked preferences and contribute to differences between young children
in their patterns of abilities (Renninger and Wosniak, 1985).
3.2
Evidence pointing to an absence of differences in ease of learning
between "talented" individuals and others
Differences in rate or ease of acquisition could reflect a specific
talent, but only if other influences are ruled out. This is not easy to
do. Confounding variables such as the degree of familiarity of task
items may influence performance even in simple memory tasks based on
highly familiar numbers (Chi & Ceci, 1987; Miller & Gelman,
1983).
Investigations of long-term practice effects provide some relevant
evidence. Sloboda, Davidson, Howe & Moore (1996; see also Sloboda,
1996) found no significant differences between highly successful young
musicians and other children in the amount of practice time they
required in order to make a given amount of progress between succesive
grades in the British musical board examinations.
Group
differences in average progress were no greater than would have been
expected from the differences in the amount of time spent practising.
Consistent with these results, Hayes (1981; Simonton, 1991: see also
Ericsson & Lehmann, 1996; Howe, 1996a; 1996b; in press) found that
that all major composers had needed long periods of training. Hayes
(1981) concludes that at least ten years of preparation are necessary.
Simonton (1991) considers this an underestimate of the amount of time
required.
He
estimates that, on average, prominent composers produced the first of
their compositions to gain a secure place in the classical repertoire
between 26 and 31, having begun music lessons around the age of 9 and
started composing at around 17. Chess players likewise need at least
ten years of sustained preparation to reach international levels of
competitiveness (Simon & Chase, 1973); and those who begin in early
childhood take even longer (Krogius, 1976).
Comparable
periods of preparation and training are essential in various other
areas, including mathematics (Gustin, 1985), X-ray and medical
diagnosis (Patel & Groen, 1991), and sports (Monsaas, 1985;
Kalinowski, 1985; see also Ericsson, Krampe & Tesch-Römer,
1993).
3.3
Exceptional levels of performance in "untalented" people
A body of findings hard to reconcile with the talent account comes from
experiments on ordinary adults who are given large amounts of training
at skills that make heavy demands on memory (Chase & Ericsson,
1981; Ceci, Baker & Bronfenbrenner, 1988) or perception (Ericsson
& Faivre, 1988).
In
some instances, the trained subjects achieved performance levels far
higher than what most people (including experts in the psychology of
learning and memory) had believed possible. Uninformed observers
assumed that the participants must have had a special innate aptitude.
There
have been similar findings in studies of job-related skills in waiters
(Ericsson & Polson, 1988) and bar staff (Bennett, 1983). The
cocktail waitresses in Bennett's study could regularly remember as many
as twenty drink orders at a time: their performance was considerably
better than that of a control group made up of university students. It
is conceivable that people who are employed as waiters and bar staff
gravitate to such jobs because of an inborn memory skill, but the Chase
& Ericsson findings make it far more likely that employees excel in
recalling orders because of on-the-job practice.
Accomplishments that are rare in one culture but relatively commonplace
in another culture also implicate learning rather than gifts. In
certain cultures very high levels of skill (by Western standards) have
been observed in children's swimming and canoeing (Mead, 1975), land
navigation over apparently featureless terrains (Lewis, 1976) and
maritime navigation across open water. Certain musical accomplishments
are also considerably more widespread in some non-Western cultures than
in our own (Blacking, 1973; Feld, 1984; Marshall, 1982; Merriam, 1967;
Messenger, 1958; Sloboda, Davidson & Howe, 1994a; 1994b), and
Australian desert aboriginal children perform better than white
subjects on certain visual memory tasks (Kearins, 1981).
The
fact that such precocious development of some skills in infants
disappears when parents do not apply traditional training customs
(Super, 1976, see Section 3.1) suggests that cultural variability in
performance is caused by differences in opportunities to learn.
3.4
Conceptual difficulties with the notion of talent
There are certain conceptual and logical problems with the idea that
talent contributes to exceptional human abilities. In everyday
discourse reasoning about talent is often circular, for example: "She
plays so well because she has a talent. How do I know she has a talent?
That's obvious, she plays so well!"
Even among researchers who use the concept of talent for explanatory
purposes, the supporting evidence is based on its alleged effects. Like
many scientific constructs, talent is not observed directly but
inferred.
There is nothing wrong with this, but one must be sure that the
findings cannot be accounted for more plausibly without introducing the
talent concept (Howe, 1988a; 1988b; 1990b; 1990c, 1996b; Sloboda et
al., 1994a; 1994b).
4.
ALTERNATIVE INFLUENCES CONTRIBUTING TO THE PHENOMENA ATTRIBUTED TO THE
EFFECTS OF TALENT
The causes of exceptional abilities may not be qualitatively different
from those of less exceptional abilities in ordinary people. The links
between high abilities and experiences that promote learning have been
extensively discussed elsewhere (e.g, Berry, 1990; Howe, 1990a). Here
we will consider the contribution of training and practice to various
kinds of expertise.
Many dimensions of human variability may influence people's learning
experiences and their eventual patterns of ability: (1) relevant prior
knowledge and skills, (2) attentiveness, concentration and
distractibility, (3) interests and acquired preferences, (4) motivation
and competitiveness, (5) self-confidence and optimism, (6) other
aspects of temperament and personality, (7) enthusiasm and energy level
and (8) fatigue and anxiety.
Variations
in opportunities and experiences, and in the appropriateness of
training and the effectiveness of learning, practice and testing
procedures are also influential.
4.1 Evidence from studies of practising
Dramatic effects of training and practice on ordinary people were
discussed in Section 3.3. Even those who are believed to be
exceptionally talented, whether in music, mathematics, chess or sports,
require lengthy periods of instruction and practice (Ericsson, Krampe
& Tesch-Römer, 1993; Ericsson & Charness, 1994; Charness,
Krampe & Mayr, 1996; Starkes, Deakin, Allard & Hayes, 1996).
Music
is an area of competence thought to be especially dependent upon talent
(Davis, 1994; O'Neill, 1994); hence practice effects in other areas of
competence are likely to be at least as strong as in music.
Ericsson and his coworkers (Ericsson, Krampe & Heizmann, 1993,
Ericsson, Tesch-Römer & Krampe, 1990) have found strong
correlations between the level of performance of student violinists in
their twenties and the number of hours of formal practice they had
engaged in.
By the
age of 21 the best students in the performance class of a conservatoire
had accumulated around 10,000 hours practice, compared with less than
half that amount for students in the same institution who were training
to be violin teachers. Differences of similar magnitude were found in a
study comparing expert and amateur pianists (Krampe, 1994).
Measures
of the accumulated amount of practice since instrumental lessons began
were good predictors of within-group as well as between-group
differences in performance. Studies of expert musicians by Manturzewska
(1990), Sloboda & Howe (1991) and Sosniak (1985) provide further
evidence that regular practice is essential for acquiring and
maintaining high levels of ability. Furthermore, considerable help and
encouragement is required by all young players, even those thought by
their teachers and parents to be highly talented, if they are to
maintain the levels of practice necessary to achieve expertise (Sloboda
& Howe, 1991; see also Section 4.2).
Sloboda, Davidson, Howe & Moore (1996) supplemented retrospective
data on practice with concurrent diary-based information. They
confirmed the strong positive correlation between practice and
achievement, which was largest for the more formal and deliberate kinds
of practice activities, such as scales and exercises.
To
achieve the highest level (Grade 8) of the British Associate Board
examinations in performing music required an average of around 3300
hours of practice irrespective of the ability group to which the young
people in the study were assigned. This suggests that practice is a
direct cause of achievement level rather than merely a correlate of it.
Correlations between measures of performance and amounts of practice by
music students range from around +.3 to above +.6 (Lehmann, 1995). It
is likely that these figures substantially underestimate the real
magnitude of the relationship between performance and practice, for the
following reasons: (1) the performance measures provided by grade
levels are inexact indicators of attainment; (2) global measures of
practice time do not take into account the effectiveness of the
particular practice strategies or (3) the role of other potentially
influential factors such as the student's level of alertness,
enthusiasm and determination to do well.
Kliegl,
Smith & Baltes (1989) have confirmed that the intensity and quality
of practice are as important as the sheer amount of it. Of course, the
finding that practising is a major determinant of success does not rule
out inherited influences; some traits that affect practising, such as
the capacity to persist, may have innate components, but such
components would not constitute "talents," as required by the talent
account.
To summarise, there may be little or no basis for innate giftedness for
the followng reasons: (1) the lack of convincing positive evidence
(Section 2); (2) the substantial amount of negative evidence (Section
3); (3) the finding that even crude retrospective measures of practice
are predictive of levels of performance (Section 4.1); (4) the
observation by both Hayes and Simonton that "talented" individuals do
not reach high levels of expertise without very substantial amounts of
training (Section 3.2); (5) the evidence of Ericsson and others that
people who are assumed to possess no talent are capable of very high
levels of performance when given sufficient opportunities for training
(Section 3.3); and (6) the apparent absence of differences in the
amount of practice time required by the most- and least-successful
young musicians to make an equivalent amount of progress (Sections 3.2
and 4.1).
The
conclusion is reinforced when some of the other measurable factors
known to contribute to variability in performance are taken into
account: opportunities, preparatory experiences, encouragement,
support, motivation, self-confidence, perseverance, single-minded
concentration (Howe, 1975; 1980).
To
these influences must also be added differences in quality of
instruction, effectiveness of practice strategy, and degree of
enthusiasm.
4.2
Criticisms and counter-arguments
There has been considerable opposition to the suggestion that the
influence usually attributed to talent can be accounted for by the many
known determinants of performance levels (including hereditary ones)
that fall outside the definition of talent (Davidson, Howe, Moore &
Sloboda, 1996; Ericsson, Krampe & Heizmann, 1993; Sloboda &
Howe, 1991; 1992; Sloboda et al., 1994a; 1996).
A
first objection is that the evidence linking practice to progress is
largely correlational. Most of the findings take the form of data
showing that the more a person trains and practices, the higher their
level of performance. These correlations could merely indicate that
those individuals who are successful in a field of expertise and
committed to it are likely to spend more time practising than those who
are less successful.
One counterargument is that the findings closely parallel those
obtained in training studies in which amounts of practice have been
deliberately manipulated (Ericsson, Tesch-Römer & Krampe,
1990).
Also
relevant is the finding by Sloboda et al. (1996) that the rate of
progress of young musicians in a given year is most highly correlated
with the amount of practice and teacher input in that same year,
whereas if the correlation simply reflected differing lifestyles of
more and less successful performers the amount of progress in one year
would be more highly correlated with the amount of practice in the
following year.
It is conceivable that some children practice more than others because
they have some kind of innate potential that encourages them to do so.
However, as Sloboda & Howe (1991; Howe & Sloboda, 1991b)
discovered, even among highly successful young musicians, the majority
freely admit that without strong parental encouragement to practice
they would never have done the amounts of regular practising needed to
make good progress.
Strong
and sustained parental encouragement to practise was evident in
virtually all successful young musicians (Davidson et al., 1996). It is
conceivable that the parents who gave the most support did so because
they detected signs of special potential, but that seems unlikely in
view of the failure to find early signs of excellence in those children
who later excelled (Section 3).
Parents' beliefs about their children's putative talents can of course
affect parental behaviours; hence such beliefs may have indirectly
affected children's performance (e.g., Brophy & Good, 1973). As
noted in Section 1, it is also true that self-beliefs can be predictors
of future performance (Dweck, 1986; Sloboda et al., 1994a; Vispoel
& Austin, 1993). However, the question at issue is whether talent
as such, as distinct from individuals' beliefs about its presence, has
an influence on a child's attainments.
A second objection is that although differences in training, practice,
and other aspects of individuals' experiences can go a long way towards
accounting for differences in technical skills, they fail to account
for those differences in less tangible traits, such as expressivity or
creativity, that separate the most exceptional performers from others.
This
objection represents a certain shifting of the goalposts when it is
introduced as an argument for the existence of talent. Nevertheless, it
needs to be considered. Expressivity in music has been discussed by
Sloboda (1996) who argues that although technical skills must be
acquired ab initio by extensive instrument-specific practice, some
expressive accomplishments may occur rather early through an
application of existing knowledge (such as emotional signals, gestures
and other bodily movements) to the domain of music.
People
might differ in musical expressivity in the absence of any differences
in music-specific practice for a variety of reasons, one being that
people differ in their levels of non-musical expressivity. Expressive
ability may thus appear to arise in the absence of overt evidence of
practice or teaching, but this does not mean it is innate.
A third possible objection is that although practice, training and
other known influences may jointly account for performance differences
in the majority of people, there could be a small number of individuals
to whom this does not apply. Evidence to support this objection is
lacking, however.
The fourth criticism is that although comparisons between more and less
successful groups of people may not have revealed differences in the
amount of practice needed to achieve a given amount of progress
(Sloboda, Davidson, Howe & Moore, 1996), this does not demonstrate
that such differences do not exist at an individual level, and there is
some evidence that they do (Charness et al. 1996).
In
future research on practising it would be desirable to pay more
attention to individual differences. However, as reported in Section
3.2, no case has been encountered of anyone reaching the highest levels
of achievement in chess-playing, mathematics, music or sports without
devoting thousands of hours to serious training.
5.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
We began this target article by describing the widespread belief that
in order to reach high levels of ability a person needs to have an
innate potential called talent. Because the belief in talent has
important social and educational consequences, affecting selection
procedures and training policies, it is important to establish whether
it is correct. Belief in talent may also act as a barrier to further
exploration of the causes of excellence in specific domains of ability.
To ensure that our use of the term coincided with that of scientific
researchers as well as teachers and practitioners, we suggested that
(1) a talent has its origin in genetically transmitted structures, (2)
there are early indicators of talent, (3) talent provides a basis for
estimating the probability of excelling, (4) only a minority of
individuals have special talents, and (5) the effects of a talent will
be relatively specific.
In examining the evidence and the arguments for and against the talent
account, we began in Section 2 by considering positive findings. We
examined evidence that certain young children excel without special
encouragement and that some children are born with special capacities
that facilitate the acquisition of particular abilities.
There
proved to be little evidence of early accomplishments that could not be
explained by other known determinants of early progress. We also found
no evidence of innate attributes operating in the predictable and
specific manner implied by the talent account, apart from autistic
savants with exceptional skills that appear to stem from an involuntary
specialization of their mental activities.
Section 3 surveyed evidence contrary to the talent account. The absence
of early signs of special ability was discussed. Where early precocity
is encountered it is invariably preceded by ample opportunities and
encouragement. In addition, when prior differences in knowledge,
skills, motivation, and other factors known to affect performance are
controlled for, there is little evidence of individual differences in
ease of learning.
High
levels of accomplishment invariably require lengthy and intensive
training, and even people who are not believed to have any special
talent can reach, purely as a result of training, levels of achievement
previously thought to be attainable by innately gifted individuals
(Section 3.3). There are also logical and conceptual arguments against
the notion that talent is explanatory (Section 3.4).
Section 4 examined alternatives to the talent account. Large amounts of
regular practice were found to be essential for excelling. Studies of
long-term practice and training suggest that individual differences in
learning-related experiences are a major source of the variance in
achievement.
The evidence we have surveyed in this target article does not support
the talent account, according to which excelling is a consequence of
possessing innate gifts.
This
conclusion has practical implications, because categorising some
children as innately talented is discriminatory. The evidence suggests
that such categorization is unfair and wasteful, preventing young
people from pursuing a goal because of teachers' or parents'
unjustified conviction that they would not benefit from the superior
opportunities given to those who are deemed to be talented.
To the question, "If talents do not exist, how can one explain the
phenomena attributed to them?", we do not claim to have a full or
precise answer. However, we have listed a number of possible
influences, and evidence of their effects.
Innate talents are inferred rather than observed directly. One reason
for assuming that they exist at all has been to explain individual
differences, but these can be adequately accounted for by experiential
ones such as training and practice, as well as biological influences
that lack the specifity and predictable consequences associated with
the notion of talent.
It could be argued that the talent account is not totally wrong, but
simply exaggerated and oversimplified. In our list of the five defining
attributes of innate talents (Section 1.1), two are relatively
unproblematic: (1) individual differences in some special abilities may
indeed have partly genetic origins, and (4) there do exist some
attributes that are only possessed by only a minority of individuals.
Talents in this very restricted sense may be said to exist.
One might argue for retaining the concept of talent even though the
other three criteria are not met. If the underlying issues were
exclusively academic this would be reasonable. "Talent" would be the
place-holder for the as-yet-unmapped influence of biology on special
expertise. In practice, however, the other three attributes - (2) being
identifiable before the emergence of high ability, (3) providing a
basis for predicting excellence, and (5) being domain-specific - are
crucial, because it is precisely these attributes that are the ones
regarded by practitioners as justifying selectivity and discrimination.
References
Ackerman, P. L (1988) determinants of individual differences during
skill acquisition: cognitive abilities and information processing.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 117: 299-318.
Benbow, C. P. & Lubinski, D. (1993) Psychological profiles of the
mathematically talented: some sex differences and evidence supporting
their biological basis. In Ciba Foundation Symposium 178: the origins
and development of high ability, ed. G. R. Bock & K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Bennett, H. L. (1983) Remembering drink orders: the memory skills of
cocktail waitresses. Human Learning: Journal of Practical Research and
Applications, 2: 157-170.
Berry, C. (1990) On the origins of exceptional intellectual and
cultural achievement. In: Encouraging the development of exceptional
abilities and talents, ed. M. J. A. Howe, British Psychological Society.
Blacking, J (1973) How musical is man?, Faber & Faber.
Bouchard, T. J., Lykken, D. T., McGue, M., Segal, N. L. & Tellegen,
A. (1990) Sources of human psychological differences: the Minnesota
study of twins reared apart. Science, 250: 223-228.
Bornstein, M. H. & Sigman, M. D. (1986) Infant habituation:
assessments of individual differences and short-term reliability at
five months. Child Development. 57: 87-99.
Brady, P. T. (1970) The genesis of absolute pitch. Journal of the
acoustical society of America, 48: 883-887.
Brophy, J. & Good, T. (1973) Individual differences: toward an
understanding of classroom life, Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
Bynner, J. M., & Romney, D. M. (1986). Intelligence, fact or
artefact: alternative structures for cognitive abilities. British
Journal of Educational Psychology, 56: 13-23.
Ceci, S. J. (1990) On intelligence ... more or less: a bio-ecological
treatise on intellectual development, Prentice Hall.
Ceci, S. J., Baker, J. G. & Bronfenbrenner, U. (1987) Prospective
remembering, temporal calibration, and context. In: Practical aspects
of memory: current research and issues, ed. M. M. Gruneberg, P. Morris
& R. Sykes, Wiley.
Ceci, S. J. & Liker, J (1986) A day at the races: a study of IQ,
expertise, and cognitive complexity. Journal of Experimental
Psychology: General, 115: 255-266.
Charness, N., Krampe, R. Th. & Mayr, U. (1986) The role of practice
and coaching in entrepreneurial skill domains: an international
comparison of life-span chess skill acquisition. In: The road to
excellence: the acquisition of expert performance in the arts and
sciences, ed. K. A. Ericsson, Erlbaum.
Chase, W. G. & Ericsson, K. A. (1981) Skilled memory. In: Cognitive
skills and their acquisition, ed. J. R. Anderson, Erlbaum.
Chi, M. T. H. & Ceci, S. J. (1987) Content knowledge: its role,
representation, and restructuring in memory development. Advances in
Child Development, 20: 91-142.
Columbo, J. (1993) Infant cognition: predicting later intellectual
functioning, Sage.
Coon, H. & Carey, G. (1989) Genetic and environmental determinants
of musical ability in twins. Behavior Genetics, 19: 183-193.
Dark, V. J., & Benbow, C. P. (1990) Enhanced problem tanslation and
short- term memory: components of mathematical talent. Journal of
Educational Psychology, 82: 420-429.
Dark, V. J., & Benbow, C. P. (1991) The differential enhancement of
working memory with mathematical versus verbal precocity. Journal of
Educational Psychology, 83: 48-60.
Davidson, J. W., Howe, M. J. A., Moore, D. G., & Sloboda, J. A.
(1996) The role of parental influences in the development of musical
performance. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 14: 399-412
Davies, J. B. (1994) Seeds of a false consciousness. The Psychologist,
7: 355-356.
Davis, M. (1994) Folk music psychology. The Psychologist, 7: 537.
Detterman, D. K. (1993) Discussion (page 234). In: Ciba Foundation
Symposium 178: the origins and development of high ability, ed. G. R.
Bock & K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Dweck, C. S. (1986) Motivational processes affecting learning. American
Psychologist, 41: 1040-1048.
Elbert, T., Pantev, C., Wienbruch, C., Rockstroh, B. & Taub, E.
(1995) Increased cortical
Ericsson, K. A. (1990) Peak performance and age: an examination of peak
performance in sports. In: Successful aging: perspectives from the
behavioral sciences, ed. P. B. Baltes and M. M. Baltes, Cambridge
University Press.
Ericsson, K. A., & Charness, N. (1995a) Expert performance: its
structure and acquisition. American Psychologist, 49: 725-747.
Ericsson, K. A., & Charness, N. (1995b) Abilities: evidence for
talent or characteristics acquired through engagement in relevant
activities. American Psychologist, 50: 803-804.
Ericsson, K. A. & Crutcher, R. J. (1988) The nature of exceptional
performance. In: Life-span development and behavior, ed. P. B. Baltes,
D. L. Featherman & R. M. Lerner, vol. 10.
Ericsson, K. A. & Faivre, I. A. (1988) What's exceptional about
exceptional abilities? In: The exceptional brain, ed. L. K. Obler &
D. Fein, Guilford Press.
Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. Th. & Heizmann, S. (1993) Can we create
gifted people? In: Ciba Foundation Symposium 178: the origins and
development of high ability, ed. G. R. Bock & K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. Th., & Tesch-Römer, C. (1993) The
role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance.
Psychological Review, 100: 363-406.
Ericson, K. A. & Lehmann, A. C. (1996) Expert and exceptional
performance: evidence of maximal adaptation to task constraints. Annual
Review of Psychology, 47:
Ericsson, K. A., & Polson, P. G. (1988). An experimental analysis
of a memory skill for dinner-orders. Journal of Experimental
Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 14: 305-316.
Ericsson, K. A., Tesch-Römer, C. & Krampe, R. Th. (1990) In:
Encouraging the development of exceptional abilities and talents, ed.
M. J. A. Howe, British Psychological Society.
Eysenck, H. J. (1995) Genius: the natural history of creativity,
Cambridge University Press.
Eysenck, H. J. & Barrett, P. T. (1993) Brain research related to
giftedness. In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
Feld, S. (1984) Sound structure as a social structure. Ethnomusicology,
28: 383-409.
Feldman, D. H. (1980) Beyond universals in cognitive development, Ablex.
Feldman, D. H. with Goldsmith, L. (1986) Nature's gambit: child
prodigies and the development of human potential, Basic Books.
Feldman, D. H. (1988) Creativity: dreams, insights, and
transformations. In: The nature of creativity, ed. R. J. Sternberg,
Cambridge University Press.
Fowler, W. (1981) Case studies of cognitive precocity: the role of
exogenous and endogenous stimulation in early mental development.
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 2: 319-367.
Fowler, W. (1983) Potentials of childhood, vol. 1: a historical view of
early experience, Heath.
Freeman, J. (1990) The intellectually gifted adolescent. In:
Encouraging the development of exceptional skills and talents, ed. M.
J. A. Howe, British Psychological Society.
Gagné, F. (1993) Constructs and models pertaining to exceptional
human abilities. In: International handbook of research and development
of giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A.
H. Passow, Pergamon.
Gardner, H. (1984) Frames of mind, Heinemann.
Gardner, H. (1993a) Multiple intelligences: the theory in practice,
Basic Books.
Gardner, H. (1995). Why would anyone become an expert? American
Psychologist, 50: 802-803.
Gazzaniga, M. S. (1985) The social brain: discovering the networks of
the mind, Basic Books.
Geary, D. C. (1995) Sexual selection and sex differences in
mathematical abilities. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18:
Geschwind, N. & Behan, P. (1982) Left-handedness: associations with
immune disease, migraine, and developmental learning disorders.
Proceedings of the National Acadamy of Science, 79: 5097-5010.
Goldsmith, G. (1990) The timing of talent: the facilitation of early
prodigious achievement. In: Encouraging the development of exceptional
skills and talents, ed. M. J. A. Howe, British Psychological Society.
Gross, M. U. M. (1993a) Nurturing the talents of exceptionally gifted
individuals. In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
Gross, M. U. M. (1993b) Exceptionally gifted children, Routledge.
Gustin, W. C. (1985) The development of exceptional research
mathematicians. In: Developing talent in young people, ed. B. S. Bloom,
Ballantine.
Haber, R. N. (1979) Twenty years of haunting eidetic imagery: where's
the ghost? The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 2: 583-594.
Haber, R. N. & Haber, L. R. (1988) The characteristics of eidetic
imagery. In: The exceptional brain, ed. L. K. Obler & D. Fein,
Guilford Press.
Hargreaves, D. J. (1986) The developmental psychology of music,
Cambridge University Press.
Hargreaves, D. J. (1994) Musical education for all. The Psychologist,
7: 357-358.
Hayes, J. R. (1981) The complete problem solver, Franklin Institute
Press.
Heller, K. A. (1993) Scientific ability. In: Ciba Foundation Symposium
178: the origins and development of high ability, ed. G. R. Bock &
K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Hendrikson, A. E. & Hendrikson, D. E. (1980) The biological basis
for individual differences in intelligence. Personality and Individual
Differences, 1: 3-33.
Hepper, P. G. (1991) An examination of fetal learning before and after
birth. Irish Journal of Psychology, 12: 95-107.
Hollingworth, L. S. (1942) Children above IQ 180: origin and
development, World Books.
Horn, J. L. (1986) Intellectual ability concepts. In: Advances in the
psychology of human intelligence, volume 3, ed. R. J. Sternberg,
Erlbaum.
Howe, M. J. A. (1975) Learning in infants and young children, Macmillan.
Howe, M. J. A. (1980) The psychology of human learning, Harper &
Row.
Howe, M.J.A. (1982) Biographical information and the development of
outstanding individuals. American Psychologist, 37: 1071-1081.
Howe, M. J. A. (1988a) Intelligence as an explanation. British Journal
of Psychology, 79: 349-360.
Howe, M .J. A. (1988b) The hazards of using correlational evidence as a
means of identifying the causes of individual ability differences: a
rejoinder to Sternberg and a reply to Miles. British Journal of
Psychology, 79: 539-545.
Howe, M.J.A. (1989a) Fragments of genius: The strange feats of idiots
savants, Routledge.
Howe, M. J. A. (1989b) The strange achievements of idiots savants. In:
Psychology survey 7, ed. A. M. Colman & J. G. Beaumont, British
Psychological Society/Routledge.
Howe, M.J.A. (1989c) Separate skills or general intelligence: the
autonomy of human abilities. British Journal of Educational Psychology,
59: 351-360
Howe, M. J. A. (1990a) The origins of exceptional abilities, Blackwell.
Howe, M.J.A. (1990b) Does intelligence exist? The Psychologist, 3:
490-493.
Howe, M.J.A. (1990c) Gifts, talents, and natural abilities: an
explanatory mythology? Educational and Child Psychology, 7: 52-54.
Howe, M.J.A. (1993) The early lives of child prodigies. In: Ciba
Foundation Symposium 178: the origins and development of high ability,
ed. G. R. Bock & K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Howe, M. J. A. (1995) What can we learn from the lives of geniuses? In:
Actualizing talent: a lifelong challenge, ed. J. Freeman, P. Span,
& H. Wagner, Cassell.
Howe, M. J. A. (1996a) The childhoods and early lives of geniuses:
combining psychological and biographical evidence. In: The road to
excellence: the acquisition of expert performance in the arts and
sciences, ed. K. A. Ericsson, Erlbaum.
Howe, M. J. A. (1996b) Concepts of ability. In: Human abilities: their
nature and measurement, ed. I. Dennis & P. Tapsfield, Erlbaum.
Howe, M. J. A. (in press) Beyond psychobiography: towards more
effective syntheses of psychology and biography. British Journal of
Psychology.
Howe, M. J. A., Davidson, J. W., Moore, D. G. & Sloboda, J. A.
(1995) Are there early childhood signs of musical ability? Psychology
of Music, 23: 162-176.
Howe, M. J. A. & Sloboda, J. A. (1991a) Young Musicians' accounts
of significant influences in their early lives: 1. The family and the
musical background. British Journal of Music Education, 8: 39-52.
Howe, M. J. A. & Sloboda, J.A. (1991b) Young musicians' accounts of
significant influences in their early lives: 2. Teachers, practising
and performing. British Journal of Music Education, 8: 53-63.
Howe, M. J. A. & Sloboda, J. A. (1991c) Early signs of talents and
special interests in the lives of young musicians. European Journal of
High Ability, 2: 102-111.
Howe, M. J. A. & Smith, J. (1988) Calendar calculating in "idiots
savants": how do they do it? British Journal of Psychology, 79: 371-386.
Humphreys, L. G., Lubinski, D., and Yao, G. (1993) Utility of
predicting group membership and the role of spatial visualization in
becoming an engineer, physical scientist, or artist. Journal of Applied
Psychology, 78: 250-261.
Kalinowski, A. G. (1985) The development of Olympic swimmers. In:
Developing talent in young people, ed. B. S. Bloom, Ballantine.
Kearins, J. M. (1981) The visual spatial memory in Australian
Aboriginal children of desert regions. Cognitive Psychology, 1981:
434-460.
Keating, D. P. (1984) The emperor's new clothes: the "new look" in
intelligence research. In: Advances in human intelligence, vol. 2, ed.
R. J. Sternberg, Erlbaum.
Kliegl, R., Smith, J. & Baltes, P. B. (1989) Testing the limits and
the study of adult age differences in cognitive plasticity of a
mnemonic skill. Developmental Psychology, 25: 247-256.
Krampe, R. Th. (1994) Maintaining excellence: Cognitive-motor
performance in pianists differing in age and skill level,
Max-Planck-Institut für Bildungsorschung.
Krampe, R. Th.. & Ericsson, K. A. (1996). Maintaining excellence:
Cognitive- motor performance in pianists differing in age and skill
level. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Krogius, N. (1976) Psychology in chess, RHM Press.
Lecanuet, J. P. (1995) Prenatal auditory experience. In: Perception and
cognition of music, ed. I. Deliege & J. A. Sloboda, Erlbaum.
Lehmann, A. C. (1995) The acquisition of expertise in music: efficiency
of deliberate practice as a moderating variable in accounting for
sub-expert performance. In: Perception and cognition of music, ed. I.
Deliege & J. A. Sloboda, Erlbaum.
Lewis, D. (1976) Observations on route finding and spatial orientation
among the aboriginal peoples of the western desert region of central
Australia. Oceania, 46: 349-282.
Manturzewska, M. (1986) Musical talent in the light of biographical
research. In: Musikalische Begabung finden und förden, Bosse.
McCarthy, G. & Donchin, E. (1981). A metric for thought: a
comparison of P300 latency and reaction time. Science, 211: 77-79.
Manturzewska, M. (1990) A biographical study of the life-span
development of professional musicians. Psychology of Music, 18: 112-139.
Marshall, C. (1982) Towards a comparative aesthetics of music. In:
Cross cultural perspectives in music, ed. R. Falck & T. Rice,
University of Toronto Press.
Mead, M. (1975) Growing up in New Guinea, Morrow.
Merriam, A. P. (1967) The ethnomusicology of the flathead indians,
Aldine.
Messenger, J. (1958) Esthetic talent. Basic College Quarterly, 4: 20-24.
Miller, L.K. (1989) Musical Savants: Exceptional skill in the mentally
retarded, Erlbaum.
Miller, K. & Gelman, R. (1983) The child's representation of
number: a multidimensional scaling analysis. Child Development, 54:
1470-1479.
Monsaas, J. (1985) Learning to be a world-class tennis player. In:
Developing talent in young people, ed. B. S. Bloom, Ballantine.
O'Connor, N. & Hermelin, B. (1987) Visual and graphic abilities of
the idiot savant artist. Psychological Medecine, 17: 79-90.
O'Neill, S. (1994) Factors influencing children's motivation and
achievement during the first year of instrumental music tuition.
Proceedings of the third international conference on music perception
and cognition, University of Liege, Belgium.
Papousek, H. (1995) Musicality and infancy research. In: Perception and
cognition of music, ed. I. Deliege & J. A. Sloboda, Erlbaum.
Parncutt, R. (1993) Prenatal experience and the origins of music. In:
Prenatal perception, learning and bonding, ed. T. Blum, Leonardo.
Patel, V. L. & Groen, G. J. (1991) The general and specific nature
of medical expertise: a critical look. In: Toward a general theory of
expertise, ed. K. A. Ericson & J. Smith, Cambridge University Press.
Perkins, D. N. (1981) The mind's best work, Harvard University Press.
Plomin, R. (1988) The nature and nurture of cognitive abilities. In:
Advances in the psychology of human intelligence, ed. R. Sternberg,
Erlbaum.
Plomin, R. & Thompson, L. A. (1993) Genetics and high cognitive
ability. In: Ciba Foundation Symposium 178: the origins and development
of high ability, ed. G. R. Bock & K. Ackrill, Wiley.
Radford, J. (1990) Child prodigies and exceptional early achievers,
Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Radford, J. (1994) Variations on a musical theme. The Psychologist, 7:
359- 360.
Renninger, K. A. & Wozniak, R. N. (1985) Effect of interest on
attentional shift, recognition and recall in young children.
Developmental Psychology, 21: 624-632.
Revesz, G. (1925) The psychology of a musical prodigy, Kegan Paul,
Trench & Trubner.
Rosser, P. L., & Randolph, S. M. (!989) Black American infants: the
Howard University study. In: The cultural context of infancy, volume 1,
biology, culture and infant development, ed. J. K. Nugent, B. M. Lester
& T. B. Brazelton, Ablex.
Sacks, O. (1995) An anthropologist on Mars, Picador.
Schlaug, G., Jäncke, L., Huang, Y., & Steinmetz, H. (1995). In
vivo evidence of structural brain asymmetry in musicians. Science, 267:
699-701.
Scheibel, A. B. & Paul, L. (1985) On the apparent non-adhesive
nature of axospinous dendritic synapses. Experimental neurology, 89:
279-283.
Schneider, W. (1993) Acquiring expertise: determinants of exceptional
performance. In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
Selfe, L. (1977) Nadia: a case of extraordinary drawing ability in an
autistic child, Academic Press. Selfe, L. (1983) Normal and anomalous
representational drawing ability in children, Academic Press.
Sergent, D. & Roche, S. (1973) Perceptual shifts in the auditory
information processing of young children. Psychology of Music, 1: 39-48.
Shuter-Dyson, R. & Gabriel, C. (1981) The psychology of musical
ability, 2nd edition, Methuen.
Simon, H. A. & Chase, W. D. (1973) Skill in chess. American
Scientist, 61: 394-403.
Simonton, D. K. (1991). Emergence and realization of genius: The lives
and works of 120 classical composers. Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 61: 829-840.
Slater, A. (1995) Individual differences in infancy and later IQ.
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 36: 69-112.
Sloan, K. D., & Sosniak, L. A. (1985) The development of
accomplished sculptors. In: Developing talent in young people, ed. B.
S. Bloom, Ballantine.
Sloboda, J. A. (1985) The musical mind, Clarendon Press.
Sloboda, J. A. (1991) Musical expertise. In: Toward a general theory of
expertise, ed. K. A. Ericsson & J. Smith, Cambridge University
Press.
Sloboda, J. A. (1996) The acquisition of musical performance expertise:
deconstructing the "talent" account of individual differences in
musical expressivity. In: The road to excellence: the acquisition of
expert performance in the arts and sciences, ed. K. A. Ericsson,
Erlbaum.
Sloboda, J. A., Davidson, J. W. & Howe, M. J. A. (1994a) Is
everyone musical? The Psychologist, 7: 349-354.
Sloboda, J. A., Davidson, J. W. & Howe, M. J. A. (1994b) Musicians:
experts not geniuses. The Psychologist, 7: 363-364.
Sloboda, J. A., Davidson, J. W., Howe, M. J. A. & Moore, D. G.
(1996) The role of practice in the development of performing musicians.
British Journal of Psychology, 87:
Sloboda, J. A., Hermelin, B. & O'Connor, N. (1985) An exceptional
musical memory. Music Perception, 3: 155-170.
Sloboda, J. A. & Howe, M .J. A. (1991) Biographical precursors of
musical excellence: an interview study. Psychology of Music, 19:3-21.
Sloboda, J. A. & Howe, M .J. A. (1992) Transitions in the early
musical careers of able young musicians: choosing instruments and
teachers. Journal of Research in Music Education, 40: 283-294.
Sosniak, L. A. (1985) Learning to be a concert pianist. In: Developing
talent in young people, ed. B. S. Bloom, Ballantine.
Sosniak, L. A. (1990) The tortoise, the hare, and the development of
talent. In: Encouraging the development of exceptional abilities and
talents, ed. M. J. A. Howe, British Psychological Society.
Starkes, J., Deakin, J., Allard, F., Hodges, N., & Hayes, A. (1996)
Deliberate practice in sports: what is it anyway? In: The road to
excellence: the acquisition of expert performance in the arts and
sciences, ed. K. A. Ericsson, Erlbaum.
Sternberg, R. J. (1993) Procedures for identifying intellectual
potential in the gifted: a perspective on alternative "metaphors of
mind". In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
Storfer, M. D. (1990) Intelligence and giftedness: the contributions of
heredity and early environment, Jossey-Bass.
Super, C. (1976) Environmental effects on motor development: the case
of "African infant precocity". Developmental Medicine and Child
Neurology, 18: 561-567.
Takeuchi, A. H. & Hulse, S. H. (1993) Absolute pitch. Psychological
Bulletin, 113: 345-361.
Thompson, L. A. & Plomin, R. (1993) Genetic influence on cognitive
ability. In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
Torff, B., & Winner, E. (1994) Don't throw out the baby with the
bath water. The Psychologist, 7: 361-362.
Treffert, D. A. (1989) Extraordinary People, Harper & Row.
Trehub, S. E. (1990) The perception of musical patterns by human
infants: the provision of similar paterns by their parents. In:
Comparative perception, vol. 1: Basic mechanisms, ed. M. A. Berkeley
& W. C. Stebbins, Wiley.
Usher, J. A. & Neisser, U. (1993) Childhood amnesia and the
beginnings of memory for four early life events. Journal of
Experimental Psychology: General, 122: 155-165.
Vispoel, W. P. & Austin, J. R. (1993) Constructive response to
failure in music: the role of attribution feedback and classroom goal
structure. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 63: 110-129.
Winner, E. (1996) The rage to master: the decisive role of talent in
the visual arts. In: The road to excellence: the acquisition of expert
performance in the arts and sciences, ed. K. A. Ericsson, Erlbaum.
Winner, E. & Martino, G. (1993) Giftedness in the visual arts and
music.In: International handbook of research and development of
giftedness and talent, ed. K. A. Heller, F. J. Mönks & A. H.
Passow, Pergamon.
------
Article source
http://www.bbsonline.org/Preprints/OldArchive/bbs.howe.html
Unedited
penultimate draft of:
Howe, M.J.A., Davidson, J.W., & Sloboda, J.A. (19XX). Innate
talents: Reality or myth? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, XX (X):
XXX-XXX.
Authors:
Michael J. A. Howe, Department of Psychology
University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QG ENGLAND
Jane W. Davidson, Department of Music
University of Sheffield Sheffield S10 2TN ENGLAND
John A. Sloboda, Department of Psychology, Keele University
Keele Staffordshire ST5 5BG ENGLAND
~ ~ ~
|
|