The Eyferth study is the name often given to a study conducted by psychologist Klaus Eyferth concerning the IQs of white and racially mixed children in post-Second World WarWest Germany. The mothers of the children studied were white German women, while their fathers were white and African-American members of the US occupation forces. In contrast to results obtained in many American studies, the average IQs of the children studied were roughly similar across racial groups, making the study an oft-cited piece of evidence in the debate about race and intelligence. Eyferth's study was first published under the title Eine Untersuchung der Neger-Mischlingskinder in Westdeutschland in the journal Vita Humana in 1959. Eyferth described further results of his study in the paper Leistungen verschiedener Gruppen von Besatzungskindern in Hamburg-Wechsler Intelligenztest für Kinder , which was published in the journal Archiv für die gesamte Psychologie in 1961.
Study design
The children studied had been raised by their unmarried German mothers. Most of the fathers, white or black, had been members of the US occupation forces stationed in Germany. At the time of the study, the children were aged between 5 and 13. The mothers of the children were approximately matched for socio-economic status; they were mostly of low SES. There were about 98 mixed race, and about 83 white children in the sample. The total sample consisted of about 5 percent of the German children known to have been fathered by black soldiers between 1945 and 1953, in addition to a matched sample of 83 German children whose fathers were white soldiers. Of the fathers of the mixed-race children, about 80 percent were French Africans and the remaining approximately 20 percent were African Americans. For assessing IQ, a German version of the WISCintelligence test was used.
Results
The white children studied averaged an IQ of 97.2, whereas the average of the racially mixed children was 96.5. Sorted out by sex and race, the average scores obtained were:
Group
Boys
Girls
Difference
White
101
93
8
Mixed race
97
96
1
Difference
-4
3
Interpretations
"Environmentalists"
Stressing the similarity of average IQ scores across racial groups in the Eyferth study, Jim Flynn, Richard E. Nisbett, Nathan Brody, and others have interpreted it as supporting the notion that IQ differences between whites and blacks observed in many other studies are mostly or wholly cultural or environmental in origin. Moreover, they have pointed out that mixed-race children may have faced prejudice growing up as a racial minority, making the similarity of results even more significant.
"Hereditarians"
Several other researchers have been skeptical about the value of the study for illuminating the causes of racial IQ differences. Arthur Jensen claimed that the difference between white girls and white boys suggested a sampling error, because in the WISC standardization sample the average IQs of boys and girls are equal. Jensen noted that the IQs of the children's mothers and fathers are unknown, and that white and black G.I.'s in Germany were not equally representative of their respective populations, since about 30 percent of blacks, compared to about 3 percent of whites, failed the preinduction mental test and were not admitted into the armed forces. Nearly all of the children were tested before adolescence, which Jensen claimed was before the genotypic aspect of IQ had become fully manifested. Finally, Jensen suggests that heterosis may have enhanced the IQ level of the mixed race children in the study.
