Date created: | Last Updated:

Category: Project

Description: Spearman’s g is the name for the shared variance across a set of intercorrelating cognitive tasks. For some—but not all—theorists, g is defined as general intelligence. While g is robustly observed in Western populations, it is questionable whether g is manifested in cognitive data from other cultural groups. To test whether g is a cross-cultural phenomenon, we searched for correlation matrices or data files containing cognitive variables collected from individuals in non-Western, non-industrialized nations. We subjected these data to exploratory factor analysis (EFA) using promax rotation and two modern methods of selecting the number of factors. Samples that produced more than one factor were then subjected to a second-order EFA using the same procedures and a Schmid-Leiman solution. Across 97 samples from 31 countries totaling 50,103 individuals, we found that a single factor emerged unambiguously from 71 samples (73.2%) and that 23 of the remaining 26 samples (88.5%) produced a single second-order factor. The first factor in the initial EFA explained an average of 45.9% of observed variable variance (SD = 13.0%), which is similar to what is seen in Western samples. One sample that produced multiple second-order factors only did so with one method of selecting the number of factors in the initial EFA; the alternate method of selecting the number of factors produced a single higher-order factor. Factor extraction in a higher-order EFA was not possible in two samples. These results show that g appears in many cultures and is likely a universal phenomenon in humans.