AboutLaurie Hamilton Expertise I am able to answer questions regarding Scientology practices and procedures, belief system, donations, religious rites, management, administrative and staff matters.
Experience I am a second generation Scientologist whose parents began in Dianetics in 1950 and studied directly with L. Ron Hubbard. I have been personally active in the church for 40 years, have eleven years former staff experience in both technical and administrative areas, and extensive technical and administative training and counseling. I am "clear" and "OT." I come from an extended family of many religions, but my spouse and children are Scientologists, as are my siblings and their spouses, several cousins, nieces, nephews, an aunt, and an uncle. Between us we have had every good and bad experience one might go through in the church at every level.
Question Hi. Do you know what type of IQ test the church uses? Is it a test that they made up, or is it an established IQ test? If someone scored, say, 125 on a Scientology IQ test, is it fair to assume that they would score around the same on an IQ test given to them by a University or a psychologist?
Also, I don't want this to sound too blunt, but is there any validity to an OCA test?
Thanks!
Answer On reading my answer below, another church member writes me:
"As an additional example on comparing IQ tests: In 1991, I took two Mensa IQ tests at a local university and scored 135 and 141 (which qualified me for membership). In 1998 I took a Novis IQ test at the Scientology Church and scored 151. These are all in the same general range."
I thought I'd add this info to your answer.
Laurie
The IQ test the church uses is the Novis Mental Ability test. I don't know where it comes from.
The test results I get on that test are quite similar to the results I get from other forms of IQ testing from other sources. It tops out at around 160 where other tests, such as the Stanford-Binet can go higher, but it's not out of line with IQ testing in general.
Be aware that IQ tests of different kinds rely on different methodologies and measure different qualities, and so can vary widely on the same person.
Experimental IQ testing by a PhD candidate for his thesis, when I was 9, put me in the "high normal" range. Standardized achievement tests in school placed me in the 80th-90th percentile. IQ testing at the end of high school had me at "very high normal" to "borderline genius" range.
When I got my first IQ test in Scientology, it was again, "high normal." Later tests after much training and processing put me well into "genius to high genius" according to the Novis test. Non-Scientology tests show me at the "mid genius" range at this time, pretty much across the board (three different methodologies, three different test authors) Lowest score I ever got in my life was about 119, and the highest about 155. Lowest Novis score was 125 and highest 153.
Supposedly, conventional wisdom has it that one's score goes down steadily from the mid-teens onward. Which would make one wonder why I run in the range of 30 points higher in my 50's than in my mid-teens.
Long story short, with a sampling of ONE (myself) to go on, I would say no IQ test is absolutely accurate and the Novis test tracks similarly with others. Further, I would say that if IQ is a valid measure, SOMETHING has done me some good as I have progressed in Scientology.
Yes, the OCA is quite valid - if one answers totally honestly, and not with what they think will be the "right" answer. It measures with fair accuracy a number of personality traits right at the time it is taken. If the person is happy at that moment, it will come out better than if they are in a dark mood or fearful. Even when answering questions such as "do you usually..." the answer will vary according to mood of the moment. In general, as one's emotional tone, empathy, confidence, sense of humor, etc. improve, this will be reflected in the test. Similar questions do not necessarily address the same issues in that test. One asking (paraphrasing here) "Are you normally sure of your decisions?" might be scored against self-confidence. "Can you easily ignore criticism?" might be scored against empathy. While a "yes" to both might seem "right," ignoring criticism might actually indicate an inability to take others' points of view in to account. I'm just making up examples. "Do our friends think you have a good sense of humor?" could measure against either cheerfulness or "thinks logically" (humor is an expression of a function of logic), and "Do you often laugh for no reason at all?" could be IMAGINED by the test taker to measure cheerfulness, but in FACT could measure against tone level in a whole different fashion. Glee is a manifestation of apathy or hopelessness - laughing in an effort to reject one's own helpless or dispersed feeling. One who laughs all the time for no reason is in bad shape, and trying to deflect their own inability to be at cause in their own life, or make light of everything because of an inability to confront things. For a SANE person, there is always a REASON to laugh - even if it is at some small or seemingly insignificant pleasure.
So the OCA works best if answered totally honestly to the best of one's ability.
