Meta-Analysis of Cross-Cultural Comparisons of Cognitive Test Performance

A meta-analysis of cross-cultural comparisons of cognitive test scores published between 1973 and 1994 is presented. Larger performance differences were found in cross-national than in intranational (cross-ethnic) comparisons. There was a strong age bias, with an overrepresentation of primary-school-age children. Five models to explain cross-cultural differences in cognitive performance were examined. First, these differences showed a positive relationship with differences in affluence of the cultural groups. Second, performance differences increased with chronological and educational age. Third, only in intranational studies were performance differences positively related to the complexity of stimuli. Fourth, performance differences were larger on common Western tasks than on locally developed non-Western tasks. Finally, performance differences were not larger for abstract thinking than for other cognitive domains. Cross-cultural performance differences were better predicted by task characteristics in intranational comparisons and by population characteristics in cross-national comparisons.

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