”Buraku” goes to America - Living, Loving, Thinking, Again

Beyond Human Nature: How Culture And Experience Shape Our Lives

作者: Jesse J Prinz
出版社/メーカー: Penguin UK
発売日: 2013/02/26
メディア: ペーパーバック
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Jesse J. Prinz Beyond Human Natureから。
知能指数の「可塑性（plasticity）」を巡るJ. U. Ogbuの研究*1を紹介するパラグラフ；

(…) In Japan, there is an ethnic group called Buraku, who are regarded as inferior and abjected to various forms of bigotry. As with blacks and whites in America, the Buraku IQ average is about 15 points lower than the IQ average for members of the priviledged ethnic group. Strikingly, however, this difference disappears when Japanese people move to the United States. Buraku living in the United States amy even perform slightly better than other Japanese immigrants. This suggests that the low score in Japan is a function of environment and that the discrepancy can be eliminated by moving to a culture where there is no special bigotry against the Buraku.(pp.71-72)

部落というのと部落民というのが混同されているような気が先ずする。それはそれとして、被差別部落 *2を「エスニック・グループ」だとするためには、「エスニック・グループ」の定義を巡る周到な議論を行う必要があるだろう*3。ともかく、低IQというのは差別の効果であり、差別のない場所に移動すれば、それは解消するというのは興味深いことだ。
次のパラグラフでは、米国の黒人に対するアファーマティヴ・アクションの効果が語られている。J. Myersonらの研究*4；

The plasticity of the black/white discrepancy has also been tested. A group of researchers looked at a group of African American college students who had been admitted to universities through affirmative action programmes. At the time of admission, these students had, on average, IQ scores that were 15 points lower than white students. This gap was cut in half by the time the students graduated. The result is especially striking given that racial prejudice is widespread in higher education. The moral is that a college education can alter IQ and shrink significant differences between groupsm even in the face of enduring biases. (p.72)

*1:Ogubu, J. U. “Cultural amplifiers of intelligence: IQ and minority status in crosscultural perspective” in J. M. Fish (ed.) Race and Intelligence: Separating Science from Myth, Erbaum, 2002

*3:定義によっては、熱湯浴や「小沢信者」を「エスニック・グループ」だとすることも不可能ではないだろう。

*4:Myerson, J., Rank, M. R., Raines, E. Q., and Schnitzler, M. A. “Race and general cognitive ability: The myth of diminishing returns to education” Psychological Science 9, pp.139-142, 1998