THE DEATH of well-known psychologist Hans Eysenck will not stop his ideas bout personality and IQ living well eyond the hype and emotion of Diana's death which largely swamped news of his demise in early September.
A measure of an enduring legacy is one that is apparent before the death of its creator - thousands of undergraduates on psychology courses are taught to use Eysenck's Personality Inventory (EPI).
Many people well beyond academic circles talk of extroverts and introverts, of people being neurotic. Many others have taken intelligence tests or talk of genetic influences. These 'common sense' notions now advanced by numerous other psychologists have a lot to thank Hans Eysenck for.
So to do the far right and fascist groups. Not that Eysenck was a member of any such groups - he was far too clever to be that closely associated and, after all, as a Jew he did flee Germany in the 1930s. So Eysenck was not a fascist, but he most definitely allowed his ideas -particularly those on the relationship between race and IQ - to be used by such groups.
In a debate with radical writer Leon Kamin in 1981 (Intelligence: The Battle for the Mind Eysenck wrote that " jews, Chinese and Japanese are often thought of as being particularly clever, Negroes and Mexican-Americans as being less able than average" (p 74). He demEysenck: his ideas based on racist stereotypes and bad science onstrates these 'facts' that are "relatively easy to establish" in the form of IQ scores from white and black children in the US.
Eysenck is careful - very careful - to present the causes of these findings as emerging from a range of possibilities: the "much more difficult question is whether these differences... are the result of cultural factors and the outcome of deprivation or hereditarily determined and produced by genetic factors."
While Eysenck is careful not to rule in genetic causes for definite he is clearly ruling out environmental factors such as socio-economic status or the fact that the language of IO tests is better suited to white middle class children.
This is despite a wealth of research findings (eg Labov 1969) which show that the language used in tests can exert huge and statistically significant influence on the outcome.
This studied ambiguity on the link between racial differences and genetic causes, coupled with clear argument in favour of genetic influence on IQ per se (citing the work of Jenson) allow reactionary ideas to emerge from a supposedly eminent source The argument goes: 'Yes, there are differences in intelligence between races. While genes cannot be ruled in for definite, genetics does cause IO. Environmental factors and biased testing can be ruled out.' This is not only bad science, as Kamin and others testify, but it is a racist approach masquerading as science. This is why Eysenck's work is loved so much by racists and fascists.
Perhaps more worrying is the extent to which his ideas have become accepted as some sort of common sense. I don't have the space to present here the wealth of evidence that shows that many forms of ability - far better measures than an intelligence quotient - are evenly distributed among different races.
There is also a large body of literature on genetic influences that argues strongly for an 'interactionist' position, whereby genetic effects combine genetically with social and environmental factors (see for example Lewontin's The Doctrine of DNA).
It is regrettable that we tend to think in terms of intelligence and personality - terms which subtly delimit us to an individuality which calls for individual responsibility - but puts agency in the hands of genes or other scientific concepts over which we have no control The reactionary notion of responsibility lies not in suggesting the need for individual agency but in deliberately ignoring the very real social factors that prevent such individual agency being realisee.
Eysenck's legacy therefore is to suggest that people are predetermined to be of a particular type - intelligent or unintelligent, introvert or extrovert.
These labels only serve to back up a society that rests on inequality between groups of people and yet kids people into thinking they are self-contained responsible individuals.
To that extent Eysenck's work is not only fuel for fascists but welcome fodder for capitalism as a whole. No wonder so many of the notions that he coined and popularised are now quoted and used by leading figures in government today.
IRREVIEWS Voices for Choice: Women recollect their experiences of abortion in Britain 1936-1997, £3.30 Reviewed by Elkie Dee "I could have gone to prison. There was the horror of what you were doing and the fear of being caught. Horrendous. Absolutely horrendous".
Here, Jane recalls her experiences of having several illegal abortions as a young woman in the 1950s, before the 1967 Abortion Act.
She is one of 30 women whose experiences of abortion before and after 1967 are described in this book published by the National Abortion Campaign and Marie Stopes International, to commemorate the 1967 Act.
It reminds us all why there must be no return to the fear and danger of backstreet abortion, and is part of a campaign to move forward. NAC campaigns not only to defend the Act as it stands, but for abortion on request to be a woman's right.
For a legal abortion to take place, two doctors must sign a form stating that "the termination is necessary to prevent grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of the woman". This takes away the decision from women and puts it in the hands of doctors.
The book makes clear the difficulties women faced before 1967. Contraception was difficult to obtain for unmarried women and often failed. Many women tried gin and hot baths or pills bought by mail order, before turning to backstreet abortionists or, for the lucky ones, doctors who would help.
Alice was 16. Her father gave her pills, and the hot bath with gin, then tried hitting her and pushing her down the stairs, before finally calling in the abortionist.
Several women tell stories of having soap and water solutions injected into their womb and being sent away or left alone to wait for he abortion to start.
Jane remembers, "I walked for two or three hours. I can remember walking round the streets, feeling bitterly cold and crying, but knowing that I had to keep on walking. Had to keep on the move. Just waiting for the pain to start." She was back at work the next day - she had to be.
Other women ended up in hospital with Voices for Choice I was 18 years old. and in Paris with some was raped and ecame pregnant. as shot. MARE, SINA infections and in- others didn't.
H complete abortions. One woman spent three months in a mental hospital in order to have an abortion, and was coerced into being sterilised at the same time. And these are woman who survived to tell us their stories An important issue for many of these The your that women was the cost of abortion. Rosemary couldn't afford the £300 required for a Harley Street abortion in 1964, so paid £60 for a backstreet job. After bleeding for 3 days she went to hospital. "They discovered I had septicaemia. If I hadn't gone there when I did I probably would have died."
was 1963 - the year resident Kennedy
Socialist Drooli It was 1963 and I was 16 years old. I'd met the father at a local jazz club.