Intelligence assessment procedures fail to tap additional capabilities of African American children. One cause of this problem is the failure of conventional IQ tests to tap attributes of the African American epistemology. This shortcoming of IQ tests is a result of the cultural bias of the tests and of the heavy emphasis on left-hemisphere brain functions and skills. These tests, moreover, significantly omit functions and skills of the right brain hemisphere, which may underlie the use of the African American epistemology. This article explains the epistemological attributes of African Americans and discusses these attributes and their implications for testing.
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