This is site dedicated to one of the most widely known intelligence researchers.
Flynn was famous for his publications about the continued year-after-year increase of IQ scores throughout the world, which is now referred to as the Flynn effect. This effect was actually named in The Bell Curve (Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein, 1994):
THE FLYNN EFFECT. Indirect support for the proposition that the observed B/W difference could be the result of environmental factors is provided by the worldwide phenomenon of rising test scores. We call it “the Flynn effect” because of psychologist James Flynn’s pivotal role in focusing attention on it, but the phenomenon itself was identified in the 1930s when testers began to notice that IQ scores often rose with every successive year after a test was first standardized. For example, when the Stanford-Binet IQ was restandardized in the mid-1930s, it was observed that individuals earned lower IQs on the new tests than they got on the Stanford-Binet that had been standardized in the mid-1910s; in other words, getting a score of 100 (the population average) was harder to do on the later test. This meant that the average person could answer more items on the old test than the new test. Most of the change has been concentrated in the nonverbal portions of the tests.
Flynn is also known for his scientific open-mindedness, and engaging respectfully and scientifically with those he disagrees with. For this reason, he enjoys wide popularity among his intellectual opponents.
This website was set up by Emil O. W. Kirkegaard with help from Jurij Fedorov. Thanks also to the people who contributed content to the site. Please email ideas and content to flynn@emilkirkegaard.dk. If you would like to make a donation towards the running of this site, and the science that Flynn supported, you can do so here.