Watching 'Jersey Shore' might make you dumber, study suggests

[iverglas]

18. if we leave aside the bell curve

I wonder whether we might see intelligence disparity increasing the way we've seen income disparity increasing.

Just as there is a wider gulf growing between the rich and the poor, after a long period of narrowing -- the rich actually getting richer while the poor actually get poorer -- might we see both higher and lower IQ scores increasing?

The culture gap seems to me to be widening too, with the dumbness of the lower end of the available offerings increasing, and the stimulating material available to people with a taste and capacity for it expanding as well, partly because of the internet.

Forty years ago, ordinary people, including the ones on the left of the 100 mark, watched things like All in the Family and even Columbo -- shows that served you stuff you actually had to think about while watching. If those same people are now watching Jersey Shore and American Idol -- and I don't think many people in the 120+ range really do watch them a lot -- might we start to see some slide toward the lower scores in the already lower segment of the adult population? I'd say it's a little early to tell yet, but I'd be curious. Just a wild theory for now; I need to google.