6. Successful intelligence

Even if one were to consider spatial visualization and other less commonly mentioned abilities in addition to the predominant fluid and crystallized abilities, psychometric theories alone do not provide a comprehensive set of intellectual abilities necessary for success in life. Because they have their origins in their attempts to describe and measure different types of thinking, they are less focused on how people relate to their surroundings, which is a primary criterion of life skills. Sternberg (1985, 1997a, 1997b) has attempted to address this shortcoming through his three-part (triarchic) theory of successful intelligence. He uses this term to emphasize the importance of intelligence as the abilities needed for life success, thereby distinguishing it from the narrower conception of intelligence that is popular in the psychometric literature.

Sternberg argues that there are three major aspects of successful intelligence— analytical, creative, and practical. Analytical abilities are those abilities used to analyze, evaluate, judge, compare, contrast, and critique. Creative abilities are those abilities used to create, invent, discover, suppose, imagine, and hypothesize. Practical abilities are those abilities used to put into practice, apply, use, and implement knowledge and skills. The three sets of abilities are hypothesized to be statistically relatively independent but to be psychologically intertwined because the same information-processing components underlie all three. What differ are the situational contexts in which the components are used. Analytical abilities tend to be used in situations that are relatively more familiar, creative abilities in situations that are relatively less familiar, and practical abilities in situations that are highly contextualized with respect to the individual's daily life.

It is important to note that the term "creative abilities" does not refer to the high levels of creativity shown by world-famous authors, artists, or scientists. Rather, it is being used in the much more mundane sense of people's abilities to deal flexibly with relatively unfamiliar problems, abilities to cope with relative novelty (Sternberg, 1985). For example, creativity in the sense it is used here is involved when workers on an assembly line formulate a strategy for more quickly moving their parts of products down the line (see Scribner, 1984). These abilities have appeared in only in a minority of psychometric theories of intelligence (e.g., Guilford, 1967).

The theory of successful intelligence adds two important elements to the consensus view that has emerged from the consideration of psychometric theories. First, it emphasizes the importance of the distinction between coping with familiar and with novel tasks and situations. Research suggests that people who are able to cope well with familiar tasks and situations are not those who are always flexible in coping with novel tasks and situations (Sternberg, 1985; Sternberg and Lubart, 1995). But in any job or personal relationship, for that matter, one will be confronted with novel tasks. An assessment of life skills therefore needs a balance of both. This idea is implicit in the distinction between fluid abilities (which can be, but need not be, applied to more novel tasks) and crystallized abilities (which are typically applied to more familiar tasks); the theory of successful intelligence simply makes this point explicit.