Douglas Northrop Jackson II (August 14, 1929 – August 22, 2004) was a Canadian

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries betwe ...

professor best known for his work in human assessment and psychological testing.

Life and career

Born in

Merrick, New York Merrick is a hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) in the Town of Hempstead in Nassau County, on the South Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. , the population was 20,130. Geography According to the United States Census Bure ...

, Jackson graduated from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1951 with a BSc in Industrial and Labor Relations and from

Purdue University Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and money ...

in 1955 with a PhD in Clinical Psychology. Jackson taught at

Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvan ...

(1956–62) and

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

(1962–64) before starting at

University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a Public university, public research university in London, Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by resident ...

in 1964, where he taught for over 32 years.Douglas N. Jackson, Ph.D., (1928 [''sic''
/nowiki> -2004).">/nowiki>''sic''">Douglas N. Jackson, Ph.D., (1928 [''sic''
/nowiki> -2004).(

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

) ''Psynopsis'', Fall 2004. Jackson created numerous tests in his life, including: *Multidimensional Aptitude Battery II, Multidimensional Aptitude Battery (MAB) *Personality Research Form (PRF) * Jackson Vocational Interest Survey (JVIS) *Employee Screening Questionnaire (ESQ) These were distributed through two companies he founded, Research Psychologists Press and Sigma Assessment Systems. He collaborated with

Samuel Messick Samuel J. Messick III (April 3, 1931 – October 6, 1998) was an American psychologist who worked for the Educational Testing Service (ETS), known for his contributions to validity theory. Early life Messick was born on April 3, 1931 in Philadel ...

at the

Educational Testing Service Educational Testing Service (ETS), founded in 1947, is the world's largest private nonprofit educational testing and assessment organization. It is headquartered in Lawrence Township, New Jersey, but has a Princeton address. ETS develops var ...

, examining

construct validity Construct validity concerns how well a set of indicators represent or reflect a concept that is not directly measurable. ''Construct validation'' is the accumulation of evidence to support the interpretation of what a measure reflects.Polit DF Beck ...

. Jackson also published several analyses on

sex and intelligence Sex differences in human intelligence have long been a topic of debate among researchers and scholars. Most psychologists now believe that there are no significant sex differences in G factor (psychometrics), general intelligence, although abili ...

that found males applying to medical schools had a small but nontrivial advantage in

general intelligence factor The ''g'' factor (also known as general intelligence, general mental ability or general intelligence factor) is a construct developed in psychometric investigations of cognitive abilities and human intelligence. It is a variable that summarizes ...

and in reasoning.Stumpf H, Jackson DN (1994). Gender-related differences in cognitive abilities: Evidence from a medical school admission testing program. ''Personality and Individual Differences'', 17, 335–344.Jackson, DN (July 17–21, 1993). Sex differences in intellectual ability. Paper presented at a meeting of the International Society for the Study of Individual Differences, Baltimore, MD. Jackson served on the Executive Council of the

International Test Commission The International Test Commission (ITC) is an association of national psychological associations, test commissions, organizations and individuals, who promote "the proper development, evaluation and uses" of educational and psychological tests. The ...

and was a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Canada The Royal Society of Canada (RSC; french: Société royale du Canada, SRC), also known as the Academies of Arts, Humanities and Sciences of Canada (French: ''Académies des arts, des lettres et des sciences du Canada''), is the senior national, bil ...

(1989). He was president of the Society of Multivariate Experimental Research from 1975–1976 and received their Saul Sells Award for Lifetime Contributions in 1997. He was President of APA's Division of Measurement, Evaluation, and Statistics from 1989–1990 and was awarded that division's Samuel J. Messick Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions in 2004. In 1994 he was one of 52 signatories on "

Mainstream Science on Intelligence "Mainstream Science on Intelligence" was a public statement issued by a group of researchers of topics associated with intelligence testing. It was published originally in ''The Wall Street Journal'' on December 13, 1994, as a response to criticis ...

," an editorial written by

Linda Gottfredson Linda Susanne Gottfredson (née Howarth; born 1947) is an American psychologist and writer. She is professor emeritus of educational psychology at the University of Delaware and co-director of the Delaware-Johns Hopkins Project for the Study of I ...

and published in ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', which declared the consensus of the signing scholars on issues related to the controversy about intelligence research that followed the publication of the book ''

The Bell Curve ''The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life'' is a 1994 book by psychologist Richard J. Herrnstein and political scientist Charles Murray, in which the authors argue that human intelligence is substantially influenced by b ...

''.Gottfredson, Linda (December 13, 1994).

. ''

'', p A18. Colleague

J. Philippe Rushton John Philippe Rushton (December 3, 1943 – October 2, 2012) was a Canadian psychologist and author. He taught at the University of Western Ontario until the early 1990s, and became known to the general public during the 1980s and 1990s for resea ...

noted that Jackson's founding of Canada's

Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship The Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship (SAFS) is a Canadian non-profit organization founded to promote academic freedom and intellectual excellence on Canadian institutions of higher education (i.e., college and university campuses). ...

was a response to "Canadian researchers challenged by '

political correctness ''Political correctness'' (adjectivally: ''politically correct''; commonly abbreviated ''PC'') is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in socie ...

'" and "demonstrated his personal commitment to ensuring personal liberty and freedom of enquiry for his colleagues."Rushton, J. Philippe (5 November 2004)
Douglas N. Jackson obituary
(

), ''

Intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. More generally, it can b ...

'' 33 (2005) 1–3.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jackson, Douglas N. 1929 births 2004 deaths Canadian psychologists Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations alumni People from Merrick, New York Purdue University College of Health and Human Sciences alumni Pennsylvania State University faculty Stanford University Department of Psychology faculty Academic staff of the University of Western Ontario 20th-century American psychologists Quantitative psychologists