Sit the test a 1918 recruit sat
Every modern IQ test — the WAIS-IV, Stanford-Binet 5, RIAS, WISC-V — descends from a handful of foundational tests built between 1905 and 1942. We rebuilt them as interactive, scored web experiences, so you can take them the way they were first given, get a result, and see how psychometrics worked at the start.
Three tests that shaped every IQ test since
Lewis Terman introduced IQ as a number — mental age ÷ chronological age × 100. Every modern test traces its scoring conventions back to it, even after Wechsler replaced the ratio with today's deviation IQ.
Designed by a committee led by Robert M. Yerkes, it proved cognitive testing could scale from one-on-one sessions to whole populations — leading directly to the SAT (1926) and the AGCT (1942).
Roughly a quarter of WWI recruits could not read English well enough for the verbal Alpha, so the Beta used pictures, mazes and pattern completion, scored to be roughly comparable.
112 historical cognitive tests
The earliest systematic experimental study of mental speed, from Wundt's founding psychology laboratory in Leipzig.
The earliest systematic attempt to measure individual differences in mental capacity, run at the 1884 International Health Exhibition in London.
The paper that coined the phrase "mental test": ten sensorimotor tasks, from reaction time to memory span.
One of the earliest attention and processing-speed tests: scan rows of letters and cancel a target letter as fast as possible.
A test of sustained mental work: long series of simple additions under time pressure.
The proto-Binet test, ten years before the famous 1905 Binet-Simon scale, proposing ten mental faculties to measure.
The first proposed intelligence test based on a single cognitive principle.
The conceptual foundation of modern psychometrics: all cognitive abilities share a common factor, g.
The first practical intelligence scale, which introduced the idea of "mental age".
The first US-developed standardized intelligence test.
The English-language adaptation that introduced Binet's intelligence testing to American psychology.
A group-administered school test that predates both the Army Alpha and the Otis Group Intelligence Scale.
An early non-verbal test: identify what is missing from each picture.
A non-verbal test designed to screen immigrants at Ellis Island: imitate a tapped sequence on four cubes.
The standard American compendium of cognitive testing methods before WWI.
A pre-WWI Binet revision that gave each item a point value, anticipating modern test design.
A series of printed paper mazes of increasing difficulty, used as a non-verbal test.
The test that introduced IQ as a number — mental age ÷ chronological age × 100 — and made 100 the average.
The first major non-verbal cognitive test battery.
The verbal WWI group test given to over 1.7 million recruits — rebuilt here with all 8 original subtests, scored against the 1918 norm tables.
One of five parallel forms of the 1918 Army Alpha; its Test 1 script and all 16 Test 3 items are rebuilt here.
The remaining three parallel forms; all 48 of their Test 3 items are rebuilt here.
The non-verbal companion to the Alpha, using pictures, mazes and pattern completion for recruits who could not read English.
The official protocol used at Ellis Island and other ports of entry to assess arriving immigrants.
The first widely used group-administered intelligence test for schools.
An individual WWI examination for recruits who could not take the Army Alpha or Beta.
The first standardized test of musical aptitude, on five phonograph records: pitch, intensity, time, consonance and tonal memory.
A Harvard-developed group test for school use, in Series A, B and C.
The school version of the Army Alpha.
A group non-verbal test that brought language-free assessment into schools.
The standard British intelligence test from the 1920s through the 1950s.
A group intelligence test for grades 3 through 12.
The definitive 890-page compendium of the WWI Army testing program.
One of the first standardized measures of attitudes and personality.
Ten inkblot cards recognised worldwide — the most famous psychological test ever created.
A group test of verbal completion: "The cat ___ the mouse."
A picture-based group intelligence test for kindergarten and grades 1–2, with instructions read aloud.
Reproduce printed designs by arranging coloured wooden blocks.
The first American achievement test from a unified, theoretically grounded testing program.
A picture-based group test for first-graders aged 5–7.
The first national college-admissions intelligence test in the United States.
Four task types: Completion, Arithmetic, Vocabulary and following Directions.
Draw a picture of a man, scored on a 51-point checklist.
The most consequential standardized test in American education, adapted from Army Alpha items.
One of the first batteries to span grades 1 through 12 with grade-specific subtests.
The first major standardized interest inventory and the foundation of modern career assessment.
A 3-hour, 6-section test created to address high medical school dropout rates.
A group test for grades 3–12 and college freshmen, known for its tight time pressure.
The foundational instrument for assessing infant and toddler cognitive development.
Name the ink colour, not the word — the single most-cited cognitive test in history.
The most influential American achievement-and-aptitude battery ever produced.
A projective personality test using ambiguous picture cards.
A scale of adaptive functioning rather than a traditional IQ test.
Verbal, non-verbal and quantitative subtests in one group test for K–12.
A machine-scoreable, 30-minute redesign of the 1918 Group Intelligence Scale.
Introduced the visual matrix-completion format, now the most-used non-verbal intelligence test in the world.
The revision that dominated US individual intelligence testing until the late 1950s.
Reproduce nine geometric figures adapted from gestalt psychology.
A 7-factor model: Verbal, Number, Spatial, Memory, Word Fluency, Perceptual Speed and Reasoning.
Introduced the deviation IQ and the verbal–performance split.
Copy a complex geometric figure, then reproduce it from memory after a delay.
The classroom-deployable version of Thurstone's 7-factor battery.
The WWII successor to the Army Alpha, given to about 12 million US service members.
The foundational personality assessment instrument.
The verbal companion to the Progressive Matrices.
Connect the dots in number order (Part A), then alternating numbers and letters (Part B).
The most popular personality test in the world by administration count.
The first standardized clinical memory test, scored as a Memory Quotient on the WAIS metric.
The post-WWII multi-aptitude successor to the AGCT.
The foundational neuropsychological assessment battery.
A simpler colour variant for children aged 5–11 and older adults: 36 items in three sets.
A multi-aptitude battery for vocational guidance in high schools and adult counselling.
Sort cards by a hidden rule that shifts every 10 correct sorts.
Developed by nine leading US law schools as an objective measure of aptitude for legal study.
Brought the Verbal IQ + Performance IQ structure to children aged 5–15.
Items designed to be as independent as possible of language, schooling and cultural knowledge.
The standardized test for US graduate school admissions.
A 16-factor model of personality built with factor analysis.
The dominant US group IQ test for school-age children from 1954 through the 1970s.
Introduced the deviation-IQ scoring (mean 100, SD 15) that all modern IQ tests use.
Hear a word, point to the matching picture — a 15-minute test with no reading required.
The first widely used clinician-administered depression rating scale.
The most-used depression assessment instrument in the world.
Scan 14 lines of "p" and "d" letters, crossing out only the "d"s with exactly two marks.
A 15-minute oral screening IQ test for ages 4 to adult, correlating r = 0.9 with the Stanford-Binet.
The 1963 revision of Draw-A-Man that added a Draw-A-Woman component.
The modern direct descendant of Otis's 1918 and 1936 group tests.
The preschool adaptation that completed Wechsler's three-instrument family.
The cognitive battery administered to every US military recruit.
A comprehensive multi-factor school cognitive battery for grades K–12.
The most-used anxiety assessment instrument in the world.
The dominant child IQ test from 1974 through 1991: 12 subtests for ages 6–16.
An 11-item bedside screen scored 0–30, the world's most-used dementia screening tool.
The first cognitive assessment battery built around CHC theory.
Updated norms and scoring; the dominant US adult intelligence test until 1997.
The dominant modern personality model, derived by factor analysis of trait language.
Name 60 line drawings of increasing difficulty — the standard clinical word-finding test.
The first major child battery based on Luria's neuropsychological theory.
The first major commercial personality assessment based on the Big Five.
Learn a 16-word "Monday shopping list" over five trials, then recall it after delays.
17 cognitive subtests for ages 2.5 to 17, with strong fluid/crystallized differentiation.
A language-free matrix test widely used for gifted-and-talented identification.
Introduced four Index scores alongside the traditional Verbal and Performance IQ.
Built on the PASS theory: Planning, Attention, Simultaneous and Successive processing.
A brief 35-minute individual IQ test for ages 3–94.
Five factors measured in both verbal and non-verbal domains.
Introduced four composite scores alongside Full Scale IQ.
10 core and 5 supplemental subtests organized into four indices.
Seven subtests yielding five index scores for ages 16–90.
The current Wechsler test for young children aged 2:6 to 7:7.
Five primary indices for ages 6–16.
The newest Wechsler adult test, with revised norms and 7 Cognitive Domain scores plus FSIQ.
How to read these tests in context
Scores rose roughly 3 IQ points per decade through the 20th century. Pick a test year to see what an average score then would be against modern norms.
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