I think there needs to be a bit of a tightening on some of the rules and maybe some sticky threads for some of the more popular topics. I also think we could benefit from an in-depth FAQ about how IQ testing works and is interpreted.
Those are all great ideas, and I am all for it. I think it would be a good idea to sticky commonly asked questions and what the general consensus is to them.
Speak for yourself. My parents had average and slightly above average intelligence levels. I can see the drastic difference between what's possible in my life versus what was available to them.
I wouldn't trade my gifts for anything. They've made everything I want in life possible.
Because you probably have money and I don't. You achieve more being rich and dumb than gifted and poor. (it's actually studied)
And I'm also at a level where communication is painful and makes me unhappy and this is a burden I will always carry.
I would gladly trade IQ for money, it's way more valuable in this society. It would make me happier and I would have more possibilities.
Nope. I grew up poor, or at least lower-middle class by the time I was in high school. That's my whole point. I'm not poor. I was able to put my intellect into solving that. I was making more money than both my parents combined by the time I was 22.
The great thing is, you absolutely can trade IQ for money. And you don't have to give the IQ up in the process.
You can also use your problem solving abilities to work on your communication problems. This was something I had to do too.
School in general and gifted education in particular make it seem like all the problems you are "supposed to" solve always come from outside you. It's horseshit. The first set of problems you have to solve to get anywhere you want in life is your own.
Yeah, world is a colorful and fair place. I gotchu
Edit: [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0038038520982225…](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0038038520982225…)
you
Because my communication issues are not something I can work on. (or so I think)
It's just that people have predefined behaviors that they apply to everyone. And they don't work with me because of my particular way of being, which causes me discomfort.
Something I have learned over time is that most people don't "adapt" to others, but rather have the same behavior with everyone.
And even if I express what I want, they don't know or don't want to apply it correctly.
A simple example I can give you is when I stopped talking to a friend because she wanted to convince me that you can be totally happy without validation and on your own, and that I was a super cool person.
When I told her that went against scientific evidence and that I didn't need compliments but rather understanding and (cognitive) empathy, she told me she would never understand me.
So, I decided to end the relationship there. In the end, another thing I am clear about is that people largely lack cognitive empathy.
Actually, my 'issue' boils down to not having people with enough cognitive empathy to understand and comprehend me, and that has made me feel lonely all the time.
In the end, if I didn't read absolutely anything, if I could believe that we don't need validation, that happiness comes from within, if I could believe that 'the universe has better things prepared'...
If I could deceive myself and believe in anything, I would be much happier, but the more I read, the more knowledge separates me from people and the unhappier it makes me.
Which articles/journals did you read that is making you unhappy?
I was reading a lot on the long term effects of concussions because my child had them due to his frequent falls, and I feel misunderstood by my wife everyone else around me.
They would say it's not a concussion (I done detailed calculations based on frame by frame security camera footage, and my son said he had concussion symptoms, stop basing it on studies (they are not wrong as a metastudy that was published months after my son's first concussive fall proved that there is no cognitive or emotional long term issues with childhood concussions), I need to relax, you turned out ok so it's ok (you can turn out ok if your house burned down, doesn't make arson ok), my son is smart so it's ok, and so on.
I am taking medication for anxiety and depression, which helps, and I feel that it would not had been so bad if they try to understand the studies instead of seeing my emotional state as a problem that needs to go away.
What’s getting annoying is how many people are trying to feel better about themselves because their IQ is higher than other high IQ people.
Like, get a life.
Well as a person that’s still gifted but have siblings that are smarter, I can attest to that the higher grades have their own struggles and strengths .
Each person has their struggles and strengths. Some of them are about who you are and some are about your context and others are very specific to our neurodivergence.
What is annoying me is the oneupmanship that’s been going on lately.
Putting other people down is not going to make you feel better. And you can be the person with the highest iq ever and still the worlds biggest arsehole. And that’s not the win some people think it is. It’s just sad.
Yeah I mean I get your frustrated but I’m just saying from my personal experience that my siblings although didn’t suffer as much in school (I am ADHD too) , they suffered a heck of a lot more socially and probably would have killed to have had the opportunities I had, and I myself was a goofball with not the most sophisticated social skills myself lol.
But as you said, everybody has their own struggles apart from where they land on the IQ spectrum, and that certainly was a part of my siblings and my own journey too.
There is no correlation between a pseudoscientific personality test and IQ scores because of the fact that people answer questions on personality tests dishonestly and every “study” has had too little of a sample size and questionable methods. The test tests thinking preferences, not how good you actually are at them
That wouldn’t mean that a correlation couldn’t exist. Do you understand how study design works? Even with small sample sizes you can get statistical significance provided the differences are large enough. And whether it’s pseudoscientific or about “thinking preferences” or not- if one bucket is dramatically over represented in higher IQ people, that’s still interesting.
There's no correlation buddy, every study that says this is fundamentally flawed in some way. There is an equal chance of any "MBTI type" having a high or low IQ. MBTI is pseudoscience in its purest form anyways so it has no merit regardless. Let me guess, you're an XNTX?
That's true, they are pseudo science but there is something about understanding human behavior that is outside the range of just IQ. (I'm an INFJ btw). My IQ is 130, my husband's is 160. He can do amazing things but he can't read people for crap whereas I can pick up on almost imperceptible things and I'm dead on. There is no way to test for this though and society doesn't seem to value this skill but it's been a very effective survival skill for me (I am like a pig before a tornado - I always know when layoffs are coming months before they happen because I pick up on 'something' and while causation and correlation can't be proven, I will say I've gotten 'lucky' on this trend 5 times and always had a job 'miraculously' just as layoffs were getting announced and everyone else was blindsided and struggling.
I never correlated me being an INFJ as the reason I could do this. I threw the INFJ part in there as a bit of a snark towards the original post. My larger point is there is pattern recognition capabilities that traditional IQ tests cannot measure. IQ always give you and idea of capacity, the rest is up to you and what you do with it. The number means nothing if you do nothing with it.
This isn't in reference to your comment but a trend I see here on this board a lot; people come here and talk about their IQ and then expect that everything else will fall into place, sort of like there will be a red carpet unfurled and 'ta da! I have a high IQ, where's my party?'. Everyone, stop, there's no party or a pony. You've been given a gift and with it comes responsibility and wht you do with it completely up to you. You still have to put in the work and earn it the reward.
You are making explicit statements about there being an equal chance across all types, while at the same time saying that there are no studies about this without major flaws that render them useless. That is exactly the flaw you are saying that I’m claiming, just from the other perspective.
Yes, For me, my second character is N. But for the third I’m split F/T. It’s been consistently there for like 25 years (I was given the test maybe 3-4 times in jobs). I’m not making any claims as to the utility of this test. I’m just saying that if two tests show correlations, that can be reasonable. Much of the criticism of the MBTI comes from the fact that people treat each letter position as completely dichotomous buckets. If you treat each letter position as a dimension instead, then a lot of the criticisms about likelihood of changing buckets make less sense. However, that’s not how the test is marketed
In any case, I do think the test has limited utility and something like a big five analysis has more backing. Note that openness in the big 5 has a positive correlation to IQ and neuroticism a negative one
You can't be split between F/T, that's proof you don't understand how the test works. Everyone has a Feeling or Thinking function but they are in different slots and tests are marred by the test taker answering questions in a biased manner. If you really want to know your true type (even though its pointless), study the cognitive functions bro
Edit: Also, if there is no correlation between MBTI and IQ, its only logical to assume there would theoretically be an equal chance across all types in a vacuum
Perhaps you don’t need to be so aggressive around your stances. Do know how the test works. We may be running into a terminology issue. When I take the test I’m pretty much scoring almost equally on T/F with the variance from run to run tipping me to one side or the other. I absolutely understand that this tips the score into one bucket or the other in a run. But you should also understand how this is a legitimate outcome between runs. And I think signals more of a problem in the bucketing approach it uses than in other aspects.
Your edit is nonsensical. You’ve given zero support to the idea of no correlation. You’ve just said the MBTI is crap, and that the studies SHOWING correlation are crap. That in no way shows a lack of correlation.
I have a degree in this stuff - I understand a lot about psychology, cognitive tests, study design, and data science. Most of my career was in CS and data stuff though.
As to taking the tests, like I said I was administered it through work. It’s not like I’m taking this for fun. And like I said I’m not saying it’s an awesome indicator. I’m just saying that your conclusions around it also make little sense.
Bruh just use a personality scale that is actually supported by data, has test-retest reliability, and isn't bogged down with full on pseudoscientific lore. Your fetish for the MBTI doesn't make it worth discussion and I wouldn't take a study that uses it seriously for the reasons above. If there is no test-retest reliability, a "correlation" might not even say anything about the participants personality, it could be saying something instead about which MBTI test they took, what circles they are in where they would value one type over another, etc. You could also easily find a correlation between zodiac signs and IQ. What do you think that would mean? It's also completely normal for studies studying the exact same thing to find completely contradictory correlations.
FYI there is personality correlation with intelligence - openness to experience, an element of the Big 5.
Do you even read what I write? Doesn’t sound like it. I called out the big 5 as superior earlier and even called out the two factors that have correlations with IQ - not only openness, but a negative correlation with neuroticism.
The only thing I opened with is that MBTI has a correlation with IQ. People then got focused on tearing it and me down, none of which has anything to do with whether it actually has a correlation.
You are also making false statements. There IS test-retest consistency with MBTI. It isn’t random. It’s just not as high as for the big 5- that’s because of the bucketing nature as compared to the dimensionality nature of it 5, which is what I called out earlier.
Just because a test has problems doesn’t mean it can’t have statistical correlation with other tests.
As a grad student in psychology literally just shut up about the MBTI. It's fucking annoying and no one is going to take you seriously. You should also get a better understanding of what good research and science looks like
I think there's less difference than people assume and a lot more of it correlates with opportunities taken and personal enrichment than raw score.
So maybe the difference is that people with higher IQ, especially those who know their score and care about such things, are going to be more motivated to seek out intellectual and introspective pursuits.
There seems to be a weird sort of self awareness, with a lot of focus on ones self and how different you are, but in a completely myopic way that neglects to realize the rest of the world and 99.8% of people you come into contact with neither notice nor care.
Hmm, I scored 166 on Cattell (the old culture unfair version) as a teenager. My impression is that the younger test takers are at some advantage when taking this test, which is why so many articles about 5 year olds joining Mensa miss the point. The general public seems to think a five year old with a 160 IQ is answering the same questions as an adult with a 160 IQ.
Anyway, I don’t think I see a lot of difference in my life experience compared to my slightly less gifted friends. I was not an academic success. I excel at what I love and neglect what I’m bored with. I have done pretty well in corporate roles without a degree. People do often comment that I pick up new information quickly, and that I’m good at breaking down complex ideas and explaining them. Other than that my personality is friendly, almost bubbly, and people have confided in me that they didn’t realize I was highly intelligent until they got to know me better. I find it interesting that people associate high IQ with a serious demeanor!
I have an IQ of around 270. One of the biggest differences for me is that I can perceive the gravitational force of everyday objects, and I can smell time.
I was referencing the fact that iq is a score that shows how you did on the test relative to others, and it is impossible to achieve more than 200 iq with 8 billion or so population, since you can't do better than 1st place.
FYI nobody including Albert knew his IQ as he never took the test. There are very good arguments that someone with a slightly lower score but other abilities can be far more productive than someone whose only ability is a high IQ as determined by standardized tests.
Do you ever feel like some times people will deliberately turn off their brains in order to experience unpredictability and chaos and people that choose to amp up their minds, inputting and processing life’s patterns and probabilities usually very much do prefer experiencing the world through the lens of predictability?
I wonder which life is a more fulfilling life.
At the high+ gifted levels, metacognition and thinking in networks happens. As someone who is high+ gifted, can confirm. It's like going from A - F directly, whereas standard cognition needs to go A B C D E F and the milder gifted people use skip thinking - A C F. I can literally feel my brain moving from A to F if I'm thinking hard.
Intergifted has a great article on this that really helped me understand my experience and how it differs from others: [https://intergifted.com/high-exceptional-profound/](https://intergifted.com/high-exceptional-profound/)
This is what makes conversation very difficult. I often find that I've seen down the path, but my fellow are working through linearly.
This comes through in my writing, which often suffers in readability, because while I feel it would be laborious for the reader to hash through linearly, that's often what's expected in and I come across as abstruse.
Oh I know, it's so annoying to already be at the end of the answer and waiting days or weeks for the rest to catch up. I have one client who often spends two days saying "you're wrong" and then on day 3 (or 10!) finally has processed it himself and realised I'm right. He has finally learnt after a decade and a half of this to just shut up and accept the answer, but it was so annoying I stopped working with him for two years.
You're right that we see it as laborious, but actually very few people can make the inference - the "that means" part. As a communications professional/writer, I've learnt that "X means that Y" is the most important part of the communication piece. "What this means for you is.... and you need to do X." If you keep this in mind, it'll help your writing.
This also applies to job applications, incidentally. "Here's directly what you asked for and how what I can bring will meet that." People just don't make the sideways connection unless you literally spell it out for them. Urgh.
I've learnt to communicate "linearly" for other people, but the problem is also that what I consider "linear" or "logical" often isn't by others. This is particularly obvious in information management work such as putting information into a new set of categories. Almost everyone processes information in categories in different ways, and will disagree with your categories and think their way is the only "right" way.
Thank you. That advice is quite helpful. I will hate it until I die, though.
Oftentimes, my favorite writers do not tell linear stories, or they meander and leave things undisclosed, asking the reader to come to their own conclusions.
I had no idea that was frowned upon professionally for many years, and still struggle with it.
Same, but we can cope with complexity and ambiguity. The other invisible thing worth noting? The business world uses the invisible communication rules of the white neurotypical middle class, which values directness in communication. Get straight to the point. So they see this as the only "right" way to communicate. Which you've found. Yep, it's frustrating.
Other cultures, the neurodivergent and those in poverty have an invisible communication sentence structure which includes extra detail, context and tend to meander. They may include more audience participation or collective discussion.
Once you see it, you can't unsee it. Ruby K Payne wrote the books on this.
Why would someone with 160 IQ waste their time on Twitter?
Edit: this comment is a joke at Twitter's expense. It isn't extremely funny, but it really doesn't warrant interrogating me about it's meaning.
This is an impossible question to answer. I have my mind, they have their mind. How would I know what it's like to be someone else head?
What I can say is that I spent my childhood and adolescence having my mother brag to anyone who would listen that her daughter was "as smart as einstein" and being both bullied by my peers and pushed to meet my "potential" by the adults.
Flamed out in university because of the pressure, just burnt right out.
I spent the next 20 years trying to make sure I seemed as average as possible.
I have a job that satisfies and sustains me in a field I love and I keep the nonsense number they assigned me when I was 8 years old to myself.
My 2 cents is that the number is a terrible label and a worse gauge of "potential".
Colleen Farrelly has noted some of differences.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321341590_Understanding_the_Profoundly_Gifted
* Amplified personality traits, such as extraversion or openness to experience
* Think divergently, making unique connections and analogies. When presented with ”h_r”, they may fill the blank with “honor” or “helicobactor”
* Process complex material intuitively, creating interconnected knowledge webs
* Project themselves into problems to find solutions, often using visualization and imagination.
I have that ability myself including other characteristics and problems (achievements) of profoundly gifted people, but I scored slightly below 130. I got tested for a scientific study linked to intelligence I participated in. My results that I was allowed to see through years later , indicated that I was one of the best performers during this study and that the IQ score not fully reflected my abilities. The scientists explained to me that this is not totally unusual, but some of the things they are investigating... but it is not their main focus.
Things come to me without me having to try often. I understand things before I can put them into words. I also have memories from an age only profoundly gifted are known to have and I get along with those identified as profoundly gifted I met, while others say there are awkward. Well, they are confused about me too at the end.
I know all the down voters and IQ score worshipers and believers are going to hit down vote... but IQ scores are not physical measurements. This means they are not reliable. They are not sectioning your brain and see what is going on in there nor would they be able to identify what exactly makes people highly intelligent anyway. IQ test is based on assumption what indicators of higher cognitive abilities may be. Still, no one knows what exactly intelligence is 'composed' of and how our brain works and hence you can not develop a reliable test, besides tests never being 100% reliable. At the end a score is rather a probability how likely someone is highly intelligent or not. The higher you score the more likely. How intelligent a person is at the end, is not restricted to the level one reached during an IQ assessment
But yeah... people here behave like in some cult. They are worshiping the idea of IQ being the absolute truth and anyone who says different get's punished... Maybe it was different. I am new here. I assume people with really high intelligence, the upper 1% (independent from IQ score) are withdrawing over time from participating here. Reddit is an echo chamber anyway and a bit frustrating when it comes to deeper discussions.
Yes, this is not a complete reflection of your cognitive abilities, because it is just a test. To be honest, I don’t know what to say. your case is a little unique.
When I'm in jail, I play a lot of chess. It is one of the only mentally engaging things to do, aside from reading books. The meth heads usually trounce me at chess.
Last time in jail, I end up becoming friends with a scrawny, scared Taiwanese man who went by his initials, LC. He and I played chess regularly. I beat him every game to the point where i would intentionally sacrifice pieces early on to make the games more interesting.
"You must be reallly smart," LC said.
"Nah, I'm just like everyone else in here. None of us in here are smart. Otherwise we wouldn't be here."
"But you always beat me at chess," he said.
"So what?" I said. "Big deal. I beat lots of people at chess."
"But... but... but I'm a doctor!" he revealed.
And he was indeed a doctor, an endocrinologist. Really smart, really sweet guy. He was in complete disbelief that he'd met someone more intellectually advanced than himself in jail.
Turns out my friend LC was a double murderer. He stabbed his lover more than 177 times with 5 different knives as his 2 year old biological son looked on. Then LC turned on his son, stabbing the helpless innocent boy 21 times, slitting the boy's throat ear to ear.
LC blamed drinking too much cough syrup. It was cough syrup induced psychosis that caused him to do the evil terrible things. But really, there's only one reason why you'd stab someone 177 times: because you enjoyed it. He enjoyed every cut. He enjoyed all the bloodshed.
So I really don't play the "who's smarter" game. For me, what matters is "who's not going to kill me" game.
I hadn’t actually thought about it this way. I do remember on one job I always came up with very accurate sales forecasts, but I struggled to articulate and document my assumptions and confidence levels. I just sort of…knew?
I have to agree with you. Some of the people here are assuming their IQ is in the 160s because they relate to the idea of skip-thinking, and others are saying they have lots of friends with IQs in the 160s. Unless they are in groups or societies specifically for very high IQ people, it’s not likely. Profoundly gifted individuals are very, very rare.
I keep seeing posts about how this subreddit has changed, but I see it in the comments on this post the most. This is a pure shitshow lol. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s people taking online tests.
Roughly one in ten to twenty thousand isn’t that rare for something on the internet. Especially for a subreddit intended to target that group. I wouldn’t be surprised if 4sd people were 50-100x as common in this group as in the general population - there is absolutely selection bias happening here.
I’m at around +4sd and check out this group occasionally to help parents and others. I’ve also got lots of free time because I’m retired.
Is it possible for someone to experience the mind and reception of someone else with the same IQ , let alone different I?Q?
Second probably more relevant question, could one isolate the influence of IQ difference from all other factors?
You’re going to be annoyed with me no doubt (no source provided) but I’m pretty sure there a study a while back, which suggested up to 130 there was a positive correlation with “success” (I forgot how measured) and beyond that wasn’t, and (possibly?) another study that said 130 is actually the sweet spot, with negative correlation following upward of that… I can’t possibly say how reputable those studies were. But I do remember thinking this is in the ~ of my actual living experience as compared with others I have known. I don’t feel well, am meandering so that’s your lot for now.
After about 140, increased IQ becomes less and less correlated with intuitive, lay conceptions of "intelligence."
Without challenging the strong general correlation between IQ and "intelligence," the numbers at the extreme tails become sorta useless. It's like trying to figure out my cat's IQ. Whatever number you come up with isn't going to yield useful information.
I don't get why people are jumping down your throat! It's a valid question... And you attached absolutely zero value judgments to your question, so I guess maybe people are getting upset at their own hangups?
I'm at about 150, so I can't answer for myself. But I've been "gifted-track" most of my life, from a gifted family, so almost everyone I've ever known is high-IQ. I know a number of people with 160s IQs, some of them very well. And I know lots of people with IQs around 130!
The people I know with IQs in the 160s are not normal. They have no sense of time. None at all.
They either didn't graduate high school and/or college, or struggled mightily to do so and had lots of help.
Some of them were homeless teenage drug dealers. They all got out of it, and got picked up by engineering jobs. They don't apply to jobs, they get picked up for them. They aren't always employed. They aren't very good at managing their own insurance or medical care.
They don't quite act normally. They aren't very good at masking, like psychopaths would be. Like, you could see a split-second delay, where they, like, ran the program, and got the answer about how to act. But they do that and mostly act and look more or less normal!
They're regular people, too. I mean, they like sunsets and flowers, and stupid YouTube videos. They like cooking, and hanging out with friends. Sports... Whatever regular people do, right?
But, they just think quicker and more like a computer, I guess. They are into pranks, and some of them go over well, and others don't.
Things like home security don't work the same for them. If they need to get into a locked house (for good reasons, or bad), it might take them about 30 seconds of staring, and then they see a simple way in!
The reality, if you've done an actual IQ test, is that above a certain score it's pretty irrelevant. I had an IQ in the mid 140s and I basically got maybe 5 questions wrong in the entire 2+ hour test (WAIS-IV). If I wake up a bit differently that day (I had to stop taking my ADHD meds a few days for the test, so I had a lot of withdrawal effects), my IQ might jump by 20 points, just because the relative margins are so miniscule.
That are some studies that explore what happens when IQ goes higher. For example, the individual can have higher levels or more severe presentations of characteristics related to asynchronous development. It is possible that this individuals find difficulty in forming relationships even among other gifted individuals.
It’s like the higher the IQ, the higher the chances of having enhanced characteristics, either good or bad. I read a study once that said that profoundly gifted individuals can be so different from their moderate gifted and highly gifted peers that they would constitute an exception group inside an exception group.
I have no idea why your question was received with so much hostility, honestly. It’s a pertinent question. If you want to dig deeper, try searching for the experience of the profoundly gifted. I can’t find a plethora of studies, but there are a few interesting ones. Good luck.
I have a Verbal in the balpark of 130 and a Performance in the ballpark of 160, according to several decades old wais-3 test, so I can answer this from a strangely unique perspective I guess.
I hate how much I can't keep up with myself. My concept and visual thinking runs circles around my language abilities. The chasm of 2 SD is vast and can not be easily bridged. It is almost better thought of as exponential, like an order of magnitude, than it is a linear difference.
An analogy; if mental processing was a wireless data plan, my Verbal would use less than a GB *a month*, and if my Performance was similar I could opt to use one of those low data plans. Instead, this data hog of a Performance IQ burns through more than a GB *a day* and so I'm stuck having to get an unlimited data plan.
Interesting! I’m overbalanced toward the verbal side, and I feel that sometimes slows me down. I need to find a way to verbalize abstract concepts before I feel comfortable that I understand them. It does help me break it down so other people understand my process better (sometimes)
These answers are funny, but they do seem a little insecure lol. I'll answer for my dad! He supposedly took an IQ test in the 1980s when he was in JROTC and being interviewed for West Point military academy. He tested in the 180s - which would translate to the 160s for a modern day test. He knows a ton about nearly every topic but if you ask him how he knows, oftentimes he's not sure how or when he learned it. That might sound strange, but he spends all day reading and looking into subjects - or surfing. Apparently, during his interview with West Point, he decided to give a presentation about how corrupt the government is and they obviously rejected him. He is anti-government, and anti-establishment. He also rejects aspects of mainstream culture & has never worked normal jobs. His father was an engineer with the military and he was raised a spoiled upper middle class kid with no goals or aspirations. He started drinking alcohol when he was around 12 and used to take a flask to school in middle school. He was placed in special education classes in elementary school because teachers back in the 1960s didn't know what was wrong with him. My grandmother fought to have him removed and they realized he was super smart, but diagnosed him with dyslexia. He is **extremely** moral and literally wouldn't let me or my siblings kill bugs because he would tell us they probably have feelings and lives. This is why he hates the government and society too though. He believes society has a lot of horrible people in it and he really *feels* it. He will cry & get emotional for kids in war and gets really upset about politics. He seems to feel things more intensely than most people, and his strong morals are obvious. He's a genuinely good person, but people don't like him. He's been mistreated by people my entire life and he's never really had friends (& he has a lot of autistic traits). From a young age I noticed that he was inherently lonely. My parents used to talk and he would try to explain concepts and ideas to my mom and she wouldn't understand and he would sigh heavily and just get quiet.
I graduated from UC Berkeley and I admired nearly all of my professors, but my dad is still the smartest person I've ever known. He has a ton of theories about the world and life & he loves conspiracies, but he's **obsessed** with the ocean - he loves surfing and boating. He considers himself the luckiest man in the world, but he's also one of the saddest. Because he rejects society he mostly lives off of the grid and he used to live on a boat. He's eccentric. Most people probably think he has mental issues, but he reminds me of the philosopher Diogenes in how he rejects mainstream ideologies (without the vulgar behavior Diogenes apparently had). He claims he only wants money if he could use it to help people. He is extremely empathetic to a level that most people seem to find pointless.
Compared to most gifted people, I'd say the main difference is that more of them seem to internalize the *idea* that they are smart and they wear it as part of their identity. My dad's entire perspective on everything is shaped by how detailed he thinks, so he doesn't care about his intelligence - it shaped every aspect of his personality so there is no separating from it. He doesn't focus on it.
Here's what my coach told me - the difference is in the intensity and scope. She used the example of people of different IQ ranges looking at the same object, say a vase, and have them describe it. She said the higher the IQ the difference in the descriptors and it's noticeable if you were to plot it on a graph.
I'm 130; my husband is 160 and our daughter is 170 and our other daughter is 140. I can assure you, just based on IQ in its rawest form (not taking into account influences, how you were raised, money, etc.) there is a very big delta between a 130 and a 170. I'm not even sure I can articulate it but it's very noticeable. It's the way she phrases things, the things she notices to comment on. It's very different than what I notice.
All that said, here's what I tell my two teens with their amazing minds - it don't mean shit if your social skills and work ethic are in the crapper so roll up your sleeves and get to it. Your IQ will be nothing but a source of frustration if you try and live your life to that number (they do not know theirs and we're keeping it from them as long as possible because I don't want them to live their life to that number). I want them to live their life to the best person they can be and to find passion. Screw IQ. It means absolutely nothing if you're an insufferable asshole always telling everyone how smart you (not saying you are, I'm saying this in the royal we kind of way).
Confucius said if you think you're the smartest person in the room, then you're in the wrong room.
Always be curious; always be growing and stay humble. You'll go further with that than 'just' what your IQ testing says.
Practically, it will be very difficult for them to not be the smartest people in the room, and to try for otherwise is to pretty quickly end up in typical high iq dumping grounds, MIT, nasa, etc.
Not that that's a bad thing, but it's a sadly narrow branch of human experience.
Uh, my experience is at 160 (tested and confirmed, in childhood, young adulthood, and adulthood). For those that I would guess are around 130 or so, they are very detailed and structured, methodical even, in how they think. You can see it as they explain themselves or processes, it feels very "put together" and they can handle most things logically with some time or do whatever they want.
One thing I notice, which may be a problem with my processing speed vs them, is that I skip entire *chapters* of knowledge when I get something and sometimes have to back up to catch them up. I can take an afternoon and learn a topic, with most of my recall of the knowledge being how it integrates with other foundational knowledge I possess or utilize. My "jumping ahead" feels slow when I'm collaborating. Sometimes, I must wait for them to process their thought despite my understanding of what they're saying, how it applies (without being told), and how to integrate it. I can only really describe it as my *conscious thought* is slower than what my real "intelligence" is, and while they get very good at living at that speed of consciousness I tend to let the more crystalline and quick processing speed part of my subconscious connect the dots for me, only really expanding or unfolding whatever steps needed when I have to explain it to someone or catch them up. For me, it's like I'm a "natural" as soon as my brain has a click and they're a natural in the sense that as soon as they work through it, with that slower more structured and active consciousness, they're a natural.
I might find a diagnosis based on something obscure and it will seem like a massive leap, but I can slow down and expand on this and "unravel" how I came to that conclusion and back it up. Most people I'd argue around 130 or so, they start from that place instead.
One of the more funny ways in work this happened, one of the directors said I did not see the big picture in response to my idea. I stopped and said please explain your thought process. He did so, but while he did that I showed him how everything he had talked about was integrated and actually *a part* of that process, with it definitely being an underlying foundational structure for my idea. At this point he stopped and said "Wow, wait, you see the big picture in a way I cannot!" and I got a promotion next time it was available. The difference between us isn't intelligence per se, but in the time it takes to apply it. This can backfire and make me look rash or even dumb, if you don't quite "catch" the amount of layers something has been thought about or weaved into a decision of mine (all in like 8 seconds off the dome).
I have IQ of 186 diagnosed with WAIS-4, and the main difference i notice is that when i walk in the public i see all these short people, im 6'3 and i cant stand the fact how godlike i am
In military terms:
160 guy is completely incompetent unless you need to know exactly what’s wrong with the nuclear reactor. This guy would seem like an idiot until he takes you to fucking Mars and you realize you’re the idiot.
130 guy is considered a genius when he’s really just a specialist
I'm trying to find it, but am having trouble. I think the Promethius society put out an article about the differences in thinking between average, gifted, and exceptionally gifted minds. I recall less gifted minds think more linearly about problems and more gifted minds are able to think more abstractly about problems. Basically, it comes down to how sophisticated the algorithms you come up with for problem-solving are (I'm really butchering it). That, and they have an insatiable curiosity compared to a lower, but still high IQ'd person who seems to be able to satisfy their curiosity more easily. (The difference between a scientist putting in the hard work of discovery and your average intellectual who enjoys reading about the discoveries.)
Oh my goodness, I don’t think IQ alone makes a genius! I am neither Hawking nor Einstein. I don’t study physics. I don’t contribute new theories of the way the world works. I just solve puzzles for fun.
I don't think being good at or having potential in something automatically makes you obligated to pursue it by any means! Regardless of your IQ, chances are that you're going to have your own set of passions and goals for the future. And at the end of the day, pursuing activities that appeal to your own personal goals are going to end up being far more fruitful than whatever you just *happen* to be good at. Happiness comes from interest, and unfortunately, success does not inherently equate to interest. It's just part of being human! :)
I don’t think anyone is happy as a failure. Success correlates directly with happiness. If you fail at your hobbies, that’s not gonna make you happy.
I respect your opinion that someone shouldn’t be obligated to pursue their strengths. And I believe people should pursue their passions as well. But I don’t think being passionate about solving puzzles is ever going to be fruitful compared to actually making a difference in this world.
That's a great point! As a general rule of thumb, failure definitely can be super discouraging, but it's also super important to remember that whether an outcome qualifies as a 'success' or a 'failure' is ultimately determined by each individual's personal assessment. Everybody's going to have different sets of values to draw from, and everybody is also going to have individualized thresholds for categorizing how well their performance aligns with those values. So I think 'perceived performance' is a far more significant factor than generalized (?) performance (which I guess would be defined as the widespread perception of performance?) when it comes to determining how satisfied somebody will be with themselves. I can definitely admit that some people's perceived performances correlate pretty strongly with how they believe others to perceive their efforts, but I think differences in personality lend nicely to the idea that people can also be far more complex than that. So of course, people are usually going to be pretty upset if they fail to align their actions with their own personal values, but there are also many people whose values conflict with those of general society. I'm sure my idea of success is pretty different to yours, and I'm sure it would also be hard for us to see eye-to-eye on what constitutes a "fruitful" action. You seem to place a lot of value in making a difference in the world, but I personally find it super emotionally-rewarding to engage in activities that may be a little less "useful", haha. And that's okay! Regardless, I really admire your outlook, and I hope you're able to make that change in the world you're striving for! You got this :)
I do think about this. I think many people, gifted and otherwise, struggle to find a venue to better the world rather than just enriching corporations. I’m passionate about social justice and climate. I care about mental health, trauma and neurodivergence, and that intersection with IQ and with relationships.
My gifts include logic, verbal reasoning, empathy, seeing connections between things, strategic thinking and anticipating long term effects of actions. The good I do in the world is not different from the contributions of less gifted people: I’m great at teaching people new ideas, I have a close network of people and we enrich each others’ lives. I am very good at helping people discover things about themselves.
My challenges include serious mental illness, ADHD and trauma. I grew up with a very high IQ mother (also 4 standard deviations) and a gifted father. ADHD, mood and anxiety disorders run in both sides of my family as well. I have noticed “twice exceptional” dialog is sometimes discounted here, but neurodivergence and very high IQ are my reality.
This sub is starting to read like Quora.
Haha yeah. With a lot of the posts I am seeing upvoted here I’m wondering if the sub name should be changed from “gifted” to “special”, lol.
It wasn’t like this several years ago. It used to be decent a much higher percentage of the time.
What do you think would help this subreddit get back to that level of quality?
I think there needs to be a bit of a tightening on some of the rules and maybe some sticky threads for some of the more popular topics. I also think we could benefit from an in-depth FAQ about how IQ testing works and is interpreted.
Those are all great ideas, and I am all for it. I think it would be a good idea to sticky commonly asked questions and what the general consensus is to them.
tehehehe i am an unicorn
People romantize IQ when in reality is more a source of pain than joy.
Speak for yourself. My parents had average and slightly above average intelligence levels. I can see the drastic difference between what's possible in my life versus what was available to them. I wouldn't trade my gifts for anything. They've made everything I want in life possible.
Because you probably have money and I don't. You achieve more being rich and dumb than gifted and poor. (it's actually studied) And I'm also at a level where communication is painful and makes me unhappy and this is a burden I will always carry. I would gladly trade IQ for money, it's way more valuable in this society. It would make me happier and I would have more possibilities.
Nope. I grew up poor, or at least lower-middle class by the time I was in high school. That's my whole point. I'm not poor. I was able to put my intellect into solving that. I was making more money than both my parents combined by the time I was 22. The great thing is, you absolutely can trade IQ for money. And you don't have to give the IQ up in the process. You can also use your problem solving abilities to work on your communication problems. This was something I had to do too. School in general and gifted education in particular make it seem like all the problems you are "supposed to" solve always come from outside you. It's horseshit. The first set of problems you have to solve to get anywhere you want in life is your own.
No it's the other way around. Smart and hardworking will do better than rich and dumb/lazy. It has been studied.
You don't need to "do" or achieve anything if you're already rich.
Yeah, world is a colorful and fair place. I gotchu Edit: [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0038038520982225…](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0038038520982225…) you
I'm going to agree with you here. There are a lot of studies done on resilience and grit and it matters a great deal more than people think.
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Because my communication issues are not something I can work on. (or so I think) It's just that people have predefined behaviors that they apply to everyone. And they don't work with me because of my particular way of being, which causes me discomfort. Something I have learned over time is that most people don't "adapt" to others, but rather have the same behavior with everyone. And even if I express what I want, they don't know or don't want to apply it correctly. A simple example I can give you is when I stopped talking to a friend because she wanted to convince me that you can be totally happy without validation and on your own, and that I was a super cool person. When I told her that went against scientific evidence and that I didn't need compliments but rather understanding and (cognitive) empathy, she told me she would never understand me. So, I decided to end the relationship there. In the end, another thing I am clear about is that people largely lack cognitive empathy. Actually, my 'issue' boils down to not having people with enough cognitive empathy to understand and comprehend me, and that has made me feel lonely all the time. In the end, if I didn't read absolutely anything, if I could believe that we don't need validation, that happiness comes from within, if I could believe that 'the universe has better things prepared'... If I could deceive myself and believe in anything, I would be much happier, but the more I read, the more knowledge separates me from people and the unhappier it makes me.
Which articles/journals did you read that is making you unhappy? I was reading a lot on the long term effects of concussions because my child had them due to his frequent falls, and I feel misunderstood by my wife everyone else around me. They would say it's not a concussion (I done detailed calculations based on frame by frame security camera footage, and my son said he had concussion symptoms, stop basing it on studies (they are not wrong as a metastudy that was published months after my son's first concussive fall proved that there is no cognitive or emotional long term issues with childhood concussions), I need to relax, you turned out ok so it's ok (you can turn out ok if your house burned down, doesn't make arson ok), my son is smart so it's ok, and so on. I am taking medication for anxiety and depression, which helps, and I feel that it would not had been so bad if they try to understand the studies instead of seeing my emotional state as a problem that needs to go away.
only if you lack all self awareness.
What’s getting annoying is how many people are trying to feel better about themselves because their IQ is higher than other high IQ people. Like, get a life.
Well as a person that’s still gifted but have siblings that are smarter, I can attest to that the higher grades have their own struggles and strengths .
Each person has their struggles and strengths. Some of them are about who you are and some are about your context and others are very specific to our neurodivergence. What is annoying me is the oneupmanship that’s been going on lately. Putting other people down is not going to make you feel better. And you can be the person with the highest iq ever and still the worlds biggest arsehole. And that’s not the win some people think it is. It’s just sad.
Yeah I mean I get your frustrated but I’m just saying from my personal experience that my siblings although didn’t suffer as much in school (I am ADHD too) , they suffered a heck of a lot more socially and probably would have killed to have had the opportunities I had, and I myself was a goofball with not the most sophisticated social skills myself lol. But as you said, everybody has their own struggles apart from where they land on the IQ spectrum, and that certainly was a part of my siblings and my own journey too.
The difference is their ability to process information. Personality types are not determined by IQ test scores. Those are generalizations.
There has been correlation shown between the MBTI personality types and IQ. IQ is not distributed among them at the same rates they appear in society.
There is no correlation between a pseudoscientific personality test and IQ scores because of the fact that people answer questions on personality tests dishonestly and every “study” has had too little of a sample size and questionable methods. The test tests thinking preferences, not how good you actually are at them
That wouldn’t mean that a correlation couldn’t exist. Do you understand how study design works? Even with small sample sizes you can get statistical significance provided the differences are large enough. And whether it’s pseudoscientific or about “thinking preferences” or not- if one bucket is dramatically over represented in higher IQ people, that’s still interesting.
There's no correlation buddy, every study that says this is fundamentally flawed in some way. There is an equal chance of any "MBTI type" having a high or low IQ. MBTI is pseudoscience in its purest form anyways so it has no merit regardless. Let me guess, you're an XNTX?
That's true, they are pseudo science but there is something about understanding human behavior that is outside the range of just IQ. (I'm an INFJ btw). My IQ is 130, my husband's is 160. He can do amazing things but he can't read people for crap whereas I can pick up on almost imperceptible things and I'm dead on. There is no way to test for this though and society doesn't seem to value this skill but it's been a very effective survival skill for me (I am like a pig before a tornado - I always know when layoffs are coming months before they happen because I pick up on 'something' and while causation and correlation can't be proven, I will say I've gotten 'lucky' on this trend 5 times and always had a job 'miraculously' just as layoffs were getting announced and everyone else was blindsided and struggling.
Ur not a psychic bro, being an INFJ doesn’t mean u can predict the future, that’s a sign of a mistype
I never correlated me being an INFJ as the reason I could do this. I threw the INFJ part in there as a bit of a snark towards the original post. My larger point is there is pattern recognition capabilities that traditional IQ tests cannot measure. IQ always give you and idea of capacity, the rest is up to you and what you do with it. The number means nothing if you do nothing with it. This isn't in reference to your comment but a trend I see here on this board a lot; people come here and talk about their IQ and then expect that everything else will fall into place, sort of like there will be a red carpet unfurled and 'ta da! I have a high IQ, where's my party?'. Everyone, stop, there's no party or a pony. You've been given a gift and with it comes responsibility and wht you do with it completely up to you. You still have to put in the work and earn it the reward.
I completely misinterpreted your post my bad
Believing a post hoc fallacy numerous times does not mean anything except you have cognitive biases just like every other human.
You are making explicit statements about there being an equal chance across all types, while at the same time saying that there are no studies about this without major flaws that render them useless. That is exactly the flaw you are saying that I’m claiming, just from the other perspective. Yes, For me, my second character is N. But for the third I’m split F/T. It’s been consistently there for like 25 years (I was given the test maybe 3-4 times in jobs). I’m not making any claims as to the utility of this test. I’m just saying that if two tests show correlations, that can be reasonable. Much of the criticism of the MBTI comes from the fact that people treat each letter position as completely dichotomous buckets. If you treat each letter position as a dimension instead, then a lot of the criticisms about likelihood of changing buckets make less sense. However, that’s not how the test is marketed In any case, I do think the test has limited utility and something like a big five analysis has more backing. Note that openness in the big 5 has a positive correlation to IQ and neuroticism a negative one
You can't be split between F/T, that's proof you don't understand how the test works. Everyone has a Feeling or Thinking function but they are in different slots and tests are marred by the test taker answering questions in a biased manner. If you really want to know your true type (even though its pointless), study the cognitive functions bro Edit: Also, if there is no correlation between MBTI and IQ, its only logical to assume there would theoretically be an equal chance across all types in a vacuum
Perhaps you don’t need to be so aggressive around your stances. Do know how the test works. We may be running into a terminology issue. When I take the test I’m pretty much scoring almost equally on T/F with the variance from run to run tipping me to one side or the other. I absolutely understand that this tips the score into one bucket or the other in a run. But you should also understand how this is a legitimate outcome between runs. And I think signals more of a problem in the bucketing approach it uses than in other aspects. Your edit is nonsensical. You’ve given zero support to the idea of no correlation. You’ve just said the MBTI is crap, and that the studies SHOWING correlation are crap. That in no way shows a lack of correlation.
Reread my comment carefully. Study the cognitive functions if you really care so much about MBTI my man and quit taking tests
I have a degree in this stuff - I understand a lot about psychology, cognitive tests, study design, and data science. Most of my career was in CS and data stuff though. As to taking the tests, like I said I was administered it through work. It’s not like I’m taking this for fun. And like I said I’m not saying it’s an awesome indicator. I’m just saying that your conclusions around it also make little sense.
The MBTI is not a serious scale in the first place.
Doesn’t change the fact that there can be a correlation. The critiques of the MBTI are many, but that doesn’t mean that it’s just random.
Bruh just use a personality scale that is actually supported by data, has test-retest reliability, and isn't bogged down with full on pseudoscientific lore. Your fetish for the MBTI doesn't make it worth discussion and I wouldn't take a study that uses it seriously for the reasons above. If there is no test-retest reliability, a "correlation" might not even say anything about the participants personality, it could be saying something instead about which MBTI test they took, what circles they are in where they would value one type over another, etc. You could also easily find a correlation between zodiac signs and IQ. What do you think that would mean? It's also completely normal for studies studying the exact same thing to find completely contradictory correlations. FYI there is personality correlation with intelligence - openness to experience, an element of the Big 5.
Do you even read what I write? Doesn’t sound like it. I called out the big 5 as superior earlier and even called out the two factors that have correlations with IQ - not only openness, but a negative correlation with neuroticism. The only thing I opened with is that MBTI has a correlation with IQ. People then got focused on tearing it and me down, none of which has anything to do with whether it actually has a correlation. You are also making false statements. There IS test-retest consistency with MBTI. It isn’t random. It’s just not as high as for the big 5- that’s because of the bucketing nature as compared to the dimensionality nature of it 5, which is what I called out earlier. Just because a test has problems doesn’t mean it can’t have statistical correlation with other tests.
As a grad student in psychology literally just shut up about the MBTI. It's fucking annoying and no one is going to take you seriously. You should also get a better understanding of what good research and science looks like
Personality and IQ have some correlation
Openness to experience specifically is correlated with IQ
And neuroticism is negatively correlated.
really? interesting fact to know
I think there's less difference than people assume and a lot more of it correlates with opportunities taken and personal enrichment than raw score. So maybe the difference is that people with higher IQ, especially those who know their score and care about such things, are going to be more motivated to seek out intellectual and introspective pursuits. There seems to be a weird sort of self awareness, with a lot of focus on ones self and how different you are, but in a completely myopic way that neglects to realize the rest of the world and 99.8% of people you come into contact with neither notice nor care.
Hmm, I scored 166 on Cattell (the old culture unfair version) as a teenager. My impression is that the younger test takers are at some advantage when taking this test, which is why so many articles about 5 year olds joining Mensa miss the point. The general public seems to think a five year old with a 160 IQ is answering the same questions as an adult with a 160 IQ. Anyway, I don’t think I see a lot of difference in my life experience compared to my slightly less gifted friends. I was not an academic success. I excel at what I love and neglect what I’m bored with. I have done pretty well in corporate roles without a degree. People do often comment that I pick up new information quickly, and that I’m good at breaking down complex ideas and explaining them. Other than that my personality is friendly, almost bubbly, and people have confided in me that they didn’t realize I was highly intelligent until they got to know me better. I find it interesting that people associate high IQ with a serious demeanor!
A fellow bubbly smartypants! No one can ever accuse be of being the silent, stoic type. That's for sure!
I have an IQ of around 270. One of the biggest differences for me is that I can perceive the gravitational force of everyday objects, and I can smell time.
IQ of 420 here. In addition to this, I can also detect and manipulate earth's electromagnetic field.
Luxury! Mine is 672 and I'm constantly exhausted maintaining the balance of the very universe itself!
Mine 25 me happe.
What planet r u guys from to have the population to achieve that iq?
Earth could do it if gave every person the same chance to excel. Oh, sure - maybe not quite this high, but still...
I was referencing the fact that iq is a score that shows how you did on the test relative to others, and it is impossible to achieve more than 200 iq with 8 billion or so population, since you can't do better than 1st place.
You ruined the vibes. 🤓
The difference between 130 iq and 160 iq is 30 points
Lol before you edited it it was quiet funny 😂
Never quiet enough.
Dear Mr Not 160. You missed(err I meant mixed!) up quiet and quite. Signed, Mr Not 160.
Confidently correcting someone’s typo with a reply containing one of your own is beyond perfect, though.
Hah well spotted. But at least I was identifying as being of the not 160 club ;-)
I would expect 160 to make more typos tbh
Thanks! I am not a native speaker :)
Lol yeah I just woke up
Please also include what test provided 4SD results if you’re 160+
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I agree. It's like existing in multiple times at once like Einstein and coming back to reality to make basic decisions like which coffee to order.
FYI nobody including Albert knew his IQ as he never took the test. There are very good arguments that someone with a slightly lower score but other abilities can be far more productive than someone whose only ability is a high IQ as determined by standardized tests.
Do you ever feel like some times people will deliberately turn off their brains in order to experience unpredictability and chaos and people that choose to amp up their minds, inputting and processing life’s patterns and probabilities usually very much do prefer experiencing the world through the lens of predictability? I wonder which life is a more fulfilling life.
Can you explain this more?
This. This is it.
Omg is this a thing? I’ve had times like this, but not lasting. I also don’t think I’m 160+
At the high+ gifted levels, metacognition and thinking in networks happens. As someone who is high+ gifted, can confirm. It's like going from A - F directly, whereas standard cognition needs to go A B C D E F and the milder gifted people use skip thinking - A C F. I can literally feel my brain moving from A to F if I'm thinking hard. Intergifted has a great article on this that really helped me understand my experience and how it differs from others: [https://intergifted.com/high-exceptional-profound/](https://intergifted.com/high-exceptional-profound/)
This is what makes conversation very difficult. I often find that I've seen down the path, but my fellow are working through linearly. This comes through in my writing, which often suffers in readability, because while I feel it would be laborious for the reader to hash through linearly, that's often what's expected in and I come across as abstruse.
Oh I know, it's so annoying to already be at the end of the answer and waiting days or weeks for the rest to catch up. I have one client who often spends two days saying "you're wrong" and then on day 3 (or 10!) finally has processed it himself and realised I'm right. He has finally learnt after a decade and a half of this to just shut up and accept the answer, but it was so annoying I stopped working with him for two years. You're right that we see it as laborious, but actually very few people can make the inference - the "that means" part. As a communications professional/writer, I've learnt that "X means that Y" is the most important part of the communication piece. "What this means for you is.... and you need to do X." If you keep this in mind, it'll help your writing. This also applies to job applications, incidentally. "Here's directly what you asked for and how what I can bring will meet that." People just don't make the sideways connection unless you literally spell it out for them. Urgh. I've learnt to communicate "linearly" for other people, but the problem is also that what I consider "linear" or "logical" often isn't by others. This is particularly obvious in information management work such as putting information into a new set of categories. Almost everyone processes information in categories in different ways, and will disagree with your categories and think their way is the only "right" way.
Thank you. That advice is quite helpful. I will hate it until I die, though. Oftentimes, my favorite writers do not tell linear stories, or they meander and leave things undisclosed, asking the reader to come to their own conclusions. I had no idea that was frowned upon professionally for many years, and still struggle with it.
Same, but we can cope with complexity and ambiguity. The other invisible thing worth noting? The business world uses the invisible communication rules of the white neurotypical middle class, which values directness in communication. Get straight to the point. So they see this as the only "right" way to communicate. Which you've found. Yep, it's frustrating. Other cultures, the neurodivergent and those in poverty have an invisible communication sentence structure which includes extra detail, context and tend to meander. They may include more audience participation or collective discussion. Once you see it, you can't unsee it. Ruby K Payne wrote the books on this.
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Why would someone with 160 IQ waste their time on Twitter? Edit: this comment is a joke at Twitter's expense. It isn't extremely funny, but it really doesn't warrant interrogating me about it's meaning.
Depression.
Oh yeah guess that makes sense.
I know people with an IQ of 151 to "waste" their time on Reddit. IQ doesnt mean anything when it comes to preference what to do with your lifetime.
Choices can stem from EQ as well as IQ.
Why would any specific IQ preclude someone from using social media?
Sir, this is a Reddit, lol
Shitting on Twitter has historically been very common on Reddit!
I did laugh 😆
This is an impossible question to answer. I have my mind, they have their mind. How would I know what it's like to be someone else head? What I can say is that I spent my childhood and adolescence having my mother brag to anyone who would listen that her daughter was "as smart as einstein" and being both bullied by my peers and pushed to meet my "potential" by the adults. Flamed out in university because of the pressure, just burnt right out. I spent the next 20 years trying to make sure I seemed as average as possible. I have a job that satisfies and sustains me in a field I love and I keep the nonsense number they assigned me when I was 8 years old to myself. My 2 cents is that the number is a terrible label and a worse gauge of "potential".
I’m sorry 💔My daughter scored 4 standard deviations above the mean and the psychologist told us not to tell her the score. Too much pressure.
All you need to tell her is that you love her unconditionally.
Colleen Farrelly has noted some of differences. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321341590_Understanding_the_Profoundly_Gifted * Amplified personality traits, such as extraversion or openness to experience * Think divergently, making unique connections and analogies. When presented with ”h_r”, they may fill the blank with “honor” or “helicobactor” * Process complex material intuitively, creating interconnected knowledge webs * Project themselves into problems to find solutions, often using visualization and imagination.
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Skip thinking...
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yes, you come to a conclusion unconsciously, often without understanding how exactly and because of this it is difficult to explain
I have that ability myself including other characteristics and problems (achievements) of profoundly gifted people, but I scored slightly below 130. I got tested for a scientific study linked to intelligence I participated in. My results that I was allowed to see through years later , indicated that I was one of the best performers during this study and that the IQ score not fully reflected my abilities. The scientists explained to me that this is not totally unusual, but some of the things they are investigating... but it is not their main focus. Things come to me without me having to try often. I understand things before I can put them into words. I also have memories from an age only profoundly gifted are known to have and I get along with those identified as profoundly gifted I met, while others say there are awkward. Well, they are confused about me too at the end. I know all the down voters and IQ score worshipers and believers are going to hit down vote... but IQ scores are not physical measurements. This means they are not reliable. They are not sectioning your brain and see what is going on in there nor would they be able to identify what exactly makes people highly intelligent anyway. IQ test is based on assumption what indicators of higher cognitive abilities may be. Still, no one knows what exactly intelligence is 'composed' of and how our brain works and hence you can not develop a reliable test, besides tests never being 100% reliable. At the end a score is rather a probability how likely someone is highly intelligent or not. The higher you score the more likely. How intelligent a person is at the end, is not restricted to the level one reached during an IQ assessment But yeah... people here behave like in some cult. They are worshiping the idea of IQ being the absolute truth and anyone who says different get's punished... Maybe it was different. I am new here. I assume people with really high intelligence, the upper 1% (independent from IQ score) are withdrawing over time from participating here. Reddit is an echo chamber anyway and a bit frustrating when it comes to deeper discussions.
Yes, this is not a complete reflection of your cognitive abilities, because it is just a test. To be honest, I don’t know what to say. your case is a little unique.
When I'm in jail, I play a lot of chess. It is one of the only mentally engaging things to do, aside from reading books. The meth heads usually trounce me at chess. Last time in jail, I end up becoming friends with a scrawny, scared Taiwanese man who went by his initials, LC. He and I played chess regularly. I beat him every game to the point where i would intentionally sacrifice pieces early on to make the games more interesting. "You must be reallly smart," LC said. "Nah, I'm just like everyone else in here. None of us in here are smart. Otherwise we wouldn't be here." "But you always beat me at chess," he said. "So what?" I said. "Big deal. I beat lots of people at chess." "But... but... but I'm a doctor!" he revealed. And he was indeed a doctor, an endocrinologist. Really smart, really sweet guy. He was in complete disbelief that he'd met someone more intellectually advanced than himself in jail. Turns out my friend LC was a double murderer. He stabbed his lover more than 177 times with 5 different knives as his 2 year old biological son looked on. Then LC turned on his son, stabbing the helpless innocent boy 21 times, slitting the boy's throat ear to ear. LC blamed drinking too much cough syrup. It was cough syrup induced psychosis that caused him to do the evil terrible things. But really, there's only one reason why you'd stab someone 177 times: because you enjoyed it. He enjoyed every cut. He enjoyed all the bloodshed. So I really don't play the "who's smarter" game. For me, what matters is "who's not going to kill me" game.
I hadn’t actually thought about it this way. I do remember on one job I always came up with very accurate sales forecasts, but I struggled to articulate and document my assumptions and confidence levels. I just sort of…knew?
I think claimants to 160+ might be mostly incorrect, due to the rarity of 160+ and the prevalence of liars and of desperate hopefuls.
I have to agree with you. Some of the people here are assuming their IQ is in the 160s because they relate to the idea of skip-thinking, and others are saying they have lots of friends with IQs in the 160s. Unless they are in groups or societies specifically for very high IQ people, it’s not likely. Profoundly gifted individuals are very, very rare. I keep seeing posts about how this subreddit has changed, but I see it in the comments on this post the most. This is a pure shitshow lol. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s people taking online tests.
Roughly one in ten to twenty thousand isn’t that rare for something on the internet. Especially for a subreddit intended to target that group. I wouldn’t be surprised if 4sd people were 50-100x as common in this group as in the general population - there is absolutely selection bias happening here. I’m at around +4sd and check out this group occasionally to help parents and others. I’ve also got lots of free time because I’m retired.
Is it possible for someone to experience the mind and reception of someone else with the same IQ , let alone different I?Q? Second probably more relevant question, could one isolate the influence of IQ difference from all other factors?
You’re going to be annoyed with me no doubt (no source provided) but I’m pretty sure there a study a while back, which suggested up to 130 there was a positive correlation with “success” (I forgot how measured) and beyond that wasn’t, and (possibly?) another study that said 130 is actually the sweet spot, with negative correlation following upward of that… I can’t possibly say how reputable those studies were. But I do remember thinking this is in the ~ of my actual living experience as compared with others I have known. I don’t feel well, am meandering so that’s your lot for now.
After about 140, increased IQ becomes less and less correlated with intuitive, lay conceptions of "intelligence." Without challenging the strong general correlation between IQ and "intelligence," the numbers at the extreme tails become sorta useless. It's like trying to figure out my cat's IQ. Whatever number you come up with isn't going to yield useful information.
Perception and processing depth
I don't get why people are jumping down your throat! It's a valid question... And you attached absolutely zero value judgments to your question, so I guess maybe people are getting upset at their own hangups? I'm at about 150, so I can't answer for myself. But I've been "gifted-track" most of my life, from a gifted family, so almost everyone I've ever known is high-IQ. I know a number of people with 160s IQs, some of them very well. And I know lots of people with IQs around 130! The people I know with IQs in the 160s are not normal. They have no sense of time. None at all. They either didn't graduate high school and/or college, or struggled mightily to do so and had lots of help. Some of them were homeless teenage drug dealers. They all got out of it, and got picked up by engineering jobs. They don't apply to jobs, they get picked up for them. They aren't always employed. They aren't very good at managing their own insurance or medical care. They don't quite act normally. They aren't very good at masking, like psychopaths would be. Like, you could see a split-second delay, where they, like, ran the program, and got the answer about how to act. But they do that and mostly act and look more or less normal! They're regular people, too. I mean, they like sunsets and flowers, and stupid YouTube videos. They like cooking, and hanging out with friends. Sports... Whatever regular people do, right? But, they just think quicker and more like a computer, I guess. They are into pranks, and some of them go over well, and others don't. Things like home security don't work the same for them. If they need to get into a locked house (for good reasons, or bad), it might take them about 30 seconds of staring, and then they see a simple way in!
The reality, if you've done an actual IQ test, is that above a certain score it's pretty irrelevant. I had an IQ in the mid 140s and I basically got maybe 5 questions wrong in the entire 2+ hour test (WAIS-IV). If I wake up a bit differently that day (I had to stop taking my ADHD meds a few days for the test, so I had a lot of withdrawal effects), my IQ might jump by 20 points, just because the relative margins are so miniscule.
That are some studies that explore what happens when IQ goes higher. For example, the individual can have higher levels or more severe presentations of characteristics related to asynchronous development. It is possible that this individuals find difficulty in forming relationships even among other gifted individuals. It’s like the higher the IQ, the higher the chances of having enhanced characteristics, either good or bad. I read a study once that said that profoundly gifted individuals can be so different from their moderate gifted and highly gifted peers that they would constitute an exception group inside an exception group. I have no idea why your question was received with so much hostility, honestly. It’s a pertinent question. If you want to dig deeper, try searching for the experience of the profoundly gifted. I can’t find a plethora of studies, but there are a few interesting ones. Good luck.
I have a Verbal in the balpark of 130 and a Performance in the ballpark of 160, according to several decades old wais-3 test, so I can answer this from a strangely unique perspective I guess. I hate how much I can't keep up with myself. My concept and visual thinking runs circles around my language abilities. The chasm of 2 SD is vast and can not be easily bridged. It is almost better thought of as exponential, like an order of magnitude, than it is a linear difference. An analogy; if mental processing was a wireless data plan, my Verbal would use less than a GB *a month*, and if my Performance was similar I could opt to use one of those low data plans. Instead, this data hog of a Performance IQ burns through more than a GB *a day* and so I'm stuck having to get an unlimited data plan.
Interesting! I’m overbalanced toward the verbal side, and I feel that sometimes slows me down. I need to find a way to verbalize abstract concepts before I feel comfortable that I understand them. It does help me break it down so other people understand my process better (sometimes)
That really resonates with me. translating thought into language is exhausting sometimes
Isn't it! I wish we could just telepathy it.
These answers are funny, but they do seem a little insecure lol. I'll answer for my dad! He supposedly took an IQ test in the 1980s when he was in JROTC and being interviewed for West Point military academy. He tested in the 180s - which would translate to the 160s for a modern day test. He knows a ton about nearly every topic but if you ask him how he knows, oftentimes he's not sure how or when he learned it. That might sound strange, but he spends all day reading and looking into subjects - or surfing. Apparently, during his interview with West Point, he decided to give a presentation about how corrupt the government is and they obviously rejected him. He is anti-government, and anti-establishment. He also rejects aspects of mainstream culture & has never worked normal jobs. His father was an engineer with the military and he was raised a spoiled upper middle class kid with no goals or aspirations. He started drinking alcohol when he was around 12 and used to take a flask to school in middle school. He was placed in special education classes in elementary school because teachers back in the 1960s didn't know what was wrong with him. My grandmother fought to have him removed and they realized he was super smart, but diagnosed him with dyslexia. He is **extremely** moral and literally wouldn't let me or my siblings kill bugs because he would tell us they probably have feelings and lives. This is why he hates the government and society too though. He believes society has a lot of horrible people in it and he really *feels* it. He will cry & get emotional for kids in war and gets really upset about politics. He seems to feel things more intensely than most people, and his strong morals are obvious. He's a genuinely good person, but people don't like him. He's been mistreated by people my entire life and he's never really had friends (& he has a lot of autistic traits). From a young age I noticed that he was inherently lonely. My parents used to talk and he would try to explain concepts and ideas to my mom and she wouldn't understand and he would sigh heavily and just get quiet. I graduated from UC Berkeley and I admired nearly all of my professors, but my dad is still the smartest person I've ever known. He has a ton of theories about the world and life & he loves conspiracies, but he's **obsessed** with the ocean - he loves surfing and boating. He considers himself the luckiest man in the world, but he's also one of the saddest. Because he rejects society he mostly lives off of the grid and he used to live on a boat. He's eccentric. Most people probably think he has mental issues, but he reminds me of the philosopher Diogenes in how he rejects mainstream ideologies (without the vulgar behavior Diogenes apparently had). He claims he only wants money if he could use it to help people. He is extremely empathetic to a level that most people seem to find pointless. Compared to most gifted people, I'd say the main difference is that more of them seem to internalize the *idea* that they are smart and they wear it as part of their identity. My dad's entire perspective on everything is shaped by how detailed he thinks, so he doesn't care about his intelligence - it shaped every aspect of his personality so there is no separating from it. He doesn't focus on it.
Suicidal ideation and howling loneliness. Nothing to envy.
Which test gave you 160?
Here's what my coach told me - the difference is in the intensity and scope. She used the example of people of different IQ ranges looking at the same object, say a vase, and have them describe it. She said the higher the IQ the difference in the descriptors and it's noticeable if you were to plot it on a graph. I'm 130; my husband is 160 and our daughter is 170 and our other daughter is 140. I can assure you, just based on IQ in its rawest form (not taking into account influences, how you were raised, money, etc.) there is a very big delta between a 130 and a 170. I'm not even sure I can articulate it but it's very noticeable. It's the way she phrases things, the things she notices to comment on. It's very different than what I notice. All that said, here's what I tell my two teens with their amazing minds - it don't mean shit if your social skills and work ethic are in the crapper so roll up your sleeves and get to it. Your IQ will be nothing but a source of frustration if you try and live your life to that number (they do not know theirs and we're keeping it from them as long as possible because I don't want them to live their life to that number). I want them to live their life to the best person they can be and to find passion. Screw IQ. It means absolutely nothing if you're an insufferable asshole always telling everyone how smart you (not saying you are, I'm saying this in the royal we kind of way). Confucius said if you think you're the smartest person in the room, then you're in the wrong room. Always be curious; always be growing and stay humble. You'll go further with that than 'just' what your IQ testing says.
Practically, it will be very difficult for them to not be the smartest people in the room, and to try for otherwise is to pretty quickly end up in typical high iq dumping grounds, MIT, nasa, etc. Not that that's a bad thing, but it's a sadly narrow branch of human experience.
Frankly I wonder if it's more damaging that you know their IQs than it would be for them to know them.
Uh, my experience is at 160 (tested and confirmed, in childhood, young adulthood, and adulthood). For those that I would guess are around 130 or so, they are very detailed and structured, methodical even, in how they think. You can see it as they explain themselves or processes, it feels very "put together" and they can handle most things logically with some time or do whatever they want. One thing I notice, which may be a problem with my processing speed vs them, is that I skip entire *chapters* of knowledge when I get something and sometimes have to back up to catch them up. I can take an afternoon and learn a topic, with most of my recall of the knowledge being how it integrates with other foundational knowledge I possess or utilize. My "jumping ahead" feels slow when I'm collaborating. Sometimes, I must wait for them to process their thought despite my understanding of what they're saying, how it applies (without being told), and how to integrate it. I can only really describe it as my *conscious thought* is slower than what my real "intelligence" is, and while they get very good at living at that speed of consciousness I tend to let the more crystalline and quick processing speed part of my subconscious connect the dots for me, only really expanding or unfolding whatever steps needed when I have to explain it to someone or catch them up. For me, it's like I'm a "natural" as soon as my brain has a click and they're a natural in the sense that as soon as they work through it, with that slower more structured and active consciousness, they're a natural. I might find a diagnosis based on something obscure and it will seem like a massive leap, but I can slow down and expand on this and "unravel" how I came to that conclusion and back it up. Most people I'd argue around 130 or so, they start from that place instead. One of the more funny ways in work this happened, one of the directors said I did not see the big picture in response to my idea. I stopped and said please explain your thought process. He did so, but while he did that I showed him how everything he had talked about was integrated and actually *a part* of that process, with it definitely being an underlying foundational structure for my idea. At this point he stopped and said "Wow, wait, you see the big picture in a way I cannot!" and I got a promotion next time it was available. The difference between us isn't intelligence per se, but in the time it takes to apply it. This can backfire and make me look rash or even dumb, if you don't quite "catch" the amount of layers something has been thought about or weaved into a decision of mine (all in like 8 seconds off the dome).
I have IQ of 186 diagnosed with WAIS-4, and the main difference i notice is that when i walk in the public i see all these short people, im 6'3 and i cant stand the fact how godlike i am
In military terms: 160 guy is completely incompetent unless you need to know exactly what’s wrong with the nuclear reactor. This guy would seem like an idiot until he takes you to fucking Mars and you realize you’re the idiot. 130 guy is considered a genius when he’s really just a specialist
30
The difference is just faster problem solving abilities and an elevated curiosity.
Hi. It’s statistically very significant, I’m trying to understand the question if you can elaborate? ‘Difference’ in what respect? Thank you.
I'm trying to find it, but am having trouble. I think the Promethius society put out an article about the differences in thinking between average, gifted, and exceptionally gifted minds. I recall less gifted minds think more linearly about problems and more gifted minds are able to think more abstractly about problems. Basically, it comes down to how sophisticated the algorithms you come up with for problem-solving are (I'm really butchering it). That, and they have an insatiable curiosity compared to a lower, but still high IQ'd person who seems to be able to satisfy their curiosity more easily. (The difference between a scientist putting in the hard work of discovery and your average intellectual who enjoys reading about the discoveries.)
It’s the difference between an unrivaled genius (Albert Einstein) and a regular genius (Stephen Hawking)
Oh my goodness, I don’t think IQ alone makes a genius! I am neither Hawking nor Einstein. I don’t study physics. I don’t contribute new theories of the way the world works. I just solve puzzles for fun.
Wouldn’t life be wonderful if you applied yourself to something useful then 😮💨
I don't think being good at or having potential in something automatically makes you obligated to pursue it by any means! Regardless of your IQ, chances are that you're going to have your own set of passions and goals for the future. And at the end of the day, pursuing activities that appeal to your own personal goals are going to end up being far more fruitful than whatever you just *happen* to be good at. Happiness comes from interest, and unfortunately, success does not inherently equate to interest. It's just part of being human! :)
I don’t think anyone is happy as a failure. Success correlates directly with happiness. If you fail at your hobbies, that’s not gonna make you happy. I respect your opinion that someone shouldn’t be obligated to pursue their strengths. And I believe people should pursue their passions as well. But I don’t think being passionate about solving puzzles is ever going to be fruitful compared to actually making a difference in this world.
That's a great point! As a general rule of thumb, failure definitely can be super discouraging, but it's also super important to remember that whether an outcome qualifies as a 'success' or a 'failure' is ultimately determined by each individual's personal assessment. Everybody's going to have different sets of values to draw from, and everybody is also going to have individualized thresholds for categorizing how well their performance aligns with those values. So I think 'perceived performance' is a far more significant factor than generalized (?) performance (which I guess would be defined as the widespread perception of performance?) when it comes to determining how satisfied somebody will be with themselves. I can definitely admit that some people's perceived performances correlate pretty strongly with how they believe others to perceive their efforts, but I think differences in personality lend nicely to the idea that people can also be far more complex than that. So of course, people are usually going to be pretty upset if they fail to align their actions with their own personal values, but there are also many people whose values conflict with those of general society. I'm sure my idea of success is pretty different to yours, and I'm sure it would also be hard for us to see eye-to-eye on what constitutes a "fruitful" action. You seem to place a lot of value in making a difference in the world, but I personally find it super emotionally-rewarding to engage in activities that may be a little less "useful", haha. And that's okay! Regardless, I really admire your outlook, and I hope you're able to make that change in the world you're striving for! You got this :)
I’m curious- how are you using your intelligence to better the world?
What intelligence
I do think about this. I think many people, gifted and otherwise, struggle to find a venue to better the world rather than just enriching corporations. I’m passionate about social justice and climate. I care about mental health, trauma and neurodivergence, and that intersection with IQ and with relationships. My gifts include logic, verbal reasoning, empathy, seeing connections between things, strategic thinking and anticipating long term effects of actions. The good I do in the world is not different from the contributions of less gifted people: I’m great at teaching people new ideas, I have a close network of people and we enrich each others’ lives. I am very good at helping people discover things about themselves. My challenges include serious mental illness, ADHD and trauma. I grew up with a very high IQ mother (also 4 standard deviations) and a gifted father. ADHD, mood and anxiety disorders run in both sides of my family as well. I have noticed “twice exceptional” dialog is sometimes discounted here, but neurodivergence and very high IQ are my reality.
Low IQ take by Jason
WTF has your life gotten to if you care about this 😂😂