Intelligence - Page 14 of 22

Consuming This Drink Is A Sign Of High IQ

People with high IQ are generally healthier, but they have one or two bad habits.

People with high IQs drink more alcohol, although they are unlikely to be heavy drinkers, research finds.

In other words, they drink more, on average, but spread it out, and are unlikely to be alcoholics.

The results fit with the fact that highly intelligent people are also more likely to use drugs.

It could be because the intelligent tend to be easily bored.

Study of IQ and alcoholism

The conclusions come from a large study of the links between IQ and health habits.

Higher IQs are generally linked to healthier habits.

People with higher IQs are likely to be fitter, as they do more exercise and strength training.

Higher intelligence was also linked to better oral hygiene, consuming fewer sugary drinks and reading the nutritional information on food labels.

The study included 5,347 American men and women.

They were first surveyed in their early 20s and followed up in middle-age.

The results provide an interesting picture of the way healthy and unhealthy habits are linked to intelligence.

The intelligent were found to be more likely to skip meals and snack in between.

Do smart people drink?

Drinking and smoking both have an unusual relationship because both high intelligence and low intelligence are linked to drinking more and smoking fewer cigarettes.

People of average intelligence tend to drink less or possibly be teetotal — however, they are likely to smoke more cigarettes.

The study’s authors conclude that they have…

“…found evidence of links between higher IQ and a number of more favourable health related habits (i.e. engaging in physical activity, nutritional literacy, and oral hygiene habits, as well as not smoking, binge dinking, or consuming sugary drinks),
[…]
These findings, support the notion that certain health behaviours may lie on a pathway that links intelligence in early life with various health outcomes in adulthood.”

The study was published in the journal Intelligence (Wraw et al., 2018).

2 Personality Traits That Indicate High IQ

The personality traits that suggest you have higher intelligence.

The personality traits of being open to experience and having stable emotions both indicate a higher IQ, research finds.

People who are open to experience are more interested in things that are complex, new and unconventional.

Emotional stability is linked to being better at dealing with stress and minor frustrations.

People who are emotionally stable usually find it easier to control their urges and are mostly unselfconscious.

Both stable emotions and being open to experience are linked to better general knowledge, which are two aspect of intelligence.

Psychologists call general knowledge ‘crystallised intelligence’ is one of the two main types of intelligence.

Crystallised intelligence becomes more important as people get older as acquired information and skills predict their success in life.

The other type is called ‘fluid intelligence’, and refers to abstract reasoning and the speed at which the brain works.

The study included 201 university students in the UK who were given tests of personality and general knowledge questions, including:

Who wrote Anna Karenina?
Who discovered penicillin?
Which Beatle was shot in New York?

(See the end of the article for the answers.)

The results showed that people got more answers correct if their personalities were more emotionally stable and they were more open to experience.

Openness to experience is particularly important for general knowledge because it makes people more curious and motivates them to learn new things.

Another personality trait the researchers found was linked to greater general knowledge was introversion.

Signs of introversion include preferring to be in a quiet, relaxing environment and having a rich mental life.

Having a rich mental life likely encourages people with this personality trait to pick up more information about the world.

(The answers are: Leo Tolstoy, Alexander Fleming and John Lennon, respectively.)

The study was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences (Chamorro-Premuzic et al., 2006).

The Surprising Sign Of High Intelligence And Self-Control

It has been linked to wise reasoning, dealing more effectively with stressful situations and feeling more confident.

Talking to yourself is a sign of intelligence and self-control, research finds.

It is far from a sign of madness, as is sometimes claimed.

Whether we talk out loud or it is a silent inner voice, talking to yourself can help improve focus and boost brain power.

Talking to yourself has also been linked to wise reasoning, dealing more effectively with stressful situations and feeling more confident.

Talking to yourself has even been linked to the ability to find items more quickly.

For example, repeating “keys, keys, keys” might help you find them.

In one study of self-control, for example, people were given a set of written instructions to either read silently or out loud.

The results showed that reading the instructions out loud improved people’s control over a subsequent task.

It is thought that the benefit comes from hearing yourself.

Control impulsive behaviour

Other studies have shown that using our inner voice to talk to ourselves can also be beneficial.

Inner talk helps to organise our thoughts and control impulsive behaviour.

Dr Alexa Tullett is co-author of a study that found people who used their inner voice were better able to exert self-control.

He said:

“We give ourselves messages all the time with the intent of controlling ourselves — whether that’s telling ourselves to keep running when we’re tired, to stop eating even though we want one more slice of cake, or to refrain from blowing up on someone in an argument.”

Dr Michael Inzlicht, study co-author, said:

“We found that people acted more impulsively when they couldn’t use their inner voice or talk themselves through the tasks.

Without being able to verbalize messages to themselves, they were not able to exercise the same amount of self control as when they could talk themselves through the process.”

The studies were published in the journals Acta Psychologica and The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology (Kirkham et al., 2012; Lupyan & Swingley, 2011; Tullet & Inzlicht, 2010).

What Your Bedtime Reveals About Your IQ

Larks tend to rise earlier while owls stay up late — each type extends the part of the day at which they feel their best.

Morning types or ‘larks’ have superior verbal IQ, research finds.

Morning types are people who prefer to do demanding things earlier in the day, whereas evening types consider their best time to be later on.

Naturally, larks also tend to rise earlier while owls stay up late — each type extends the part of the day at which they feel their best.

The results come as a rebuff to other studies that have found the reverse, that it is owls that have the IQ advantage.

Dr Stuart Fogel, study co-author, how his study is different:

“Once you account for key factors including bedtime and age, we found the opposite to be true, that morning types tend to have superior verbal ability.

This outcome was surprising to us and signals this is much more complicated that anyone thought before.”

The study included 61 people whose ‘morningness’ or ‘eveningness’ was assessed, along with their cognitive abilities.

The results showed that people who were at their best in the morning scored higher on tests of verbal IQ.

Verbal IQ refers to being able to use language to achieve goals.

Critically, the researchers had to account for the fact that young people as a group tend to be evening types.

Young people tend to be evening types

The fact that young people tend to be evening types may make it harder for them to get the best out of the school day, said Dr Fogel:

“A lot of school start times are not determined by our chronotypes but by parents and work-schedules, so school-aged kids pay the price of that because they are evening types forced to work on a morning type schedule.

For example, math and science classes are normally scheduled early in the day because whatever morning tendencies they have will serve them well.

But the AM is not when they are at their best due to their evening type tendencies.

Ultimately, they are disadvantaged because the type of schedule imposed on them is basically fighting against their biological clock every day.”

The study also found that people with regular daily habits tended to perform the best.

Dr Fogel said:

“Our brain really craves regularity and for us to be optimal in our own rhythms is to stick to that schedule and not be constantly trying to catch up.”

The study was published in the journal Current Research in Behavioral Sciences (Gibbings et al., 2022).

The Weirdest Way To Increase IQ By 10% (M)

IQ was unexpectedly boosted by a training programme designed for a different purpose.

Keep reading with a Membership

• Read members-only articles
• Adverts removed
• Cancel at any time
• 14 day money-back guarantee for new members

Become a member

An Early Sign Of Lower IQ

The brain is very sensitive in early childhood.

Exposure to maltreatment or trauma early in life is linked to lower IQ, research finds.

Being abused, physically or emotionally, neglected or witnessing domestic violence, was linked to an IQ score 7 points lower, on average.

Abuse that occurs before the age of two-years-old is particularly damaging to intellectual development.

The brain is very sensitive in this early period, neuroscience has revealed.

Trauma and adversity early in life has repeatedly been linked to changes in the structure and circuitry of the brain.

The conclusions come from a study of 206 US children enrolled in the Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children.

The study started in 1975 and tracked the children from birth.

Children and mothers were assessed and interviewed at regular intervals and the children were given IQ tests.

The study revealed that one in three children had been maltreated and/or seen their mothers subject to violence.

This happened in infancy to 5 percent of children, in the pre-school period to 13 percent and in both periods to 19 percent.

Maltreatment — including witnessing violence and being neglected — was linked to lower intelligence scores every time it was measured.

The study’s authors write:

“The results suggest that [maltreatment and witnessing domestic violence] in early childhood, particularly during the first two years, has significant and enduring effects on cognitive development, even after adjusting for [other risk factors].

Because early brain organisation frames later neurological development, changes in early development may have lifelong consequences.”

The study was published in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health (Enlow et al., 2012).

The Surprising Link Between Prejudiced Attitudes And IQ

High intelligence is linked to holding certain attitudes, psychological research finds.

More intelligent people are less likely to be prejudiced against same-sex couples, research finds.

People of lower intelligence, though, are more likely to hold homophobic attitudes.

The conclusions come from an Australian study of 11,654 people who were given intelligence tests.

All were asked if they agreed with this statement:

“Homosexual couples should have the same rights as heterosexual couples do.”

Less intelligent people were more likely to be prejudiced on LGBT issues, the results showed.

People with low scores on the verbal ability test were particularly likely to be prejudiced.

Higher levels of education were, however, consistently linked to being less prejudiced.

Dr Francisco Perales, the study’s author, writes:

“Altogether, the findings provide clear evidence that cognitive ability is an important precursor of prejudice against same-sex couples.”

Dr Perales explained that studies have generally found that prejudice is more prevalent among people of low intelligence:

“Research conducted chiefly in the US, Canada and Western Europe reports correlations between low cognitive ability and support of prejudicial or non-egalitarian attitudes towards certain social groups (including ethnic minorities, migrants, women and people with AIDS), as well as related constructs, such as conservatism, ethnocentrism, authoritarianism,
and dogmatism.”

High IQ prejudice

Some psychologists, though, think this is not the whole story about the link between intelligence and prejudice.

A survey of 5,914 people in the US has tested prejudice against 24 different groups.

It found that both people of high and low intelligence are prejudiced — just against different groups.

People of higher intelligence showed prejudice towards groups perceived as conservative and conventional.

These included the military, Christians and big business.

Dr Mark Brandt, the study’s first author, explained:

“Whereas prior work by others found that people with low cognitive ability express more prejudice, we found that this is limited to only some target groups.

For other target groups the relationship was in the opposite direction.

For these groups, people with high levels of cognitive ability expressed more prejudice.

So, cognitive ability also does not seem to make people immune to expressing prejudice.”

The rather depressing conclusion is that most people are prejudiced against those they don’t agree with.

The studies were was published in the journals Intelligence and Social Psychological and Personality Science (Brandt & Crawford, 2016; Perales, 2018).

How Smart Would You Like To Be? Most People Choose This IQ Score

Thousands of people were asked how smart they wanted to be.

When asked, people choose an average IQ of around 130, research shows,

This level makes a person smart, mildly gifted even, but certainly not a genius.

In fact, people are surprisingly modest across a wide range of personal traits, when asked their ideal level.

When asked how long they’d like to live, the average is 90 years, which is only a little higher than normal life expectancy.

Even when given the option of taking a magic pill that gives eternal youth, they still only go for 120 years, on average.

Professor Matthew J. Hornsey, who led the research, said:

“Our research shows that people’s sense of perfection is surprisingly modest.

People wanted to have positive qualities, such as health and happiness, but not to the exclusion of other darker experiences — they wanted about 75% of a good thing.”

People who live in more holistic cultures — like Japan and China — were even more modest in the ideal levels they chose.

This reflects the fact that Eastern philosophies often emphasise the coexistence of good and bad.

Professor Hornsey explained:

“Interestingly, the ratings of perfection were more modest in countries that had traditions of Buddhism and Confucianism.

This makes sense — these Eastern philosophies and religions tend to place more emphasis on the notion that seemingly contradictory forces coexist in a complementary, interrelated state, such that one cannot exist without the other.”

The study’s conclusions come from 2,392 people in Australia, Chile, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Peru, Russia, and the United States.

The results showed that people were much more interested in being perfectly healthy than perfectly happy.

Professor Hornsey said:

“This principle of maximization is threaded through many prominent philosophical and economic theories.

But our data suggest that people have much more complex, blended notions of perfection, ones that embrace both light and dark.”

The study was published in the journal Psychological Science (Hornsey et al., 2018).

4 Positive & Upbeat Personality Traits Linked To High IQ

The personality traits that are signs of high intelligence.

People whose personalities are happy, energetic and lively have higher IQs, research finds.

Higher IQ is linked to experiencing more positive emotions, enjoying complex problems, having a larger vocabulary and understanding things more quickly.

The researchers found that smarter people were less stressed when given a taxing task to do.

They were also more engaged with it.

People with higher IQs were more likely to agree with statements like:

I am quick to understand things.
I have a large vocabulary and enjoy being intellectually engaged.
I enjoy tackling difficult problems.

The more people agreed with statements like these, the higher their IQ was, researchers found.

The study included 440 people who completed surveys of their happiness and IQ.

The results showed that energetic lively people had higher fluid intelligence.

The study’s authors conclude:

“The results indicated that Intellect was generally associated with lower stress (low distress and worry and high task engagement) before and after intelligence tests.”

Fluid intelligence refers to the speed at which the brain works.

It is like the raw power of an engine or the speed at which a computer can process information.

Fluid intelligence is contrasted with crystallised intelligence.

Crystallised intelligence is something like general knowledge: the information that people have learnt about the world over the years.

The reason that IQ and happiness are linked could be down to how much importance is placed on being smart in Western cultures.

The authors write:

“It is striking that Intellect was correlated with affect even in Study 1, in which there was no requirement to perform an intellectual task.

At least in Western cultures, intellect may be of sufficient importance to the self-schema that it influences general emotional functioning.”

The study was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences (Zajenkowskia & Matthews, 2019).

How Reading For Pleasure Affects Your IQ (M)

Around half the children in the study had little or no experience of reading for pleasure or did not pick up the habit until later on.

Keep reading with a Membership

• Read members-only articles
• Adverts removed
• Cancel at any time
• 14 day money-back guarantee for new members

Become a member