Intelligence - Page 12 of 22

A Fascinating Sign That You Have A High IQ

There is a particular musical skill that indicates higher intelligence.

People who have higher IQs can keep a beat more precisely, a study has found.

Those in the study with higher IQs found it easier to keep a regular beat on a drum pad.

The reason may be that good timing is vital to solving problems and the efficiency of the brain.

Brain scans revealed that people with higher intelligence had more white matter in parts of the brain important for problem-solving, planning and managing time.

These factors were also linked to an improved ability to keep time.

So, better timing is built in to the brains of more intelligent people at a fundamental level.

Professor Fredrik Ullén, a pianist and neuroscientist who led the study, said:

“It’s interesting as the task didn’t involve any kind of problem solving.
Irregularity of timing probably arises at a more fundamental biological level owing to a kind of noise in brain activity.”

The study included 34 people who tried to copy the clicking of a metronome by hitting a drum pad.

They were given 20 beats to warm up, then they had to keep the same rhythm going for a further 45 beats.

The results showed that the more intelligent people were, the better they could keep time when the metronome stopped.

Professor Ullén said:

“All in all, this suggests that a factor of what we call intelligence has a biological basis in the number of nerve fibres in the prefrontal lobe and the stability of neuronal activity that this provides.”

Faster brains make quicker perceptual judgements as well as being better at solving puzzles or analysing decisions.

For example, people with higher IQs find it easier to tell which way an object is moving.

The study was published in the Journal of Neuroscience (Ullén et al., 2008).

These Positive Feelings Are Signs You Have A High IQ

People with higher IQ have this cheerful quality.

Feeling happy and satisfied is linked to having a higher IQ, research finds.

In fact, experiencing positive emotions, feeling lively and wide awake all predict higher intelligence.

The conclusions come from two studies of 440 people who completed tests of personality and well-being/happiness.

When given a task to do, people with higher intelligence were less stressed both before and afterwards, as well as being more engaged, researchers found.

People who were happier and more lively were also more likely to agree with statements like:

Am quick to understand things.
Have a rich vocabulary, and intellectual engagement.
Like to solve complex problems.

Positive answers to these questions matched up with an actual fluid intelligence test they were given.

In other words, smart people were right about being smart, they didn’t just ‘feel’ smart.

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.

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.”

Even without being given a test to do, people with higher IQs felt happier and more energetic.

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 To Look More Intelligent Using Only Your Eyes

Research demonstrates how to use your eyes and voice to project a higher IQ.

Maintaining eye contact while talking is one of the easiest ways to appear smarter, research finds.

Other common ways to appear smarter include speaking pleasantly, clearly and quickly.

The handy tip comes from a study in which people were recorded while trying to act smart discussing an assigned topic.

This condition was compared to people who were given no instruction about how to act.

Judges viewed the video and rated the person’s apparent intelligence.

Maintaining eye contact while speaking was rated as giving the smartest appearance.

Indeed, intelligence tests revealed that people who maintained eye contact were actually smarter.

Two other signs of high IQ were:

maintaining eye contact while listening,
and standing upright.

However, neither of these was linked to people’s measured intelligence.

Still, you could use them, as it creates the right impression.

Other ways to look more intelligent were:

Speaking for longer.
Having a self-assured expression.
Being responsive.

People did not use these methods spontaneously, though.

The study’s authors conclude:

“Looking while speaking was a key behavior: It significantly correlated with IQ, was successfully manipulated by impression-managing targets, and contributed to higher perceived intelligence ratings.”

Along with more eye contact, other ways of appearing more intelligent are listed by the study’s authors:

“…pleasant speech style, clear or easy-to-understand communication, and faster speech rate all have been associated with higher perceived intelligence ratings.”

The study was published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin (Murphy, 2007).

How IQ Can Predict A Long And Happy Marriage

Can intelligence help predict how long a marriage will last?

A man’s verbal intelligence helps to predict a longer marriage, suggesting it is also happier, research finds.

Higher verbal IQ also predicts getting married earlier in the relationship.

Higher verbal intelligence is particularly attractive to younger women, the study found.

Perhaps in the long haul of a marriage it’s most important to have someone who can make good conversation.

Longer marriage

In fact, all aspects of intelligence helped to predict length of marriage, it was just verbal intelligence that stood out — maybe because it is easier to spot than numerical or logical intelligence.

Another important factor in the marital equation the researchers developed was the man’s car.

Men with newer and more expensive cars were also more likely to remain married for longer.

The psychologists used the car as a signal of the man’s social status.

In other words, it is really higher social status that is linked to a longer marriage.

The study’s authors write:

“In parallel to the effect of a peacock’s mysterious tail on its mating success […] human intelligence has a direct positive impact on human mating prospects in terms of marriage.”

The authors conclude that:

“…verbal intelligence, i.e. the type of intelligence that is easier to observe, was found to especially predict the likelihood of getting married, while the harder-to-observe numerical and logical intelligence were also found to predict the likelihood to stay married, to an equal extent as verbal intelligence.”

The study was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences (Aspara et al., 2018).

The Surprising Personality Trait Linked To High IQ

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

People who are anxious have a higher verbal IQ, on average, research finds.

In particular, people with high IQs are more likely to ruminate.

Rumination is the term psychologists give to the turning over of depressing thoughts in the head.

Rumination is a common symptom of depression.

While worrying is not normally considered beneficial, it may be that people who worry tend to keep out of danger — so passing on their genes.

The benefit may be that intelligence allows people to better imagine what might go wrong.

As a result, anxiety and verbal intelligence may have evolved together.

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

Higher levels and anxiety and IQ are also linked to superior abstract thinking, problem-solving and critical thinking.

The study involved 126 people given tests of anxiety, depression and IQ.

The results showed that people with higher verbal IQ ruminate more.

The study’s authors write:

“It is possible that more verbally intelligent individuals are able to consider past and future events in greater detail, leading to more intense rumination and worry.

Individuals with high non-verbal intelligence may be stronger at processing the non-verbal signals they interact with in the moment, leading to a decreased need to re-process past social encounters.”

The study took into account that anxious people often perform worse on tests — including intelligence tests.

The authors write:

“…symptoms of acute depression might decrease an individual’s ability to perform optimally on an intelligence test,
and that the individual may not have lower intelligence.”

Previous research has shown that people who are low in intelligence are also prone to worry — possibly because they achieve less in life.

Average intelligence show less of a link with anxiety.

The study was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences (Penney et al., 2015).

Academic Achievement Is About More Than Just Intelligence (M)

Why the heritability of educational achievement is about much more than just intelligence.

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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).