Category: Intelligence

Scores on IQ tests change dramatically when people feel poor.

Feeling poor causes IQ to drop by around 10 points or roughly 10 percent.

Worrying about a lack of money uses up people’s cognitive resources, leaving them less brainpower to deal with other problems in life.

It is not that the poor are less intelligent, explains Professor Sendhil Mullainathan, study co-author:

“Our results suggest that when you’re poor, money is not the only thing in short supply.

Cognitive capacity is also stretched thin.

That’s not to say that poor people are less intelligent than others.

What we show is that the same person experiencing poverty suffers a cognitive deficit as opposed to when they’re not experiencing poverty.

It’s also wrong to suggest that someone’s cognitive capacity has gotten smaller because they’re poor.

In fact, what happens is that your effective capacity gets smaller, because you have all these other things on your mind, you have less mind to give to everything else.

Imagine you’re sitting in front of a computer, and it’s just incredibly slow.

But then you realize that it’s working in the background to play a huge video that’s downloading.

It’s not that the computer is slow, it’s that it’s doing something else, so it seems slow to you. I think that’s the heart of what we’re trying to say.”

A cognitive tax

In one study the researchers conducted in a mall, low- and middle-income shoppers were given IQ tests.

Half, though, were first asked what they would do if their car broke down and the repairs cost $1,500.

This made poorer people start worrying about money and reduced their scores on the subsequent test by around 10 percent.

Professor Mullainathan said:

“For the poor, because these monetary concerns are just below the surface, the question brings them to the top.

The result was, for that group, the gap between the rich and the poor goes up, in both IQ and impulse control.

There was no gap in the other group, but ask them anything that makes them think about money and you see this result.”

Another study compared farmers in rural India.

Professor Mullainathan explained:

“The month after the harvest, they’re pretty rich, but the month before – when the money has run out – they’re pretty poor.

What we did is look at the same people the month before and the month after the harvest, and what we see is that IQ goes up, cognitive control, or errors, goes way down, and response times go way down.

The effect here is about two-thirds of the size of the effect found in the mall study – it’s at least nine or 10 IQ points, just between these months.”

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The study was published in the journal Science (Mani et al., 2013).

Research examined the link between bilingualism and intelligence.

Children who use a second language at home have a higher IQ.

The study looked at 100 Turkish children growing up in the UK, speaking English to their friends and at school.

The results showed that children who spoke Turkish at home had higher IQs than those who only spoke English.

Bilingualism may act as a kind of ‘cognitive reserve’, the scientists think.

Those with more cognitive reserves may be better able to resist Alzheimer’s and similar neurodegenerative diseases.

Dr. Michael Daller, study co-author, said:

“It is easier to develop concepts at a young age in a first language and then learn a new word for it later in a different language.

Children who have to learn to understand things for the first time in a less familiar language will find it much harder, so it follows that the children in our study who had done this scored lower on the IQ test.

The research suggests parents can help their children develop their intelligence by encouraging them to use their native language at home, as this won’t be supported at school.”

The study was published in the journal Neurology (Craik et al., 2010).

Higher intelligence is associated with this personality type.

People whose personalities can accept vagueness and confusion tend to have a higher IQ.

Those who accept ambiguity tend to be open-minded, creative and relaxed about problems that do not have a definitive answer.

Given that the world is filled with grey areas, this allows those who can accept ambiguity to make better decisions.

Other personality traits linked to high IQ are taking risks, being conscientious and being competitive.

Conscientiousness is a sign of higher fluid intelligence, which is the speed at which the brain works.

People with higher IQs are also more likely to have ‘Type A’ personalities, which are characterised by a competitive nature.

The conclusions come from a study of 820 people in the UK who completed assessments of their personality and intelligence.

The personality traits are part of the High Potential Traits Inventory, which is, the authors write a:

“…measure of personality traits directly relevant to workplace behaviours, thoughts and perceptions of the self and others at work.”

Four personality factors were linked to intelligence.

Being able to cope with vagueness is a strong sign of high IQ, the authors write:

“This study found that multiple intelligence measures were predictive of higher tolerance of uncertainty.

Previous researchers have found that more intelligent
individuals are able to adequately adapt to and evaluate
changing work tasks, leading to greater accuracy in decision-making.”

People who are curious also had higher IQs the study found:

“Curiosity – marked by high openness, creativity, imagination, and cognitive complexity – was hypothesised to associate with higher levels of intelligence.

individuals high on curiosity exhibited higher levels of WM ability.”

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The study was published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences (Furnham & Treglown, 2018).

People with higher IQ have this cheerful quality.

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

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.”

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

Cognitive ability is higher in this personality type.

Laid back and unhurried people tend to have a higher IQ, psychological.

Intelligent people become more laid back because they can do things quicker than others, so do not need to rush, the authors speculate.

High IQ people also have a tendency towards procrastination — perhaps because another benefit of higher intelligence is being able to start tasks later.

The study also found that higher IQs was linked to be cautious and being a perfectionist.

This may be because being a perfectionist takes longer and people with higher IQs have the patience to wait until the job is done right.

The conclusions come from a study of 722 people who were given personality and IQ tests.

The personality tests focused on conscientiousness, one of the five major traits of personality.

Different aspects of conscientiousness were examined, including being cautious, deliberate, orderly and having a tendency to procrastinate.

The results revealed a consistent link between being unhurried and having a higher IQ.

The study’s authors explain:

“The common feature of these three characteristics (procrastination, perfectionism and caution) is timing or hurriedness.

One possible interpretation of our results is that people with greater cognitive ability tend to be less hurried in their general approach to life’s activities.

This interpretation implies both positive aspects (e.g., the cautiousness involved in checking details, delaying acting, and continuing with tasks until their product is “perfect”) and negative ones (e.g., the tendency to procrastinate).”

The link between procrastination and higher IQ is down to greater abilities, the authors think:

“This suggests a slower internal pace among more intelligent people that more easily allows for interruptions or the incorporation of new information while completing a task.

This is not to imply that more intelligent people are physically slower in their tasks, as in fact they appear to be faster at most tasks.

Rather, we are suggesting that one way in which those demonstrating higher levels of cognitive ability may differ from those exhibiting lower levels of cognitive ability is a behavioral tendency to pace their work or other tasks at less than their maximum potential ability.”

The study was published in the Journal of Personality Research (Rikoon et al., 2016).

Certain personality traits and this interest are signs of high IQ.

Musical training is a fascinating sign of high IQ, a study finds.

People with musical training tend to have IQs up to 10-15 points higher than those who do not.

The reason is probably that an interest in learning music is linked to higher intelligence, as well as certain personality traits.

Children whose openness to experience is greater are more likely to be interested in music lessons.

Typically people who are open to experience tend to have more interest in beauty, new ideas and be more curious about the world.

Higher IQ is strongly linked to the personality trait of openness to experience.

People who are conscientious are also more likely to stick at their musical training, the study found.

However, the study does not support the so-called ‘Mozart effect’, the idea that listening to certain music can make you more intelligent.

Professor Glenn Schellenberg explained:

“The prevailing bias is that music training causes improvements in intelligence.

But you can’t infer causation simply because children with music training have higher IQs than children who haven’t had music training.”

The study included 167 12-year-olds and 118 young adults who were asked about their musical training and given IQ tests.

The results showed that having a higher IQ was linked to taking music lessons, but personality predicted who stuck with it.

Professor Schellenberg said:

“The differences in personality are at least as important as cognitive variables among adults, and even more important among children in predicting who is likely to take music lessons and for how long.

Much previous research may have overestimated the effects of music training and underestimated the role of pre-existing differences between children who do and do not take music lessons.

Children who take music lessons may have relatively high levels of curiosity, motivation, persistence, concentration, selective attention, self-discipline and organization.”

The study was published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology (Corrigall et al., 2013).

The quality that people with higher IQ tend to have.

Freedom from prejudice is a clear sign that someone has a high IQ.

More intelligent people are less likely to be either homophobic or racist.

On top of this, more intelligent people are also more likely to be trusting of others and sensitive to other people’s needs.

The conclusions come from a couple of studies in which people were given IQ tests and asked questions that probed whether they were prejudiced.

In one survey of 15,874 people in the UK, participants were asked questions like:

• “I wouldn’t mind working with people from other races.”

Their answers to questions like this were compared with IQ tests they had been given as children.

The results showed that people with lower IQs tended to display more overt racism.

A second group of 254 people in the US were asked about their attitudes to homosexuals, as well as being given IQ tests.

Once again, the results showed that people with lower IQs were more likely to be prejudiced against gay people.

The researchers found that in both groups of people, those with lower IQs had lower contact with people from minorities — in this case, races other than their own and gay people.

The study’s authors conclude that:

“…we found that lower general intelligence (g) in childhood predicts greater racism in adulthood a predictive effect of poor abstract-reasoning skills on antihomosexual prejudice, a relation partially mediated by both authoritarianism and low levels of intergroup contact.

Our results suggest that cognitive abilities play a critical, albeit underappreciated, role in prejudice.”

Authoritarianism is a disregard for the feelings and wishes of others.

Unsurprisingly, this was also linked to prejudice.

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The study was published in the journal Psychological Science (Hodson & Busseri, 2012).

A range of positive traits like this one are linked to higher intelligence.

People with higher IQs are less aggressive and tend to follow the rules.

Since higher intelligence is linked to better behaviour, intelligent people are less likely to steal and cheat.

In contrast, younger people with lower IQs are more likely to alarm and harass others, as well as taking part in antisocial behaviour.

Antisocial boys typically have IQ scores 10 points lower than their more social peers.

The insights come from a study of over 1,116 pairs of twins in the UK.

The children were given tests of externalising behaviour and IQ.

Externalising behaviour refers to stealing, cheating, physical aggression and rule-breaking.

The study’s results showed that higher IQs were linked to lower levels of externalising behaviours.

Naturally, lower IQs were linked with more antisocial behaviour.

The study’s authors write:

“Low IQ is a consistent risk factor for emergence and continuity of antisocial behavior across the life course in both prospective and cross-sectional studies, even when other relevant risk factors are statistically controlled.”

Both genetic and situational factors are likely important in the link, the study’s authors write:

“…cognitive deficits might promote antisocial behavior if children with low IQs misunderstand rules, find it too difficult to negotiate conflict with words, find school frustrating, or become tracked with antisocial peers.”

Studies have also linked other positive traits to higher intelligence.

For example, one study has found that being cooperative is a sign of high intelligence.

Cooperative people are good at learning from experience and seeing the bigger picture.

They are generally helpful, mutually supportive and believe in teamwork.

More intelligent people tend to cautiously trust others at first and then build on this over time.

This helps them cooperate better in the long-run, the researchers found.

The study was published in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology (Koenen et al., 2008).