Why do clever people

The question may seem like a trivial matter concerning a select few — but the insights it offers could have ramifications for many. Much of our education system is aimed at improving academic intelligence; although its limits are well known, IQ is still the primary way of measuring cognitive abilities, and we spend millions on brain training and cognitive enhancers that try to improve those scores. Anxiety can be common among the highly intelligent Credit: Thinkstock. The first steps to answering these questions were taken almost a century ago, at the height of the American Jazz Age.

At the time, the new-fangled IQ test was gaining traction, after proving itself in World War One recruitment centres, and in , psychologist Lewis Terman decided to use it to identify and study a group of gifted children. As you might expect, many of the Termites did achieve wealth and fame — most notably Jess Oppenheimer, the writer of the classic s sitcom I Love Lucy.

Nor did their smarts endow personal happiness. Over the course of their lives, levels of divorce, alcoholism and suicide were about the same as the national average.

It's lonely being smart Credit: Thinkstock. As the Termites enter their dotage, the moral of their story — that intelligence does not equate to a better life — has been told again and again. At best, a great intellect makes no differences to your life satisfaction; at worst, it can actually mean you are less fulfilled. One possibility is that knowledge of your talents becomes something of a ball and chain. Indeed, during the s, the surviving Termites were asked to look back at the events in their year lifespan.

Rather than basking in their successes, many reported that they had been plagued by the sense that they had somehow failed to live up to their youthful expectations. Early achievers don't always go on to be successful Credit: Thinkstock. The most notable, and sad, case concerns the maths prodigy Sufiah Yusof. Enrolled at Oxford University aged 12, she dropped out of her course before taking her finals and started waitressing.

She later worked as a call girl. Constant worrying may, in fact, be a sign of intelligence — but not in the way these armchair philosophers had imagined. Writer and philosopher Edward de Bono coined the concept of lateral thinking , the idea of using an indirect and unconventional approach to view problems in a new light to generate ideas and solutions from a fresh angle. Highly intelligent people know that great thoughts can happen at any moment and tend to carry notebooks.

The smartest people gravitate towards meaningful conversations over small talk and prefer growth-oriented pursuits over binge-watching TV shows on Netflix. They love to continuously learn and broaden their horizons because they know that it improves their ability to solve problems on a regular basis.

Ignorance, on the other hand, is often rooted in firm convictions and absolutes. Anouare Abdou. Related Stories:. They never stop questioning things Highly intelligent people know better than to follow groupthink. They let their mind wander On that note, the smartest people let their minds travel. They stay curious Plato said that learning is, by nature, curiosity. If a person felt held back at school by being in a class with less smart kids, this frustration with teamwork can develop early — you know what this feels like if you routinely did most of the work on group projects, or got scolded for daydreaming during a class that was moving too slowly for you.

These feelings can get re-triggered throughout life. When people develop an emotional raw spot as a child, they often have outsized internal reactions when that raw spot is rubbed in their adult life. Smart people also sometimes find it difficult to delegate because of a sense they can do a task better regardless of whether this is actually true.

This is especially likely for those who have a perfectionist streak. Solution: Be self-compassionate about your internal reactions and understand where they come from, but also learn to genuinely appreciate what diverse minds bring to a team. If a lot of your self-esteem rests on your intelligence, it can be very difficult to be in situations that reveal chinks in your armor. That might be working with people who are even more skilled or intelligent, or receiving critical feedback, or taking a risk and failing.

Any situation that triggers feeling not- smart is experienced as highly threatening. The smart person may even seek to avoid those situations, which ultimately holds the person back. Solution: Take an objective view of the benefits of working with people who are, in some respects, smarter than you. Remember, iron sharpens iron. Develop relationships with people who you trust to give you helpful constructive feedback.

The more you become accustomed to receiving critical feedback from people who believe in your overall talents and capacities, the easier it will become. Smart people get bored easily. Being smart is not exactly the same as being curious, but if you have both these qualities you might find yourself becoming easily bored with executing the same behaviors over and over.

Some types of success stem from creativity, but other types come from becoming an expert in a niche and performing a set of behaviors repeatedly. This can end up being less lucrative than finding a niche and repeating the same formula, but that might seem too boring or unchallenging to you. Instead of attempting dramatic change, decide when tolerating short periods a few minutes or hours of boredom could have a very beneficial impact on your success.