Making use of a high IQ

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So, I know a large number of fellow Aspies on this site have IQs in the gifted/genius range. What does this mean to you? I recently had my psych give me my results and tell me how proud of myself I should be. In fact, I felt the opposite. So I can quickly put coloured blocks together, or use my working memory to remember alphanumeric sequences, or look up a symbol and copy it down on a piece of paper. Wow! None of this stuff, as far as I can tell, is useful in the 'real world'. In particular - in the workforce.

I've chatted to my psych about this, how I feel that I have very few skills that have any practical use in society, and would like to know how these IQ-related skills can be used. He said he can't tell me yet as he doesn't know me well enough. Well I only have a couple more sessions with him...is there some way I can figure this out for myself? Have any of you managed to turn 'useless' skills into 'useful' ones? How did you do this?

Figure out what you'd like to do, and then go do it.

You won't know if your "skills" fit until you try.

I have the opposite problem. People are eternally telling me what I can't do and shouldn't even attempt.

Maybe being stupid has made me bold!

Find an area where your high IQ can be put to practical use. In my case it is with computer programming for which I have a natural ability. Many aspies have a natural ability in this area. Languages is another common skill area. Find which area you can apply your intelligence to and with a bit of luck you may be able to earn a good living from it; assuming of course that you don't have too many social interaction problems to hold you back.

I guess I was hoping I could figure out what these skill relate to in the real world, then see if I like it, rather than the other way around. I've been in the workforce for nearly 15 years now, and not found anything I am passionate about whilst being able to use my IQ to accomplish it successfully.


Do you have any hints on how to figure this out? This is exactly what I would like to do, but I lack the "imagination" (as Aspies tend to) to see how IQ skills relate to vocational skills. Actually computer programming was something I was good at in high school, and I did pursue it but got into the wrong uni course and lost interest. I feel like now it is too late (i.e. I am too old) to get back into the IT world and learn how it all works.

I think what I'm hoping for it some kind of guide, explaining that, for example, "those who score highly on X subtest are more likely to excel at X tasks in the workplace. Something like that. Is that possible or is it all too vague/unrelated for that?

I wish I had your IQ. I would quickly know what skills I'd want to learn with such an IQ.

What skills would those be?

I kind of feel guilty for having a high IQ. It is almost completely wasted on me, because I don't know what to do with it. Better for the world that I give it to you, to make use of it!

Like others have said, you probably won't see how those IQ-test skills matter until you get into some field and see what you can do. I.e. working memory. Writing code was a hobby of mine for years (never did it professionally, though), but then I developed problems with working memory and that has left me pretty much unable to write or debug code of any complexity at all. It's all so seamless when you're using it (your cognitive skills) that it's hard to appreciate how important they are because they seem so simple in their isolated form.

I don't believe that is true. But I think most people are imaginative. For example if you are good at strategy games, well strategy takes a type of imaginative cognitive function

The way I have had the "lack of imagination" thing described to me is that we have trouble 'imagining' what a person is thinking when they say something, or 'imagining' what is 'between the lines'. I would extend that to, for me at least, 'imagining' what it is about a particular skill that makes it useful in other tasks. I see the skill 'as it is', and don't know how to relate it to other things or make inferences about what else it might be good for.

I would learn everything from basic skills for doing various errands, to learning all kinds of factual knowledge I could understand if I were to have much better reading comprehension and ability to understand things. I would learn the stuff I'd need to know in order to get a career. Originally, I wanted to be a doctor. You seem very considerate. I wonder if those like you with high IQs could use your aptitude to come up with a way to spread intelligence around to all others.

Hmmm. Maybe you're a subgenius like me. At the perfectly wrong level of intelligence. Just enough to make life difficult, not quite enough to figure out how to profit from it.

If you are in the gifted / genius category, then I would say the best way to make use of it would be my turning one of your special interests into your career, or at least into a marketable skill.

Maybe you should start looking at your interests and work from there, that might be the easier way to go about this.

Being smart isn't really going to help if you lose interest in what you are doing or if you cannot focus for extended periods of time on something, particularly when you consider that you could be doing this for years at a time.

This is great advice, except I differ from most Aspies in that I do not have special interests. I had some when I was a kid, but these days I don't bother due to my pathetic mindset of "there's no way I can know EVERYTHING about this, and how do I know I am learning the correct information? Where do I begin? etc. etc." so I just give up before I even start. I don't involuntarily get engrossed with an interest.


Interesting. *ponders*

Well, it is a bit difficult to give advise with so few details.
What kind of education do you have?
How old are you? you write that you have been in the workforce for nearly 15 years now, so you probably do not have huge people-interaction problems?
Family situation?

I have only recently found out that I have Aspergers, but now I can see a lot of explanations for why, I am as I am. I think Asperger and high IQ can do a lot of good things, if you are able to interact with the real world

I have a university masters degree in science, with a minor and a major (7½ years at uni). But I also have dyscalculia. The dyscalculia made it extremely difficult for me to pass my math and statistical exams (and made som other courses very difficult). But with a quite good ability to learn things by heart (but I do not have a visual memory - as discussed somwhere else on WP) and a stubborn mind, I got through those subjects.

My last job lost it´s novelty after a couple of years (been trough the annual cycle a couple of times - so nothing new happpening). As part of the job was designing new legislation - I found myself lacking in the law part of it. So I enrolled at University of London (payed by my work - but I had to put my own time in the studying). I like Uni. of London, it is all based on distance learning, and I newer have to trawel to London. Being a whole new area of study, it was quite hard, but wery satisfactory to do.

After I quit the job (to move back home with my family) I got a industrial Ph.D, even though I am quite old for the Ph.D stuff. The Ph.D is based on my former job, skills in international law and a local reputation with the industry for being good at what I am doing (it is a male dominated industry, and since I am quite petite and a woman and not looking very old - it took me some years to earn my street cred).

I do have special interests, but they can be directed towards learning new stuff, effectively and fast. Before I knew about my asperger it really puzzled me why people seemed so unable or slow to learn new things.

This was sort of a personal history, but I guess that my point is that with aspergers, hight IQ and persistence you can turn your interest to many areas and then hopefully success. But it has to be an area you are interested in.

Uni of London courses: http://www.londoninternational.ac.uk/co ... sort_title asc

Helle

I suppose it was too naive of me to hope that IQ skills could relate to real world skills without needing to also relate them to other personal factors. E.g. my highest score was in Performance IQ, what are people who have a high Performance IQ good at? But then, I scored highly in everything (relative to the general population), so it may be useless to try to pick out separate skills.

Am happy to give extra info though. I'm 31, and have a BSc with Honours in Psychology and Psychophysiology. My last job was for our national statistical agency, as data analysis and questionnaire development were my main interests during my course.
Social interaction, while difficult, is probably not the biggest difficulty I have in the workplace. The problem in my original post is the biggest issue.
Family situation? Not much to say there that would be useful...My dad is an engineer, I have a similar mind to him.

Not sure if any of that helps...the main difference I see between my history and yours is that you seem to have been able to turn your skills into jobs that you have stuck with for a while. I haven't stayed long enough in a role I would call 'relevant to my education' long enough for it to become stagnant. Also, I am quite jealous of your university history, and your ability to stick out a PhD! Wouldn't it be nice to be able to be a student for life?

When you already have a degree, I guess that it makes things a lot easier. Where I come from a BSc is not really of any use. I think it is a bit different in english speaking countries? At the moment it is difficult to get a job, and I guess that a masters is of more use, if you want to get an interesting job. I found it extremely difficult to navigate through university. Probably due to my lack of understanding how the system worked. If I had known I have Asperger, it would have been easier, i guess.

I would guess that data analysis and questionnaire development are two areas that could sustain a career. I guess the thing to do is to get an impressive CV and networking (are you on LinkedIn?). It would probably be best to stay in that field of work. Try woluntary work to boost your CV. There must be some kind of green organisation (or the like) near you that could use somebody to organize their data or their quetionnaires.

Regarding workplaces, I always try to be friendly to the secretaries. It is highly usefull to be freindly with the people who are going to help you through the office paper work If working in a professional environment, being able to pick up things fast, learn fast (if it is an interest) and the ability to work with large datasets are very usefull skills. The problem might be to get through the HR department and job interviews.

When asking to your family situation, I was mainly thinking about children. It is more difficult to pursue your own interests if you have children. I have four children, and their father left a few months ago (due to alll my traits as an aspie). This means that I am now "stuck" with four small children and a demanding job - not a good combination. But, I am planning to go to Hobart in December (work) - I hope that it works out, and that the usless bastard of a father can take care of the children for a couple of weeks, while i work.

It would be nice to be a student for life, but I don´t think it is nice to be in a university, for real. From what I hear the environment is not especially friendly any more. There is not enough money and the science staff use a lot of their time applying for money and administrative stuff.

Helle