Can you be innately smart but have a low IQ?

Post Reply New Topic

Everyone always tells me how smart I am, but my IQ has twice been tested as average. It makes me feel horrible about myself, like I'm not living up to my image and am lying to everyone. My verbal IQ is "very superior", but my parents are academics so I think that was learned. My nonverbal skills are average and my working memory is low average.

Usually it's the opposite from what I've gathered.

Consider what i call the "Frankenstein complex": someone who is smart enough to bring a dead body back to life, but not smart enough to know or realize that it's a bad idea in the first place. If you know something is a bad idea before implementing it then you are smart.

I only realize something I did or said is really stupid after I have thought and reflected about it for a little bit. Its encouraging if you are one the people who recognizes his own stupid moments without having to get arrested first, as opposed to some if not most people who live clueless, ignorant and are unapologetic of their stupidity. It can be horrible due to the stress of regret. I wish I could stop myself from doing the stupid thing first instead of acting first and realizing later. But I am getting better and improving, the ability to change and adapt however slowly is the mark of intelligence.

The kind of smarts I value, but don't have, is what I call "running intelligence" meaning it works in the moment ,quickly under of pressure and stress, which is why I will never try to become a military officer . I can't do it. I can come up with a reasonably good idea but I have to sort of sit and meditate a little bit and make sure it makes sense and if necessary revise it. I have said and done my fair share of really stupid dumbass things but I blame that on ADD, anxiety and lack of impulse control, sort of. I get really stupid when I am nervous. Like you I have a very high Verbal IQ but I still say some really dumb things. But that has improved with my ADD meds. That is in-part due to my lack of empathy and self centered thinking: it makes it hard for me to know if what I am trying to communicate will be understood by others or know that sometimes what is said can be taken two different ways



\

I do not trust IQ tests based on personal experience as a teacher.

I once asked a psychologist if my student had potential in math based on his IQ testing. The psychologist referred me to a math teacher who referred me back to the psychologist. No school psychologist will ever say that a kid can not learn something based on an IQ test.

We can look at it from a different perspective. It takes a great mathematician to recognize a great mathematician. It takes a great painter to recognize a great painter. A psychologist who is not a great mathematician can not measure a person's ability to paint or do math unless he or she is great in that area.

I got tired of listening to teachers talk about IQ tests one day. Thus, I announced, "Did you know that there is some research that says that elementary education teachers are among the stupidest of college graduates?" If us teachers really believe in IQ tests, then we need to own up to the fact that we are stupid.

IQ tests don't measure your intelligence, they measure how well you do on IQ tests. It's entirely possible to not score well on IQ tests and be intelligent, I don't test well myself. When it comes time to recite what I've learned, my mind just goes blank.

my dad knew many highly effective GIs in WW2 who scored poorly on mass army IQ tests.

People cannot have low IQ and be smart, but they can score lower on IQ tests despite being smart (things like timed tests can limit and stress them). I've also noticed that there are big differences between different IQ tests. Some ask questions that only people with specific interests can know, like a question I saw once about something about sports in the 1920's. Who knows anything about that?

Average isn't low.


Nope, you wouldn't inherit it just by being in the same house. If you score high on VIQ then your verbal intelligence is high.
That's where I score highest too.


Non-verbal? Do you mean PIQ (performance IQ)?
A lot of us have poor work memory.

I'm sure I took an IQ test at some point in school, but don't recall. I think they only told our parents how we did. But the test only measures how good you are at taking tests. The classic example is meeting someone in a place like Bronx USA. Talking to the person you might assume they aren't all that smart. But if it was night time, and your rented car had broken down, that same person might impress you as very smart indeed for their survival skills in that environment.

The other classic example is going to a party full of "geniuses" and they're all a crashing bore to talk to, and have made terrible decisions in their personal life.

some brighties have a penchant for taking the road less travelled without comprehending in time, that those less travelled roads are that way for a reason more often than not.

Only if the definitions of both "smart" and "intelligence" are relative?

Richard Feynman had some choice words to say about the fallibility of intelligence testing.

I've never been cleverer than anyone else, and I've always struggled at school, even in subjects I enjoyed the most.
But I've found I'm good with problem solving. I can be very creative, and I would love to have a job where I could think up movie ideas and stuff like that.

At school I failed art because of being too creative. We had to create an art piece relating to an artist, but I created something completely original and spent hours on it, only to discover that it means nothig to my grades because it didn't relate to any artists. So that let me down a bit.
But in resistant materials class, we were allowed to literally make anything we wanted. I spent loads of time designing on paper different DVD/CD racks. But I struggled at all the measuring and using machines and so on, so I had the teacher do most of the work. But I still got a good grade for this because they were pleased with the amazing designs I came up with. So my creative mind came in useful there.

IQ tests are not the most definitive measure of intelligence. I was measured at 140, but cannot see this. I have average interests and I am not interested in some subjects that many people would automatically assume I am interested in (math) based on AS. Standardized tests do not accurately predict everyone's abilities and intelligence levels. I went through this recently with my son (who scored 90), yet he does complex math problems in his head rather than work them out on paper. his memory is amazing as he remembers every little detail of just about everything. I know he is smart and intelligent because of what I see, not from what an IQ test tells me. His teachers and other professionals have remarked that his IQ number is very unlikely a true indication of his intelligence. I would suggest for you to not put too much of an emphasis on that test alone. We all have our strengths and weaknesses. I had parents (they died when I was a child) who were educated and considered highly intelligent. One parent was a music teacher who could write and play beautiful complex pieces of music and the other parent was a mathematics professor who taught at university. I was the never pressured to be anything other than myself. They taught me things, yet they encouraged me to develop my own path. To think of it, I remember them letting me get dirty discovering the great outdoors, drew with crayons, and play piano by "ear". I learned a great deal by them letting me experience life for myself. I think people who let themselves experience as much as possible end up with a fuller and richer education and life. Try to be kind to yourself and just know that you have many strengths and I have no doubt you are an intelligent person.

Can you be innately smart but have a low IQ?

I think the answer is "Yes"! ! There's so many of us who are smart, but are REALLY bad test-takers----MYSELF, included. We get nervous, have anxiety, or whatever, and it just screws everything up. Don't think something is wrong with you just because you don't think your scores "add-up".

I have a fairly high IQ and am a TERRIBLE test-taker, so I don't know how THAT happened. I can know a subject from top to bottom----and, inside-out----and STILL fail the test!! My doctor, however, was EXTREMELY smart in how he administered the test. He got me talking about all kinds of things----my interests, philosophy, etc.----and, all-the-while, interspersed, he was asking me questions on the test. I had NO IDEA, and just thought we were having a conversation. I answered his questions, and we would expound on whatever subject, maybe, then we'd go back to talking about other stuff. He was a friggin' GENIUS if you ask ME----and, I think ALL IQ tests should be given that way.

Also, I think, like most here, that IQ tests don't amount to a hill of beans----generally speaking----if, for no other reason, than because.....

Like one person said about sports in the 1920s, or whatever.....

Another person gave the example of someone in the Bronx that probably wouldn't do well on an IQ test.

I'll tell you another one.....

There's an awful lot of people who think most black people are stupid / uneducated / whatever----but, I tell ya what.... I've learned more from little old black ladies, on buses, than maybe, ANYBODY!!