Mensa - Intelligence - Nature/Nurture

[SingingInTheRainstorm]

I've got a couple of questions, the first is, if you've passed the Mensa stuff, is there any point to paying the yearly subscription fee? Do we have any Mensa bods on here?

Also is intelligence nature or nurture. Both my DC have their Dads features, his hair, his lack of interest anything academic, his lack of interest reading. There's little that says they're my children, apart from a certificate for 16 months of morning sickness.

On holiday a few years back I had my books out giving them interesting facts. DD & DS were giggling, I asked what was funny, they said why do you have to be so boring.

When I was there age I read for enjoyment, still do, loved learning stuff, my parents weren't that academic so it was all off my own back, my other siblings weren't pushed like I wasn't, they scraped through school.

My latest trick is to read a book in front of them, to see if they see me reading and think, oh I'll grab a book. It's early days but all I've got so far is, what you reading for?

Do you think kids are either intelligent and interested, or they just want to mess about. I was reiterating interesting facts about where we were, history etc. They're at an age to appreciate it if they wanted too.

Both are average in ability, DS is in a lower set for maths. DD is middle sets for both maths & English. I cruised along in the top set with little effort, but never talk about it. I know it's silly but I was hoping they'd inherit something from me that was good.

My family is split fairly evenly between the very academic and the less-academic: one brother and me got PhDs, one started as a manual labourer, and one left university after his first term to set up his own business. But we have all taken something from the intellectually curious home we grew up in: we all enjoy reading, we all listen to music, we all enjoy travelling and learning about new places.

I think the trick, OP, is not to appear too anxious. Don't let them feel this is something you expect of them or else you will be disappointed. Don't let it become laden with tension. Read a book because you enjoy it and want to read that book, not as some kind of statement.

"Social class wiped put any gains of IQ ie those with high IQ and low social class did poorly (not sure on what measures ?salary ?job status) so nature counts but not to overcome nurture."

This does not surprise me at all! As a working class woman with a high IQ, I reckon I've achieved as much as is feasible by getting into a lower middle class job that is technically complex, very interesting but not especially well paid. Probably the majority of "geniuses" in the UK are doing something similar. Not to knock it: it's still a higher standard of living than the overwelming majority of the world's population. In fact, it's an unprecedented standard of living in human history.
It does make me when I see people on here predicting that their kids will go on to become surgeons or edit the London Review of books, on the back of an IQ test though
I don't think your example proves much about nurture though. The US class system is especially rigid and unfair. All the nurture in the world won't fix that for an individual. I'd like to see the study replicated in, say, Sweden.

To be fair, exceptionally lucky (and determined) individuals have always been able to push their way forward. A swineherd became pope in the middle ages. Dh's family went from rat catcher to upper middle class in two generations. Kenneth Branagh came from an Irish working class background and has now succeeded the (proper posh) Richard Attenborough as president of RADA.

But that is hardly the point. Not as long as more privileged children with equal or even less talent don't have to be either exceptionally lucky or exceptionally determined to get to the same place.

I was in Mensa in my early 20's.

I joined when my first marriage was in its death throes. I think I was looking for some of reassurance that I wasn't "thick" and "stupid". I've always had a problem with low self-esteem. I left school at 16.

I was a fully paid-up member for several years. I went to some of the local meetings and met some wonderful people - some of which I'm still in touch with 40 years on. I also met a lot of weirdos, and a LOT of people who would probably be classed as AS now.

I stopped the subscription when I realised that a lot of the top level membership, the management committee, were very elitist. As a working-class northerner I felt the organisation had moved too far away from its principles. I was also extremely unhappy about the number of younger members they were accepting. When I first joined, the minimum age for membership was 16.

After a while I also stopped telling people I was a member, and deliberately hid it. I met my husband at a Mensa meeting (he joined for much the same reasons I did). Its difficult explaining to people exactly how we met without mentioning Mensa.

It gave me a reason to socialise when I badly needed to, but these days I think people like quiz contestants who make a thing of mentioning it are a bit strange.

Sorry this is turning into an essay.

Most people I meet with a high level of intelligence are chronic underachievers. In my case its because I have low self-esteem and I'm also probably AS (never been assessed). I strongly believe your personality determines your "success" (however you choose to define it) more than your IQ.

I think it's mostly nature. The people I know who are exceptionally bright are all from very bright families. There is definitely a nurture element to it, but I know plenty of people from wealthy families who are just average. So you can't buy genius.

However, an interesting question - if a child looks like one parent, and has their personality traits, will they also inherit that parent's IQ?

DD is a clone of DP to look at, and seems to have his mellow easy going nature (she's only a toddler so far). He's far from thick, but he's not academic, left school at 16. On the other hand I am v academic, have a couple of degrees, City job etc. It is firmly ingrained in me that high flying academic performance is important, because I was always praised for it I guess, and because everyone I work with is very academic. I was hoping she'd take after me there, but if she's inherited everything else from her father, who knows!?

But I do think EQ has a huge amount to do with success too. You need to be able to understand people and get on with them well - to give one example, if you're in a job interview, people will give the job to someone they want to work with, really!

I have a high IQ. I think I was measured to be in the top

GoesDownLikeACupOfColdSick Thu 02-Feb-17 09:54:05

"However, an interesting question - if a child looks like one parent, and has their personality traits, will they also inherit that parent's IQ? "

As far as I am aware the genes that control eye colour/hair colour/looks are not the same as the ones that control intellectual ability, so there would be no real reason.

I look more like my dad but have inherited (some of) my mum's musicality- and a genetic chronic condition that she has. The latter I have managed to pass on to both my children, one who looks like me and one who looks like dh. Ds is more like me in personality, dd in academic interests and abilities.

"Most people I meet with a high level of intelligence are chronic underachievers."

Well yeah, Mensa accept the top 2% of acievers on an IQ test. 2 in every 100 people don't hold down elite jobs.

A lot of children with very or indeed just high IQ will switch off at school as our school system is tailored for the average child and repetition.
It must be annoying if you learn fast yet the teacher wants to repeat the same thing over and the very annoying when you already have it at two or three repetitions when they still want you to do it again.
Eventually a lot of these children either turn off education or start being a nuisance.
Which is both sad for them and for society as it is a waste of potential.

Notwithstanding disability, I think there's a definite correlation between high IQ coupled with low emotional intelligence. It's almost a balance, the higher the IQ, the weaker the social skills it seems, and the power of social skills should never be underestimated

This is just baseless opinion, and an anti-intellectual one at that. It's pretty much bollocks from people who are trying to convince themselves and others that they are better than people who are smarter than them.

I recently read a report on gifted children in nursery education. There were some case studies of real kids that had been observed in nursery settings. One was a little boy from a difficult background, parents drug addicts, came to school badly dressed etc...
The teachers were putting huge efforts into his percieved social short comings but hadn't noticed he was bright. When he was attracted to the researchers with their puzzles and activities the teachers at first assumed he was "attention seeking" because he didn't get a lot of interaction at home. The researchers had to point out that he was operating at a high level.
I felt so sad for that little boy, who's teachers weren't really seeing him.

^that also happens a lot with children who are 2e (high ability with a learning difficulty). The intelligence is clouded by the learning disability and usually by the time the teachers figure it out it is years later.

If at all. Or neither the learning difficulty or the high ability isn't detected as they are cancelling each other out.

So sad. It's such a simple thing to understand that all children have strengths as well as weaknesses. And yet, so often missed

Genetics is utterly fascinating. I remember reading a description in a book that stuck with me, where the author described a resemblance to an ancestor as "a shout across generations", which I liked.

I have green eyes and DP has brown, but at 17 months, DD's are still blue - I know they can still change, but it seems more likely they'll stay blue. His mother has blue eyes, but not one person in my family that I've ever met does, so that rogue recessive gene must have sneaked through somehow! Amazing when you think just how many genes there are swirling around every single person/egg/sperm.

The eye genes are very complex. My husband has green, I have hazel and my son has blue. Both my parents have brown. DH's parents have brown and grey.
My husband wanted to study the genes that contribute to eye colour in the late 90s when he was at uni but couldn't due to that fact.

Tomorrowillbeachicken Thu 02-Feb-17 10:29:05
"A lot of children with very or indeed just high IQ will switch off at school as our school system is tailored for the average child and repetition. "

I think that may depend to some extent on the type of IQ. The kind of child who combines high verbal ability with an active imagination and an innate ability to multitask may be absolutely fine because s/he will be able to provide her own entertainment whilst keeping up with the school work. If you can compose novels or write poetry or walk around in a magical world of your own imagination, you don't actually need to be bored ever, anywhere, and if school work is mainly repetitive you may well be able to keep up at the same time.

Otoh the child whose intellectual needs are the kind that need external input and/or does not have a lively imagination may become very frustrated.

I've never thought it like. I spent my school life bored and unchallenged and then went inside my own head to get away, writing in school and out. Never thought it could be IQ related. I thought it was normal.
My hubby is more intelligent than I am and played up at school as he was bored and also has some issues getting ideas down at paper.

Like many traits, it is a combination of genes and environment (innate intelligence is useless without the ability to express it).

I wouldn't worry about your children being average/below average at a young age. There is way too much worry about this: it's quite common for children to flourish as they get older. The present education system is not designed to accommodate natural curiosity, with its emphasis on targets.

I am an early career academic. My uni has a large percentage of privately educated students, and I can say with some confidence, that most are no more intelligent than those who have come from a more disadvantaged background. In fact, the statistics are that those who come from relatively disadvantaged backgrounds tend to receive a higher class of degree.

For the record, I did poorly up until about 14 [i]as no-one noticed I was deaf[/i]. I also bounced around the foster care system due to emotional, physical, and sexual abuse at home. I landed at UCL the first time I went to uni, dropped out (essentially, mental health issues due to background), got my act together. Returned to do a subject I really enjoyed (philosophy), now have a PhD, and I'm a (temporary) lecturer this year.

I don't know, or care much for, IQ. I think my intelligence is of a very specific kind (I'm good at analysing things/logic). I'm not so good at emotional stuff, and received an unofficial (I say unofficial as the Dr said there was no funding to help ppl. like me who were pretty much functioning) diagnosis of Asperger's last year.

Even now my brain never stops and I write to slow it and I thought that was normal.

unlimited I totally agree, and I can see this with ds5, he has learning delay and speech delay, does not make him an idiot! Because of his difficulties, school are not challenging him, and are taking the easy options. My husband and I are helping with him every night, with his writing, reading, maths, what school are saying he can't do, we are doing with him, and he is picking up well, and making progress. It made me cry when they showed me the report they were writing for the paeditrician, to get an EHCP for him, some of it was not true, and was nothing like the boy we see at home, who loves people, children, inqusitive, always asking questions, wanting to learn. The boy they described had severe special needs and was extremely low functioning.

I had to video him making a sandwich from his own volition for the Paeditrician, and video him saying his letter sounds and trying to write the letters corresponding to the sounds, on his chalk board. He has just turned 5 last week.

I think at school, he retreats into himself, they don't see the real him.

Aeroflotgirl I'm sorry your son is having these difficulties with his school. He is very lucky to have you to advocate for him