[Dannyboy1]

I'll give you an example. I took an IQ test recently for the heck of it. Naturally I just went as fast as I could because I was at work. After reviewing the score, I was just below genius. I went back to look at the ones I had missed and realized I knew the answer immediately. If I had just taken that extra second to think about it more, I would have gotten it right. It was like I lost my patience for a split second and said to myself, "Just answer the question and move on." I've read what you wrote about yourself and I can really relate to it with one major difference. I'm totally disorganized. I'm not sure if it's emotional intelligence or an impatience that hits me whenever I have to slow down. The emotional intelligence may have to do with the fact that I was raised by a Dad who, although brilliant, always looked at things as black or white, always or never, all or nothing, etc. I have been working extremely hard over the past year to recondition that out of me. Any thoughts?

Originally Posted by openeyes

That paragraph sums up my experience fairly well.

No one in my family has an IQ below 130, and some of us score significantly higher than that, with each of us being fairly eccentric. Particularly, none of the men fit into the mainstream. We have our own ways of doing things which we deem more efficient for our particular uses, and feel little need to bow to the party line.

One of my prime traits is the ability to see patterns and various interrelationships very easily. When taking algebra in junior high I’d usually come up with my own formulas for doing problems, and was the only student in the class allowed to not write out the problems, as I’d been the only one who could do so and consistently be right. Instead of filling a page with 20-30 lines of work, I’d have a problem line, answer line, and check line.

In foreign languages I take on native accents within a couple weeks of study. It still takes a bit of studying to learn much vocabulary though. As a senior at one of the public Ivy universities, I still haven’t developed much of anything that could be referred to as a study habit. On average my coursework may take up 15-30 minutes per day outside class.

With essays I’ll usually read the assignment and then leave it alone until a day or so before it’s due, even if I’d had weeks to do it. Most 2-3 page papers can be done in 30-120 minutes, and my first 9 page essay was done in a 24 hour period, including a break for 8 hours of sleep. My papers seem to largely write themselves in my sleep, and I try to always at least take a nap before writing.

I tend to be very intuitive. I can go into any class and be one of the main people contributing ideas within minutes of walking in, even if I officially know little to nothing about the subject. With most questions a professor or a test asks, it feels that the question itself has the answer within it. Around age 14 I made particular use of this, and found that even with tests such as the practice MCAT I could get virtually every question right even though I’d never studied the subject. Back then, I did the same with IQ tests and routinely maxed them out.

I tend to be very open to new ideas and have no problem admitting the possibility that my views on something may be inaccurate, as my understanding of the world is continually growing. IQ isn’t everything, but nothing is With everything else being equal, I’d prefer a high IQ over a low one.

Being “highly interested in anything related to intelligence”, you might enjoy Project Renaissance with Win Wenger, Ph.D.