Intro: We revere intelligence and award “smart” people with a high IQ score, but are we actually born with our intelligence, and can we learn to be smarter?
THE IQ (Intelligence Quotient) score is an internationally-accepted measure of total brain power, calculated via a series of tests. These tests usually involve numeracy, spotting patterns, and logic – so if your forte lies in practical problem solving, negotiating with others, or creativity, the chances are you won’t excel at an IQ test.
Intelligence has no clear definition. Like beauty or personality, it’s relatively subjective, and this is one reason why IQ scores are problematic.
Another issue is that IQ tests have historically been created by (mostly) men in Europe and North America – and are skewed in favour of people from Western culture. Someone from a community that values storytelling, for example, may have great verbal reasoning and memory, yet their overall IQ score might be low because they flopped on the number puzzles.
So, although scientists have worked hard to make tests reliable and relevant across cultures, IQ tests have a limited use. For mentally taxing jobs such as programming, a test is an effective barometer for picking the best candidate. However, if we were patients given the choice between a 22-year-old novice surgeon with a genius IQ and a 55-year-old expert with countless surgical operations under their belt, we will all know who to choose.
Experience, knowledge, social skills, drive, and conscientiousness – all of which could all be considered intelligence – are not accounted for in the conventional IQ test. Even though young adults tend to get the best overall IQ scores, just like a fine wine, many of our abilities continue to improve with age.
Good IQ score or not, everyone can improve their cognitive powers, regardless of their age, schooling, and past experience. Don’t be sold on quick fixes: brain training games and programs will help you get better at those games and tasks, but rarely translate into any practical thinking powers. To get really good at something – be it memorising place names, coding software, or crafting musical compositions – you’ll need to practise that particular skill for many hours.
IQ’S disturbing history
The first intelligence tests were devised by French psychologist Alfred Binet in the early 1900s as a benevolent way to find the least able children who needed special schooling. A strong believer in the idea that intellectual prowess was not set in stone and could be improved with teaching, practice, and discipline, Binet insisted that intelligence tests should never be used “for ranking [people] according to mental worth”.
Soon after his death in 1911 however, Binet’s test, later named “IQ” tests, were seized by scientists in the eugenics movement who reformulated it for adults, labelling those who scored poorly as “feeble-minded” or “degenerate”. In the early 1900s, 30 US states passed laws that meant low-scoring people could be forcibly sterilised. By the middle of the 20th century, around 60,000 people had been sterilised against their will.
Adolf Hitler also espoused the IQ test and created his own stylised version. Hundreds of thousands of low-scoring people were duly sterilised or executed in Nazi Germany.
OF the essays written by Einstein in 1905, arguably the most influential was his enunciation of a “special” theory of relativity, which advanced the idea that the laws of physics are actually identical to different spectators, regardless of their position, as long as they are moving at a constant speed in relation to each other. Above all, the speed of light is constant. It is simply that the classical laws of mechanics appear to be obeyed in our normal lives because the speeds involved are insignificant.
The Speed of Light
But the implications of this principle if the observers are moving at very different speeds are bizarre and normal indicators of velocity such as distance and time become warped. Indeed, absolute space and time do not exist. Therefore, if a person were to theoretically to travel in a vehicle in space close to the speed of light, everything would look normal to them, but another person standing on earth waiting for them to return would notice something very unusual. The space ship would appear to be getting shorter in the direction of travel. Moreover, whilst time would continue as “normal” on earth, a watch telling the time in the ship would be going slower from the earth’s perspective even though it would seem correct to the traveller (because the faster an object is moving the slower time moves). This difference would only become apparent when the vessel returned to earth and clocks were compared.
If the observer on earth were able to measure the mass of the ship as it moved, he would also notice it getting heavier too.
Ultimately, nothing could move faster than or equal to the speed of light because at that point it would have infinite mass, no length, and time would stand still.
A General Theory of Relativity
From 1907 to 1915, Einstein developed his special theory into a “general” theory of relativity which included equating accelerating forces and gravitational forces. Implications of this extension of his special theory suggested light rays would be bent by gravitational attraction and electromagnetic radiation wavelengths would be increased under gravity. Moreover, mass, and the resultant gravity, warps space and time, which would otherwise be “flat”, are turned into curved paths which other masses (for example, the moons of planets) caught within the field of the distortion follow.
Amazingly, Einstein’s predictions for special and general relativity were gradually proven by experimental evidence. The most celebrated of these was the measurement taken during a solar eclipse in 1919 which proved the sun’s gravitational field really did bend the light emitted from stars behind it on its way to earth. It was the verification which led to Einstein’s world fame and wide acceptance of his new definition of physics.
Einstein spent much of the rest of his life trying to create a unified theory of electromagnetic, gravitational and nuclear fields but failed. It was at least in keeping with his own remark of 1921 that “discovery in the grand manner is for young people and hence for me is a thing of the past.”
E=MC²
Fortunately, then, he had completed three other papers in his youth (in 1905) in addition to his one on the special theory of relativity! One of these included the now famous deduction which equated energy to mass in the formula E=mc² [where E=energy, m=mass and c=the speed of light]. This understanding was vital in the development of nuclear energy and weapons, where only a small amount of atomic mass (when released to multiply by a factor of the speed of light squared under appropriate conditions) could unleash huge amounts of energy.
The third paper described Brownian motion, and the final paper made use of Planck’s quantum theory in explaining the phenomenon of the “photoelectric” effect, helping to confirm quantum theory in the process.
Further Achievements
Almost inevitably, Einstein was also drawn into the atomic bomb race. He was asked by fellow scientists in 1939 to warn the US President of the danger of Germany creating an atomic bomb. Einstein himself had been a German citizen, but had renounced his citizenship in favour of Switzerland, and ultimately America, having moved there in 1933 following the elevation of Hitler to power in his home country. Roosevelt’s response to Einstein’s warning was to initiate the Manhattan project to create an American bomb first.
After the war Einstein spent time trying to encourage nuclear disarmament.
In 1922, Albert Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics.
CHARACTER strengths are such an important element of positive psychology that for many people and organisations who work in this field, they have become the central focus of their work, to the exclusion of all other positive psychology topics. One reason is that strengths are such a tangible, concrete subject. When you talk about strengths, people easily grasp what you mean. There’s none of the confusion or raised eyebrows that you often get when hedonic or eudaimonic wellbeing are mentioned . And what’s more, the language associated with strength is, by and large, pretty down-to-earth.
– You can read more about hedonic or eudaimonic wellbeing by reading the captioned article
At the time of writing there are several well-known classifications of strengths.
Firstly, there’s an assessment of personal, or “character”, strengths: the VIA Inventory of Strengths (VIA-IS, or VIA for short) is probably the best known in positive psychology circles. It’s made up of 24 character strengths, such as love, curiosity and social intelligence. The basic online VIA assessment is free and includes a short report showing your strengths in top-down order, with an option to pay a small fee for a more detailed report.
The second model is the Strenghtscope ™ assessment of work-related strengths. This model is also available online, and assesses the 24 strengths which are most critical to your work performance, such as decisiveness, results focus and collaboration.
Lastly, there is the R2 strengths assessment (formerly known as “Realise2”) which spans both work-related and personal strengths, and is based on 60 different psychological attributes including “listener”, “rapport builder” and “time optimiser”.
A misconception about strengths
People often confuse strengths with competencies, talents or skills, but in positive psychology they are not the same thing.
For example, the 24 VIA character strengths differ from competencies, talents and skills in that:
. They are morally valued in their own right
. They cannot be wasted.
It’s worth remembering that the various strengths models used by positive psychologists do not necessarily define strengths in the same way, so take care with any interpretation delivered.
What is a strength?
In models such as Strengthscope ™ and R2, strengths are those personal attributes which energise us, feel like us and enable us to perform at our best. It’s very likely that your strengths are
also the things that you good at.
When is a strength not a strength?
If you have a competence, talent or skill in something, you are by definition good at it. In positive psychology terms, a strength is most probably something you are good at because you use it a lot but not necessarily! For example, it could be that you have an “unrealised strength” (using R2 terminology), that is, a strength which lies dormant, waiting to be discovered and developed to its maximum potential.
To illustrate this, let’s take the example of somebody who is an excellent organiser. If you want an event to run smoothly, whether it’s a social event, or a community litter-pick, this is the person to contact. The organiser knows exactly who to contact, what to do and how to do it, and the job gets done efficiently and professionally. The right people turn up in the right place at the right time, everyone enjoys themselves and says what a wonderful job the organiser has done.
But does the organiser feel good about organising? Here’s a typical reply where there is a conflict in character strengths:
“No! I know I’m good at organising, and I can do it with my eyes closed. That’s why people always ask me to do it. And it’s pretty easy work, but when I think about it, it doesn’t really feel like me at all. And I don’t feel energised by it, quite the reverse. In fact, I’m absolutely drained by the time it’s all over.” In other words, this individual has a competence in organising, but it is not one of the person’s strengths.
Benefits of playing to your strengths
There is growing empirical evidence to suggest that using your strengths every day is beneficial to your psychological wellbeing in a number of different ways, such as:
. Increased resilience. People who use their strengths more are better able to bounce back from adversity in their lives.
. Increased vitality. Using your strengths is associated with higher levels of positive energy.
. Decreased stress. Higher use of strengths predicts lower stress over time.
. Increased confidence and self-esteem. Using your strengths more is associated with both increased self-efficacy and self-esteem.
. Increased happiness. Using your strengths in new ways is associated with increased wellbeing over the longer term.
Not only does playing to your strengths improve your wellbeing, research suggests it also improves your performance in work-related activities, makes you more engaged and more likely to achieve your goals. I’m sure readers will agree that these are very compelling reasons to identify your strengths and start using them more, in whatever setting you find yourself in.
A word about weaknesses
Whilst empirical research confirms the long-term wellbeing benefits of identifying and playing to your strengths, there are two important caveats to take into consideration.
Firstly, it’s likely that you’ll have strengths in some areas and weaknesses in others. If you complete the VIA Inventory mentioned earlier in this article you will know which strengths energise you and which one’s don’t. The ones at the bottom of your VIA list are not necessarily weaknesses, rather they are strengths that you probably haven’t used very much because they don’t energise you. It may be that you can get through life perfectly well without paying much attention to the ones at the bottom of your list. However, this may not always be the case. If, for example, they include leadership and social intelligence and you work as a team leader, then to be fully effective you may need to try to develop them in some ways. You could do some additional training, with a coach or mentor who specialises in that field, or work with colleagues who have complementary strengths which you can draw on as and when you need to.
Secondly, you need to bear in mind that it’s possible to overdo or overuse a strength, and when this happens, the strength paradoxically becomes a weakness. Strengthscope ™ calls this “strengths in overdrive”. As an example, if you overuse the strength of courage, you may find yourself taking unnecessary risks or challenges that have a high chance of failure, and others may perceive you as reckless, impulsive or foolhardy. It’s worth remembering, then, to use a little old-fashioned common sense when considering how and when to play to your strengths.
In Summary
. Using your strengths has been shown in research to lead to higher wellbeing over the longer term.
. Using your strengths will not feel like a chore. On the contrary, you will feel excited, eager and exhilarated.
. Playing to your strengths leads to improved performance.
. Use common-sense when deciding how and when to play to your strengths in order to avoid overdoing them.
. The basic VIA Inventory of Strengths is free to use. By completing it you’ll also be contributing to essential academic research.
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