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Intelligent People More At Risk of Mental Illness, Study Finds (independent.co.uk)
schwit1 shares a report from The Independent: The stereotype of a tortured genius may have a basis in reality after a new study found that people with higher IQs are more at risk of developing mental illness. A team of U.S. researchers surveyed 3,715 members of American Mensa with an IQ higher than 130. An "average IQ score" or "normal IQ score" can be defined as a score between 85 and 115. The team asked the Mensa members to report whether they had been diagnoses with mental illnesses, including autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). They were also asked to report mood and anxiety disorders, or whether the suspected they suffered from any mental illnesses that had yet to be diagnosed, as well as physiological diseases, like food allergies and asthma. After comparing this with the statistical national average for each illness they found that those in the Mensa community had considerably higher rates of varying disorders. While 10 per cent of the general population were diagnosed with anxiety disorder, that rose to 20 percent among the Mensa community, according to the study which published in the Science Direct journal.
No wonder people keep saying I'm crazy.
"However, the study pointed out that a high IQ was not the cause of mental illness, but it could be correlated with the highly intelligent community."
Or a high IQ could be correlated with better jobs and better health benefits, therefore leading to more diagnoses of mental illness.
Or mental health professionals could have more difficulty identifying mental illnesses in those with lower IQ.
Or.
Or.
Where are the controls? I realize that relying on subject-reported data in studies is necessary in some cases, but I believe they could've done better than this.
This is easy, lots of people are too stupid to realise they have problems.
Doesn't mean they don't have problems. Smarter people are better at diagnosis.
It is probably true. OTOH maybe the mentally ill are more likely to join Mensa.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
People with mental illness more likely to be intelligent?
Trump is a GENIUS!
TRUMP powa!
If you're not using it, are you going to notice when it's not in working order?
I envy those people I know who are capable of insanity and irrationality.
So far my brain just won't break.
But alzheimers or dementia are probably in my late 70s.
It's a problem because the rational person sees a lot of the bad in the world and can't really alleviate their own suffering other than by taking mind altering substances or temporarily distracting activities.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Correlation is not causation. An obvious explanation is that intelligent people have higher incomes, and can afford to better medical care, which leads to more mental health diagnoses.
Maybe people with mental disorders are more likely to join Mensa.
Members of MENSA more likely to have access to health care, including psychiatric kind.
Film at... umm... whenever. Just stream the goddamn thing.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
It seems like a flawed study in a number of ways, but it is nonetheless a believable situation.
I know a few people, co-workers and friends, who I consider brilliant. To a person they are more bothered by the disparity between how the world could be if people made better choices, and how it actually is. It is difficult for them to see a society which does not value education and understanding, where a pop celeb is held in high esteem by millions and listened to when they spout pseudoscientific babble, while scientists with real expertise are ignored.
I think the smarter you are, the more you end up disappointed by the human animal. They hide it, but it shows.
In my experience, the people I know who join MENSA are a bit mentally unbalanced. They aren't a representative group of all of the intelligent people that I know. Actually, I would go so far as to say that the desire to join that type of group likely indicates some insecurity.
I know, I know -- I read it. I'm sorry.
Their research was based on model that suggests intelligent people with "hyper brains" are more reactive to environmental stimulus and that “may predispose them to certain psychological disorders as well as physiological conditions involving elevated sensory and altered immune and inflammatory responses".
Their study seemed to confirm this, as it suggested that because of their increased awareness levels, those with higher IQs react more to their environment. This creates a hyper brain/hyper body scenario, where they display a hyperactive central nervous system.
So highly intelligent people focus more on the shit going on around them and melt down over it. The more oblivious percentiles brush it off (if they even noticed it at all) and move on with their lives. That seems about right.
Only if you knew.
Maybe the problem is that the more intelligent you are, the more likely you are to really understand how fucked up things are and so the more likely you are to have anxiety. You look around at the people running things and realize the inmates are running the asylum.
It certainly goes a long ways in explaining the comment section around here.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Don't worry about your children, modern christian teaching methods can handle all their little problems.
A complex intricate machine is more delicate and more prone to breaking down than a rock.
It is not true that intelligent people get more mental diseases: it's just that it is easier to tell the before/after difference when an intelligent person becomes ill.
Maybe people who want to belong to an organization like Mensa are more prone to mental illness?
This is what you get.
Seriously, it all comes back to definitions. Ever since the mid 70s, when the psychological establishment decided to get 'scientific' and 'quantitative' about its definitions of mental illness, it's been clear that those definitions are way too broad.
It's simple. If 50% of the population is abnormal, that doesn't mean they all "need treatment", much as you might like to sell it to them; it means that your definition of "normal" is wrong.
Imagine if you will: a world in which the other inhabitants are mere monkeys, like Planet of the Apes.
Now contrast with reality, for a man like Chris Langan:
Now think to yourself: you live in a world run by damned dirty apes, where success and means are virtually decoupled from intellectual ability, where in effect the animals have it better than the sentient creatures of the world. Would you hoot and holler and fling shit like the apes to be king of monkeyworld, or would you aim to withdraw and try not to get beaten with rocks for being different? In fact, you might even come off as a paranoid and depressed reclusive douche.
But good news! You don't have to take this post as a tautological proof of itself: you can move to Congo right the fuck now and try to become the king of a tribe of silverback gorillas, I bet you'd be just like Tarzan, wouldn't that be grand? Go on, give it a shot.
Trump isn't mentally ill, he's just a moron.
Its like being the only person with working legs in a world built by wheelchair-bound fools who outlaw walking since they cant fathom how it works.
Everything "right" about myself is ignored or lost upon inefficient fools who are quick to point out what is wrong and apply limits. I have to watch the potential to enjoy a higher state dimished through disbelief and the energy cost of constant reassurance to others that Im smart enough to be doing the things Im doing.
My main issue with society is that despite supposedly appreciating intelligence; anyone acting the slightest bit different has to "explain themselves" and face identical "limits" as less capable. That deprives me of MY specific skill while I watch other types of skills get highly rewarded (musical, athletic, political).
I hate "sharing" which is essentially me bringing myself down a notch so the "less fortunate" get a chance. I never agreed to this so society can stop stealing from me kthx.
The sample populations here are terrible, but I can accept the overall proposition as plausible.
My theory would mostly center around the idea that higher intelligence is associated with a diminished ability to accept falsifiable or non-provable platitudes, optimism and superstitious thinking. This leads to a deficit of coping mechanisms for the difficulties of every day life and hardships, resulting increased stress, pessimism and negative thoughts and ideation. You might even oversimplify it as a lack of hope in some ways.
Less intelligent people may find superstitions (including but not just religious belief) easier to accept, especially if provided by authority figures. They're more likely to believe in optimistic future outcomes, including improbable ones, not out of gullibility but because they lack the understanding of why they are unlikely -- it's a "I can win the lottery" mindset. This provides a wealth of coping mechanisms for dealing with ordinary setbacks and problems, reducing stress and anxiety. Jesus won't _really_ set you free, but if you're dumb enough to believe it, he will actually set you free.
All this being said, it's probably just as easy to believe that people with an interest in joining an exclusive high IQ group are also people with a low sense of self esteem who are prone to depression. Belonging to a group that's not only exclusive but also exclusively for high intelligence people provides them with a sense of validation and superiority, but for many it's not enough and they wind up depressed and anxious anyway.
But I guess all of it could be true to some extent.
The same types of people that sign up for Mensa may feel that it is a badge of honor to identify as being on the autism spectrum.
Just like with other complicated systems.
I see patterns that other people don't. I notice things other people don't. I care about things normal people don't. I keep insane amounts of information on designs in my head.
What does this give me? An absolutely crazy detailed view of the world that normal people can't see or even process. I write software no one else can. I write software that is more stable and secure than anyone else can produce, ever. In fact, you're probably using software I wrote right now. It's so good that nobody even notices it exists because it doesn't break and nobody has ever needed to debug it. Yes, I'm that good and yes, I got paid very little for things that millions or even billions of people use every day and nobody knows who I am.
What is the trade-off? Well, every day life gives me anxiety you can't imagine. I hear, see, taste, feel, everything in the world with very high intensity while you are able to ignore it. I can't ignore it. I see patterns in everything and I need absolute perfection and control with my own designs. I suffer tremendously just to exist. I'm not joking when I say I would give up all my special abilities just to be normal. Just living is torture even though I do "amazing" things (to normal people).
I'm not the typical geek that has issues. I have issues way beyond these people. Yes, I have tried to get professional help but I'm not like anything anyone has seen before so they're not quite sure what to do.
You will all benefit from my abilities even though other people will take credit. I'm OK with that. I just want to be normal and not suffer.
The ratio of people to cake is too big
That feel when to intelligent too remain sane.
The study isn't about the incidence of mental disorders in people with high intelligence, it's about the incidence of mental disorders among people who pay money annually to gain a sense of belonging and community among other people they feel have a similar IQ to themselves.
I suggest that the results of an inverted study would be better to support the conclusion that seems to be drawn here: get a random sampling of people who report mental illness, and then test their intelligence. Don't start with a members of a well-known high intelligence community and then test them for mental illness.
When people are smart, they are able to see and understand things around them that many people do not understand or aware of. I have been writing about the instability in America and the world. I expect many people who read Slashdot can understand the the issue of instability. This is just one issue that is facing the world today. But many people are not aware of these issues so they are ignorant and not depressed.
The stereotype of a tortured genius may have a basis in reality after a new study found that people with higher IQs are more at risk of developing mental illness. A team of U.S. researchers surveyed 3,715 members of American Mensa with an IQ higher than 130. An "average IQ score" or "normal IQ score" can be defined as a score between 85 and 115.
Another interpretation of the data is that people who join American Mensa have a higher probability of having a mental illness. There's even a very plausible mechanism for this, people with a mental illness often look for ways to treat that illness, joining a group of people they can potentially relate to (ie Mensa) is one way to deal with their illness.
I stole this Sig
Illness, or a label put on healthy dissenting thought?
All of those intelligent people seeing inconsistencies and contradictions in society probably struggle to justify these things and this causes stress.
It's to the point that any stress is able to be diagnosed as a mental illness and a psychiatric drug can be prescribed. It's not even subtle. The medical industry is drugging and brainwashing people. Even children, as if public schooling wasn't enough.
The healthy reaction to this society whose only values are conformity and materialism is armed rebellion. Hard to organize when your instincts are suppressed with drugs. Hard to rebel when nonconformity is labelled by many as "mental illness" with no rational basis.
The human spirit is in its death throes. They establishment is struggling to find ways to sedate it until the killing blow can be delivered.
But that doesn't align with my hopes and dreams! I wish I hadn't lived to see such times! I just come here to feel good!
Then call me 'mentally ill' and wait for your obsolescence in the eyes of the so-called elite. It's coming soon. Or accept your fate and resist your destruction, maybe we can succeed. There is hope yet!
Is the author implying that they can't be as crazy as men?
Or that they are not "smart" enough to be crazy?
E"mail" the author and demand answers!
USB, USB, USB!
A logical person might conclude people who join MENSA are perhaps a little too impressed with themselves, perhaps even to the point of being narcissistic.
So one could argue that such people might well be less stable than people with a 130+ IQ who feel no need to constantly reassure themselves about their putative intellectual superiority.
I am a model of psychological balance, yet I could join MENSA if I wanted to. I have never felt the need.
Besides, our Chairthing said I'd have to give up my seat on the Galactic Council of Woke Beings if I debased myself so blatantly.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
No it is not "people with higher IQs are more at risk of developing mental illness" it's "Mensa members are more at risk of developing mental illness".
And I've known enough Mensa members to say: "No shit Sherlock". If you need an organization of random jackasses to validate your IQ, you probably don't have issues, but subscriptions.
On the other hand if you bother engage in hobbies that exercise your mind, (solving crappy little puzzles doesn't count), then you don't need the Mensa circle-jerk you will find the company of other intelligent people during your everyday life.
Nature tries really hard to produce "average" people. That's why we have a think called the "normal curve"--the majority of people are within the "average" intelligence range, and are "average" in most ways. Only a very few are exceptionally beautiful, or smart, or strong, or whatever other superlative quality might be desirable.
Most extremely talented people I know are somewhat out of balance. Extremely gifted artists tend to struggle with logic, and brilliant scientists tend to struggle with social relationships. These gifted people are blessed--or cursed--with a kind of imbalance that gives them their gift, and also gives them struggles in other areas.
I'd guess that this phenomenon is linked, that when more of a person's brain is devoted to a "gift," it takes away from other areas considered "normal."
It's not at all surprising to me that gifted people might suffer more often from mental illnesses.
When did Mensa lower requirements from IQ of 3x std.dev. To 2x std.dev ?
I.e. from 148 to 130?
Read a History book ... any subject ... and figure that one out pretty quickly.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Back when "super science" SF reigned, and Hubbard was taking notes, lol. The wikipedia article doesn't go much into the mechanics of it, but in the book controlling the central nervous system was part of the protagonists method of prevailing.
Many intelligent people do not feel they need to join any specific organization to mark that fact. Perhaps those who do are more likely to have emotional or mental issues?
Any such study that does not start with a large and unbiased cohort before they even got their IQ tested is close to worthless.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
Dear Everyone Else. Stop driving us nuts with your stupidity, stop driving us to depression with your idiocy, and stop driving us to frustration with your obstructionism. Sincerely, the smart people who have to put up with you.
Smoke weed Everyday
We need a database of people with high IQ so that they can be put under strict surveillance and subjected to mandatory psychiatric tests. The public must be protected!
After reading this site for the past week, I can safely say most of you are not risk for mental illness...
Hmm. I am one of those "intelligent people". And I do not say this with a pride, since it has never brought me any joy. In fact, complete opposite. It is a curse. In so many different ways. I do not know what my IQ is, but in government tests it apparently was quite high. I really don't care and you should not either.
When you have more of something, you will have less of something else.
My social skills are about the level of a pet dog. And it has pretty much destroyed most of my life. No matter how "wise" I am, I've never been able to understand other people.
I am slightly autistic. Surprise surprise. Aspergers, ADHD, whatever.
I am extremely good at my research job. It comes and goes. Sometimes it takes months to get myself going. Sometimes I do spectacular things. I wish I did not hate myself so much, I might be able to do so much. But nothing just makes sense anymore. I have few ideas which might actually change the world. Tested some of them with surprising results. But nobody really gives a f**k. And neither do I anymore. In this world, in the end, in these days, there is very little you can achieve alone. And I don't speak human.
I most likely was born this way. So has my "intelligence" caused my problems? Well, yes and no. Some part of my brain that was supposed to make me happy and social got reserved for something else. Yeah I know, it is not that simple. Believe me, I know. But that describes the situation best.
And what I've seen and spoken to the people who are absolutely the best in what they do, they don't seem that happy either. They do what they do because they must. I am not saying that intelligence and happiness can't coexist, in fact I am pretty sure I am saying nothing here. But the happiest people I've seen usually aren't exactly the sharpest tools in the shed, and never ever the truly "intelligent" ones. If you, happy intelligent human, feel offended now, feel free to do so. But beware the cracks.
You don't have to believe me and I don't have to prove anything to any of you. I really don't care. I know, I'm bitter and full of it. But you're nothing new either. I fiercely love all of you beasts in human form.
Because they're both impossibly stupid and crazier than playing in a flaming barrel of fresh shit.
An unproportionately large share of these people are probably ashkenazi jews, who are a result of hundreds of years of inbreeding.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ9EWcaS7II
(Which the band Oasis ripped off with their song Whatever: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly-3jIrlkYQ)
Less redundancy, more flukes. This isn't particularly sensational.
In other news, people with legs are more at risk of foot diseases.
Duh.
Asking any group of people to self-diagnose is hideously unscientific. Would you expect people who go into Mensa to be any different?
What's the correlation of the "desire to participate in a survey" and "mental illness"?
If you have the desire take a survey/poll, shouldn't that knock ~10 points off your I.Q. Score?
Nope. You're talking about conditions that precede any awareness of "how things are".
I've been thinking along these lines for a while. What if the Fermi Paradox can be explained by a deep information-theoretic limit to intelligence? Something like a limit to interconnection density in three dimensions, or that with enough information the false connections between facts vastly overwhelm the true connections between facts, or something very roughly along those lines.
Autism is *not* a mental illness (software) but a neurological difference (hardware). It's not something you acquire, but rather you're born with (and most assuredly will die with). This amateur gaffe calls the rest of the article into doubt.
You need to be in the top 2% for IQ scores to join Mensa. It means that about 6 million Americans are eligible to join Mensa, compare this to abound 60000 actual members.
It means that only 1% of Americans with high IQ are Mensa members, so I think it is safe to assume that there are other important criteria that make people join Mensa. So is it the IQ or is it something else that cause this correlation.
I don't know how they addressed this in the (paywalled) paper. Did they run tests to weed out external factors or did they leave that task to other researchers? For example, did they do their own IQ tests in addition to relying on Mensa members to get a good sample of people with high IQ?
Amongst many other problems with this study a quick look did not show any correction for the sample population's weighted likelihood to develop ASD and related issues. Estimates for the prevalence in males vs. females vary form 4:1 to 6:1 and this factor alone would appear to remove much of the difference found.
It would explain Slashdot's comment section.
... just drive me crazy.
...because the mental illness bit looks like a lock in.
So people smart enough to know what they might have, and smart enough to get tested for things, and smart enough to ask for help, report problems more often than the average dumb person who needs to be convinced to go to a doctor once in a while, wear a seatbelt in a car, get vaccinated for major illnesses, and not fall for Nigerian scams?
I think it's safe to say that smart people identify more problems than dumb people -- independent of how many problems either group has.
I also get my car repaired more often than the average car owner -- and my car's more reliable than the average car too. But I'm willing/able to repair non-essential parts, where the average car owner would just let it go, and drive with a cracked windshield, a squeaky bushing, a rusty dent, a less-than-perfect oxygen sensor, et cetera. There's a reason why routine emissions tests are now mandated.
I feel like the more I discover and learn about things the more troubled I am and scared of the world
Mensa members have a higher IQ than average, but they are also self-selected based on other criteria, like an obsessive need to demonstrate their intelligence to others. In addition, the conclusion also assumes that mental illness is diagnosed at the same rate independent of IQ, which seems implausible.
So this result only shows you that Mensa members are more prone to having mental illness diagnosed, not that people with high IQ in general have a higher rate of mental disease.
When you are smart enough to see through all of the bullsh*t in the world, it scars the mind...
From TFS:
A team of U.S. researchers surveyed 3,715 members of American Mensa with an IQ higher than 130.
So how do we know that this isn't just a case that mentally ill people are more interested in joining Mensa?
The first step in becoming mentally ill is being diagnosed. Until you have been diagnosed, you don't know for certain how you should behave, nor which medications you should begin to take.
Once you have been diagnosed, things become a little easier for you. A network of support will form, allowing you to flex and extend your behavior out into the framework provided, so that your mental illness can fully take root.
I'm sure including hot and trendy mental illnesses doesn't mess with the numbers at all.
In the 70s it was hyper activity then ADD then ADHD and now Autism Spectrum. There will always be something that kids all get diagnosed with to tell parents "it isn't your fault".
As for mad scientists, I have been saying "After a certain point on the bell curve everyone is crazy" for 3 decades.
The more intelligent you are, the more aware you are of more things around you, and your understanding of them also increases; that's my experience, at least. That heightened awareness of the worlrd around you, and all the troubles that you perceive, can certainly stress you emotionally. "Ignorance is bliss" is a truism; on the flip-side of that coin, "Laughter is the best medicine" is also true; without sometimes laughing my ass off at whatever, I think I'd be much less balanced emotionally (Whose Line Is It Anyway is very good for this, by the way).
This is so wrong I hardly know where to begin.
And damn fool can solve the world's problems with a generous application of "if everyone would just ...".
For those who lack imagination and drive the continuation is inevitably "behave the same way that I behave." (With drive, the continuation becomes "drink this special Kool-Aid.")
I concede that grotesque distortion of the problem domain displays a certain genius, but only if a) it serves your interests—usually as projected onto the slangy, self-serving axis of T, A, H, and S-class—and b) you are charismatic enough to convince many followers to go along with your views.
Also, head-up-ass IQ generally tests well. That would change if more of the tests involved actually pointing the guy who just mounted dual Evinrude V8s on the back of a birch bark canoe in the general direction of Polynesia.
In theory, it should be a short voyage.
Deep thinkers are less inclined to side-step the problem domain. Deep thinkers tend to spend most of their lives attempting to more accurately define the underlying problem domain, while their "sharper" peers futz around with ever more cylinders complexed.
Before Einstein: Assume time and space are separable.
Einstein: Why would we assume that, if light itself doesn't seem to have gotten the memo?
The coprolite breadcrumbs of head-up-ass IQ is to feign puzzlement over the origin of sex, since, after all, "asexual reproduction is more efficient". Duh! Of course. Right, because before sex, organisms could only compete, but after sex, it became possible to compete and cooperate at the same time. Competing and cooperating at the same time sure doesn't sound efficient (especially if your hearing is muffled by your liver and kidneys), yet here we are.
Yet. Here. We. Are.
Then: Eureka! Some dewy thinker leaps out of the bathtub to solve all of humanity's problems. "If only everyone would just ..."
That wet slapping sound you hear? That's the sound of some wet wizened wanker trying to uninvent sex (the oft attempted, yet rarely successful genie-returns-to-bottle reverse orgasm).
All competition and no cooperation makes Jack a dull boy.
Sex: the original, unruly mess (which somehow has never stopped humanity from reducing male vitality down to one number, and female vitality down to three—turns out, sex is inherently nostalgic about its far simpler prelude).
Yea, I say unto you, imagine if numbers in the "real" world were not just a single value, but two different values, magically bound together? How crazy would that be?
Well, for starters, it would be z->z^3-1 crazy.
And who would want that in a universe far easier to conceptualize without invoking spinors? (Sorry, Einstein, we tried, we really did.)
I don't know what IQ is deep down, but it certainly exists in some brittle forms ("sex is an aberration") which are far easier to stereotype than the real thing (the almost completely stymied "sex is not an aberration" crowd).
Hence a lot of flipping bullshit about how "intelligent" people really think.
———
[ed: GEB bonus prize for spotting the half-crab ass hat.]
And, no, I'm not the least bit bitter about EME.
It's easier to tell when they suffer from mental illness than less intelligent people.
since when is autism a mental illness?
Maybe they don't suffer more mental disorders, they are just more introspective and sensitive to their own mental state. Maybe someone stupider wouldn't identify their unpleasant feelings as being depression or whatever.
This study relies on self-reporting suspected illness, not diagnosed illness.
It stands to reason that a smarter person would be more likely to know about, and therefore be a hypochondriac about, mental illness.
No reasonable conclusions can be drawn from it.
God bless âem smarties, let baby Jesus walk with them through the valley of darkness. Pray for the intelligent!