# Can high intelligence lead to low self esteem? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 20, 2018, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905 "2018-03-20T19:02:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ZonexandScout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zonexandscout/32/544_2.png) [@ZonexandScout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZonexandScout)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/22 "2018-03-21T16:54:24Z")
> [@pool](#): > > “Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know” - Ernest Hemingway [EGO=OFF] I’m a fairly smart person (Ivy-League degrees, high IQ) and I constantly get asked why I don’t “do this” or “do that” so I can “be a huge success.” Even my business partner says, “You know, you can make ten times what you’re making now if you just apply yourself.” Guess what? I don’t care for the narrow definition of “success=how much money you make or how much power you have.” One nice aspect of being fairly smart is that one can find quite a few ways to achieve satisfaction and happiness INDEPENDENTLY of financial or business accomplishments. I’m basically lazy, but it only takes a fraction of my time to make plenty of money to satisfy myself (and my wife). There are lots more things in life that interest me than becoming a VP or owning a third house in the mountains. I don’t think I have low self-esteem. I think many other people (who are a lot less happy than I am) are seeking self-esteem in the wrong way. Just me saying this… ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/23 "2018-03-21T17:04:54Z")
> [@](#): > > Happiness is significantly associated with IQ. Those in the lowest IQ range (70-99) reported the lowest levels of happiness compared with the highest IQ group (120-129). Mediation analysis using the continuous IQ variable found dependency in activities of daily living, income, health and neurotic symptoms were strong mediators of the relationship, as they reduced the association between happiness and IQ by 50%. [Cite.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22998852) So those who aren’t happy probably are not so because of their IQ. Hemingway committed suicide - maybe he isn’t the best source. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/24 "2018-03-21T17:07:57Z")
> [@pool](#): > > “Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know” - Ernest Hemingway According to this, intelligence and happiness are correlated. > **[The relationship between happiness and intelligent quotient: the contribution...](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22998852/)** > > Those with lower IQ are less happy than those with higher IQ. Interventions that target modifiable variables such as income (e.g. through enhancing education and employment opportunities) and neurotic symptoms (e.g. through better detection of mental... I’d assume it is because more intelligent people are better at understanding their own goals and achieving them than less intelligent people. This is what I’ve seen in my own life. In general, the lower IQ people had more problems (health problems, money problems, vocational problems, interpersonal problems, legal problems, etc) that constantly made them angry, resentful and stressed out while the smarter people were better at either avoiding or solving these problems. Edit: I see Shodan posted the same study 3 minutes before I did. Either way, my point still stands. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/25 "2018-03-21T17:37:12Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > [Cite.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22998852) > > So those who aren’t happy probably are not so because of their IQ. Hemingway committed suicide - maybe he isn’t the best source. > > Regards, > Shodan This is far from an authoritative answer. There are myriad studies that demonstrate the complex interactions with people’s minds, hormones, life experiences and dispositions. Basically depressioned people and non-depressed people experience at similar rates. What may ] ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/26 "2018-03-21T18:08:06Z")
> [@ZonexandScout](#): > > One nice aspect of being fairly smart is that one can find quite a few ways to achieve satisfaction and happiness INDEPENDENTLY of financial or business accomplishments. I’m basically lazy, but it only takes a fraction of my time to make plenty of money to satisfy myself (and my wife). There are lots more things in life that interest me than becoming a VP or owning a third house in the mountains. I don’t know why people think intelligence is correlated to hard work. Well, maybe I do. The average person needs to study hard to achieve some goals, while the intelligent person can accomplish them without a lot of effort. In fact intelligence can build laziness, because you don’t need to work hard to succeed in a mediocre environment. Same goes for lots of talents. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/27 "2018-03-21T19:18:14Z")
Now you know why Einstein built that bomb. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/28 "2018-03-21T19:47:53Z")
On the one hand, people who are identified as “gifted” often experience issues with social isolation, laziness, obsessive-compulsiveness and depression. On the other hand, their abilities often provide them with opportunities that “little brains” could never dream of. But it can also provide them with missed opportunities if they happen to fall short of those goals. A lot of it has to do with the sort of environment they were raised in. > [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > I don’t remember the title of the story, though I do remember that it began with the words “Mewling, puking babies. That’s how we all come into this world …”] William Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Dope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Dope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Dope)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/29 "2018-03-21T19:59:44Z")
it’s all about nature and nurture, intelligence many intelligent people are depressed because people don’t understand things on their level, which is actually normal. it’s the same reason why so many dumb idiots think they’re TEH SHIZ … all comes down to arrogance. Self esteem is all about feeling better than those around you, or at least equal to those around you. Intelligent people can’t relate to “average” people so they feel left out of the party which is comprised of 90% of the world population. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/30 "2018-03-21T20:24:52Z")
> [@The\_Dope](#): > > it’s all about nature and nurture, intelligence > > many intelligent people are depressed because people don’t understand things on their level, which is actually normal. it’s the same reason why so many dumb idiots think they’re TEH SHIZ … all comes down to arrogance. Self esteem is all about feeling better than those around you, or at least equal to those around you. Intelligent people can’t relate to “average” people so they feel left out of the party which is comprised of 90% of the world population. 99.9%…by most accounts.😃 You’re talking about the Dunning–Kruger effect - Stupid people tend to overestimate their abilities because they are too stupid to know better. Intelligent people underestimate their abilities because they assume the tasks are just as easy for other people. For example, ZonexandScout not realizing that having “business partners” and a business that can sustain him financially on 10% effort puts him ahead of most people. I think what can also be frustrating to Big Brains is the fact that the success doesn’t always go to the smartest. How many politicians or corporate managers seem like complete morons? How many celebrities seem dumb as shit? How many meathead sales guys do you see driving Porsches compared to college professors and scientists? How many brilliant engineers have to suffer dimwitted project managers with their Gantt charts and daily standup meetings? And the smarter you are, the more intolerable regular jobs would seem. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/31 "2018-03-21T20:48:07Z")
> [@TreacherousCretin](#): > > How have I survived 67 years thinking the word was “adverse”? Ignorance fought. In your defense, adverse is a word with a very similar meaning to averse. I think there’s something related to the Dunning-Kruger effect and Imposter Syndrome going on: people of high intelligence are more aware of their shortcomings, and also feel they have more to lose from being “found out” as less talented. ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/32 "2018-03-21T20:58:49Z")
I actually did know the difference between averse and adverse when I posted. I think I made a simple typo just because I use the former word more often. I am a big admirer of intelligence. I know I have decent intelligence but I lack education and general exposure to a lot of things. I can tell when I run into someone with superior intellect. I don’t exactly envy them but I do wish I had what they had. I get very frustrated with them when they seem so negative about themselves. I have this weird desire to hold them captive and use their brain. This is what people with money basically do all the time. ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/33 "2018-03-21T21:08:56Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > Can high intelligence lead to low self esteem? > > Sadly I have had many friends and acquaintances over the years who I would consider very bright and well read, really nice interesting people who for one reason or another failed to see their own worth. They were all very good at contributing to others success but often not their own. I sometimes get the impression that high intelligence causes them to look too closely at things and if they can’t resolve all the variables they tend to move on to something else and avoiding the risk. So maybe my question is really are highly intelligent people more adverse to taking risks? IIRC, self esteem is respect for ones self (yourself?). High, or low, intelligence has little to do with respecting yourself. Does someone feel bad about themselves because they have few friends? Maybe they should be working on their social skills? Or take a bath? Acquiring one more degree isn’t going to make someone more popular if they act like Sheldon on the TBBT. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2018, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/34 "2018-03-21T23:23:45Z")
A perfect recipe for low self-esteem was nature giving a child both a high IQ **and** a neurodevelopmental disorder. It’s only been a handful of years since most people believed you could have a learning disorder or something like ADHD if you were very intelligent, so kids like my brother and I grew up under the **constant** disapproval of adults who were all convinced we simply weren’t trying hard enough and being willful. Now a days they call kids who are gifted and have a disability “twice exceptional” or “gifted and challenged” but when we were young, it was “Smart, but…” As in “you’re smart, but you don’t listen/pay attention” “You’re so smart, how can you fail to think things through before you \_\_\_?!” “You’re so smart, so why won’t you bother to remember where you left things?” “You’re smart but you’re so disorganized” “You’re smart, so why can’t you focus on what you’re supposed to be doing??” and on, and on, for 12 years of school. They say there’s no IQ high enough to completely mitigate the affects of having ADHD, and with rare exception people with it will always be less successful than NT people of the same IQ, and I have to wonder how much of this is growing up being told by everyone that you aren’t meeting expectations… ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2018, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/35 "2018-03-22T16:26:06Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > A perfect recipe for low self-esteem was nature giving a child both a high IQ **and** a neurodevelopmental disorder. It’s only been a handful of years since most people believed you could have a learning disorder or something like ADHD if you were very intelligent, so kids like my brother and I grew up under the **constant** disapproval of adults who were all convinced we simply weren’t trying hard enough and being willful. I did as well. Turns out, after some testing, I mostly just found sitting and listening to a teacher drone on for 45 minutes excruciatingly boring. The problem with high intelligence that in order to be successful with it, you still need to do something smart and creative - start a successful business, invent a better lightbulb, compose a brilliant musical piece, write a great novel, whatever. You can be somewhat smart and do very well just by showing up on time, getting your work done and not being too much of a jerk. I think where highly intelligent people have problems is with the long period of “paying your dues”, often requiring dealing with coworkers or managers who are significantly less intelligent and who may feel threatened. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2018, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/36 "2018-03-22T16:44:15Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > The problem with high intelligence that in order to be successful with it, you still need to do something smart and creative - start a successful business, invent a better lightbulb, compose a brilliant musical piece, write a great novel, whatever. You can be somewhat smart and do very well just by showing up on time, getting your work done and not being too much of a jerk. More than that (IMO) is that interpersonal skills are far more important to success than intelligence. I’m not sure that very smart people tend to lack interpersonal skills or if it’s just a stereotype. But I suspect that the stereotype is correct, and that it’s largely the result of very smart people having high-IQ interests which separate them from the majority of lower-IQ people who won’t share those same interests. (And this also applies to personality generally. For example, there are some types of jokes which will be funny to intellectuals but not to non-intellectuals, and vice versa.) ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2018, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/37 "2018-03-22T18:10:55Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > IIRC, self esteem is respect for ones self (yourself?). High, or low, intelligence has little to do with respecting yourself. Does someone feel bad about themselves because they have few friends? Maybe they should be working on their social skills? Or take a bath? Acquiring one more degree isn’t going to make someone more popular if they act like Sheldon on the TBBT. You seem awfully sure of yourself. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2018, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/38 "2018-03-23T07:31:54Z")
> [@Inigo\_Montoya](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Originally Posted by **Charles Bukowski** > > “The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts, while the stupid ones are full of confidence.” Nothing personal, **Inigo** , but Bukowski didn’t actually say that. It’s a dumbed down and less poetical plagiarizing of Yeats’ 1920 poem [_The Second Coming_](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43290/the-second-coming): > [@W. B. Yeats](#): > > The best lack all conviction, while the worst > Are full of passionate intensity. As I discovered [here](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/03/04/self-doubt/#more-10737), Bertrand Russell expressed a similar sentiment 13 years later, regarding the rise of the Nazi party in Germany: > [@Bertrand Russell](#): > > The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt. In 1989, Bukowski was interviewed about the art of writing, as expressed in one of his poems, and said, > [@Charles Bukowski](#): > > …the problem is that bad writers tend to have the self-confidence, while the good ones tend to have self-doubt. So Bukowski wasn’t talking about the world in general, as Yeats and Russell were, but about writing specifically. But somehow the Internet takes a scrambled version of Russell and attributes it to Bukowski, ignoring Yeats, who said it first and best. Much better to go back to the source and quote _The Second Coming_. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2018, 8:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/39 "2018-03-23T08:18:00Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > [When I was in HS there was a story in our literature book in which the author explicitly made this point upfront, and the story itself illustrated the point. It was about a kid who had a “policy” against going out on blind dates but whose cool friend convinced him to give this one girl a shot. He met the girl who turned out to be a knockout, and he thought he hit the jackpot. But the girl seemed strangely detached during the date, until at one point he suddenly had a blinding flash of illumination in which he realized that he was the blind date, and that the girl was only going out with him as a favor to his friend who felt sorry for him. The narrator described his psyche as taking a blow from which it never recovered. I don’t remember the title of the story, though I do remember that it began with the words “Mewling, puking babies. That’s how we all come into this world …”] > [@msmith537](#): > > William Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”? Actually, radio personality and raconteur par excellence [Jean Shepherd](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Shepherd), quoting the bard in “The Endless Streetcar Ride into the Night, and the Tinfoil Noose” from his collection, _In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash_. Read the whole story [here](http://www.nsftools.com/misc/EndlessStreetcarRide.html). My favorite passage: > [@Jean Shepherd](#): > > There are about four times in a man’s life, or a woman’s, too, for that matter, when unexpectedly, from out of the darkness, the blazing carbon lamp, the cosmic searchlight of Truth, shines full upon them. It is how we react to those moments that forever seals our fate. One crowd simply puts on its sunglasses, lights another cigar, and heads for the nearest plush French restaurant in the jazziest section of town, sits down and orders a drink, and ignores the whole thing. While we, the Doomed, caught in the brilliant glare of illumination, see ourselves inescapably for what we are, and from that day on skulk in the weeds, hoping no one else will spot us. Is there a correlation between the intelligent and “the Doomed”? FYI, Shepherd wrote the script (and the short stories it was based on) for _A Christmas Story_. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/40 "2018-03-24T14:02:09Z")
My I.Q. is in the 150’s range. I think part of the problem is with having to parent an intelligent child. While there are tons of resources for parents with low I.Q. children, having an I.Q. is not seen as requiring special treatment. ---
**Author:** ![Chicken\_Fingers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Chicken\_Fingers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chicken_Fingers)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905/41 "2018-03-24T15:38:38Z")
Even intelligent children don’t know better, when they’re very little, and believe what their parents tell them about themselves. If you have the bad luck to be born to parents who made you feel unlovable and not good enough, you internalize this. If you’re intelligent, you reason out at some point that this isn’t logical and that you’re actually not so bad, and that your parent had issues. That negative self concept is still in there, like a nagging little voice. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-high-intelligence-lead-to-low-self-esteem/810905.md?page=3)