A few years ago someone named Robert Jordan applied to be a police officer and was rejected because it was claimed that an IQ of 125 means he would become bored with police work and eventually quit his job after tens of thousands of dollars had been devoted to training him. He is now a prison guard (I believe) and I’m guessing stable at that job.
The concept that a higher IQ means you will get bored doing repetitive work (I have no idea if it would result in boredom with life in general) is something I’ve heard before, but I don’t know how true it is.
Either way, according to the Flynn effect IQ has gone up about 3 points a decade from 1920-1990, and IQ across the board has gone up roughly 30 points during that period. So an IQ of 130 back in 1920 is equal to about 100 today.
So if a higher IQ does lead to more boredom, and IQ has gone up 20-40 points in the last century, how has this affected the way people work? Many jobs are still menial and repetitive like they were 100 years ago.
Has work culture changed in any way due to this compared to 100 years ago? The concept that work should be personally fulfilling is pretty popular now, but you have to wonder how much of that is just Maslow’s heirarchy, since most jobs provide for basic physical needs like shelter, food and protection which wasn’t necessarily the case 100 years ago.
Shouldn’t there be mass unrest, alienation and discontentment at work and maybe at life in general if we are getting smarter but everything is just as repetitive as it always has been? There arguably is, but hasn’t that always existed?
Assuming the test has not changed (which is a questionable assumption), an IQ of 130 back in the 1920’s is equal to an IQ of 130 today. While the average may have risen over time, a 130 would be more intelligent and a 100 regardless of date.
Arguably, work now is less menial than it used to. Many unskilled labor jobs have been transferred to foreign nations. Add in that robotics has replaced a lot of the REALLY repetitive jobs. It’s very difficult to find a job these days that is standing on an assembly line and tightening the same bolt over and over again for eight hours. I suspect what is viewed as a repetitive job today involves far more variation and thought than what was viewed as a repetitive job in 1920.
OTOH, I didn’t bother even trying to look this up since I’m not sure how I’d even start. So this is all a WAG.
I seem to recall a study about exactly that… something about a department having an overabundance of new recruits so they selected the ones with the highest IQ of the bunch… most of whom later rose high up in the organization (apparently they didn’t get bored). Wish I could remember where I read it.
Hmm . . . a few years ago I went through a couple interviews, had a good rapport with the hiring manager, and just assumed I was a lock for a job that, honestly, I thought was a little below me. I needed a job, though. One of the last steps was a really long test. At the end, I submitted it for grading and took a seat, waiting to be told my start date. A nice young lady eventually came out to tell me that, according to the test, I would not like this job, and thank me for my time. From here on out, whenever I think back about that, I’ll take it as a compliment :p:D.
I could argue that a lot of jobs haven’t gotten less skilled over time. I can remember when supermarket checkers were skilled positions before bar codes and computerized registers.
I suspect truck driving takes less smarts than it did before GPS, especially driving delivery trucks. I wonder if any delivery companies have their computers automatically compute the delivery route to come up with the optimum route, so the driver doesn’t even have to do that.
More than what? Alienation and discontentment at work is a common problem these days.
Also, I don’t think there are as many repetetive jobs as there were 90 years ago. There are a lot more service oriented jobs that require intelligence and “soft” skills instead of brute force and repetition.