Mensa - A scam?

Factual Questions
1

Simple question: Is the Mensa organization a scam?

From what I’ve read you may do a test online for Mensa where it seems I would qualify (according to them I have an IQ in the top 95% of the population). Now is this a scam? Is their test set up to pass the majority of people?

Realistically, it seems like a very simple set up: convince the population that only very smart people are allowed into Mensa. Then when anyone goes to take the entrance exam, force them to pay (I believe, not certain) 150 dollars to take the exam. At this point they could fail or pass you, either way they’ve made a tidy sum without really costing themselves much at all.

Basically what I’m asking is: is Mensa really a very exclusive organization, or are they set up mainly to drag money out of egotistical peoples pockets?

PS: I do realize that Mensa does have many events that I would be interested in. I also realize that there are probably many people on this board associated with the Mensa organization; these are the people that I would really like to hear from.

2

If you’re only in the top 95%, you probably wouldn’t qualify. They only accept people in the top 2%. Mensa does accept the results of certain other tests, so you are not required to take theirs. There are annual dues, however.

3

I believe that something like 95% of all people are in the top 95%.
Not very impressive if you ask me. :wink:

4

I didn’t pay $150 to do a test to join mensa- I paid $45 in 1997. This was basically just to cover materials, room rental and transport for the guy who administered/supervised the test, and to cover marking.

As for the test on the website, well, I can’t help you- I didn’t take it until after I joined. I believe my annual fee was something like $35 because I was under 18 at the time.

I really enjoyed Mensa but I just didn’t have the time to be as involved as I needed to be to get the most out of it.

5

The whole Mensa thing sinks or swims on the legitimacy you give IQ tests. There’s been plenty of discussions on these before here, do a search.

But no, they’re not a scam. Whether you’d want to be a member of a society whose member want to meet people who do equally well in a series of puzzles, is up to you. But until you work out the difference between being in the top 5% and 95% of the population, I’m guessing you’ll not be welcome. :slight_smile:

6

My late mother was very active in Mensa – she was head of a local chapter. And while it wasn’t a scam, the people were always weird, snobbish or both, leaving me with absolutely no interest in trying out for it.

Since joining the SDMB (and getting questions answered quickly on everything from medieval Latin to general relativity), I’ve come to think of the SDMB is a more democratic, less pretentious version of what Mensa tries to be. Cheaper too.

7

I took the Mensa test about 10 years ago at a local college. I wasn’t really interested in joining. I just wanted to see how the ole gray matter was doing after a decade out of school. I passed the test and was offered membership, but I never sent the forms back in. IIRC, the test cost about $12.

8

I’m pretty sure it’s the top 2% that they take, not 5.

And I’m sure they’re not faking, because I took their test and missed by 2 or three questions. No, it wasn’t an easy test. Each section starts at an elementary school level and gets harder.

9

Cardinal, you are correct. As stated by
American Mensa :

Taking the proctored exam costs nowhere near $150. It is probably more like $20 or $25. This is in the U.S., of course, but I cannot imagine the fee is not equivalent elsewhere.

You don’t have to take the proctored test. Many join based on prior evidence – an IQ test from school or the military, for example.

You would definitely find people who are weird in Mensa – that’s one of its charms, especially if you happen to be a little weird yourself; nobody particularly cares if you are (or not). Snobbish – not that many. But you do have to remember that the ONLY thing the membership has in common is, as was previously stated, the ability to do well on an IQ test. There is no screening for, say, attractiveness, social graces, political persuasion, occupation, or any other characteristic. So you’re as likely to meet a complete oaf at a Mensa meeting as you are anywhere else, including the SDMB, which I believe has a few of those. Just a few snobs and a few weirdos here, too. Just one of the many things that makes both SDMB and Mensa interesting.

I could go on at great length. Yes, I am a member of Mensa – for about 20 years. My very, very best friends are people I’ve met there.

10

Mensa also admits people with certain standardized test scores. I qualify on the basis of my SATs, but haven’t considered joining.

11

Love your link, RealityChuck! Did you happen to notice that the text on the page is double-posted? Nobody’s perfect…

12

I can’t speak for everyone, but my experience with Mensa certainly qualified as a “scam.” I took a proctored test (I think it was $15 to take) in December 2001, and I was told I’d have the results back in about a month. I didn’t hear another thing from Mensa until last May, when I got a very apologetic letter from their national offices, explaining that the chapter who proctored the test had put it aside and forgotten about it. I was still welcome to join the chapter at the regular, fairly hefty, fee. I called them and explained that I might be willing to join, if I could join another chapter which might not be so absent-minded. (I’d applied to take the test in September 2001–I had to call them four times before they called back, and twice before they’d cancelled my test at the last minute, citing “prior engagements.”) They didn’t seem to think that was a good idea, so I just ate the $15.

As for the chapter being “weird”…I generally like weird people, but this group was mondo. I took the proctored test at the chapter leaders’ house. While I was taking the test, the lady of the house physically assaulted their cat. I couldn’t make that up if I tried.

13

Duke, this is not a typical Mensan behavior; sounds like a shortcoming of one or two particular people. If there was a distraction during your test, that makes the test itself invalid, for example. I hope you’re not judging the whole organization on the basis of one person’s mistake.

I also think the dues are a little high, but do bear in mind that it’s not just membership in a local chapter that you get. Membership includes the international and national organizations, too. Did you ever go to any local events? You might find other people that you felt more comfortable with.

To answer another question, a new member is assigned the local chapter geographically, but you can be a member of any local chapter you want to, by preference. I’m surprised that the national office did not explain that to you. The local chapter I’m a member of has quite a few members by preference from other geographic areas.

14

I’ve been wondering about the purpose of Mensa for about 15 years or so, and watching the news for any indication that the organization had contributed in some way to humanity. You’d think a bunch of really smart guys would put those high-powered heads together & solve some of the world’s ills. I haven’t seen anything yet; has anyone else?

15

C’mon! The only requirement for membership is the ability to do well on certain standardized tests! And doing well on these tests has never been positively correlated with either success or happiness in life. You think they’re gonna fix the problems? I won’t hold my breath. I’d put more trust in my local auto mechanic to fix what needs fixing in front of me. I’ve worked with these MENSA types; hell, I’m eligible for membership! Working like them is like herding cats, trying to organize them to do a task is like being nibbled to death by ducks!

I prefer DENSA

16

i sent mensa a check for $50, then a check for $100. When i told them i wasn’t sending anymore, they said “you’re getting smarter”.

17

This is not true, I’ve read lots of studies that show some correlation of IQ with some type of succes, in school or career. This is why standardized testing is so pervasive in higher education. Just do a literature search on this topic and you will see your above statement is incorrect.

for example see: http://www.nuffieldbioethics.org/publications/geneticsandhb/rep0000001013.asp

7.8 The claim of those who support IQ tests must be, however, that the tests do measure some important aspects of intelligence. They have attempted to prove this by showing that people’s IQ scores are correlated with, or predict, many other things about them: how well they are now doing and will do later at school, how long they will stay in full-time education, the kind of job they will obtain and how well they will perform that job. Schoolchildren’s IQ scores correlate in the range 0.50 to 0.70 with their current and subsequent educational attainment: for example, the correlation between 11-year-olds’ IQ scores and their GCSE grades at age 16 is over 0.50.(7) Studies in the US have shown that the correlation between children’s IQ scores and their occupational status as adults is also about 0.50. Moreover, these correlations cannot simply be attributed to the pervasive influence of family background. Although there is a correlation of around 0.30 between IQ scores and socioeconomic status, Herrnstein and Murray showed that children’s IQ scores were substantially more powerful predictors of their subsequent educational and occupational attainments than was their family background.(8) Their analyses have been vehemently criticised, and some of these criticisms require some qualification of their arguments.(9) But their central conclusion stands: IQ scores do predict, independent of family background, significant things about people’s lives. The prediction is far from perfect: even correlations of 0.50 leave much unexplained. Moreover, many of these correlations, for example, between IQ and measures of actual performance of a job are usually substantially lower than this. This is hardly surprising. No one could sensibly doubt that success, whether at school or in the adult world, depends on many other things besides intelligence, including hard work, ambition, social skills and plain luck. But IQ is also a significant factor.

18

As stated on the American Mensa web site,

Actually, the original founders of Mensa thought that a bunch of really smart guys (and women) might help to solve some of the world’s ills. It hasn’t worked out that way. For one thing, you could never get many people whose only common denominator is intelligence to agree on the answer. Within Mensa, you will find liberals, conservatives, Christians, Jews, atheists, Buddhists, NRA members, animal rights activists, and every other category you can think of.

In fact, one of the current rules is that Mensa itself has no official opinions on anything other than the 3 main points listed above. Individual members and groups of members, of course, do have and express their opinions vigorously and (ususally) with some logic behind them, much like many of those who post to the SDMB. You’re not going to get the collective wisdom of the SDMB to solve any of the world’s problems, either, but if you look and listen, you may find some interesting things to think about.

Give a look at the site link above, and you will also find information about some of the useful things that groups of Mensa members have done.

19

OK, so I’m not all that smart, but the General Question is answered here, yes?

20

Having a high IQ means one does well on IQ tests.

An IQ test is an indicator of certain kinds of intelligence or cleverness. There is no particular reason to suppose that the kinds of intelligence of cleverness measured by an IQ test are being defined and measured exactly, or that these types of intelligence or cleverness are necessarily the best definitions of intelligence.

Looking smart is different than being smart.

It can be argued that an organization which has one’s score on an IQ test as an admission standard is an organization for people who are greatly concerned with looking smart rather than with being smart.

I speak from sorry experience. When I was an undergraduate in themid-1970s, there was rather a lot of argument in the popular press about the relationship (if any) between general intelligence and race. Most of these arguments centered on the results gathered by IQ tests.

This piqued my interest in such tests and I sent away to the Mensa Society for an IQ test. I had to send the test back for scoring. When my results came back, I was told that I qualified for membership based on my performance, but if I wanted to join I would have to arrange for a personally administered examination. I was also told that if I did not wish to join, I need do nothing; I would not be contacted again. This was consistent with the advertising matter to which I had originally responded; it had been full of assurances that if one got tested through the mail, one would not be approached for membership.

There then followed two years of hell.

My family was called at odd intervals from members of the local Mensa Society pestering me to pay for a personally administered admission test. As luck would have it, I was never home when these calls came. My parents explained to the various people who phoned that I was adamant that I did not want to join, and that this is why I had followed their instructions and had withheld from contacting them. We would hear nothing from them for months, and then the calls would start up again and be more-or-less continuous for a period of weeks.

Finally, by chance, I was home one day when a psychologist who who a member of the local Mensa group phoned. She was quite insistent that I schedule an appointment for an admission test, and seemed quite testy about the inconvenience she was convinced I was somehow causing her and her group.

While it has been rougly twenty-five years since that day, I still remember the general course of our conversation. It went roughly like this:

"Ma’am, I don’t want to join the Mensa Society. I have never wanted to join the Mensa Society. I have never done or said anything to suggest that I wanted to join the Mensa Society. When I sent away for an IQ test from your group, the promotional literature plainly stated that I would never be obliged to apply for membership in your group. When I got the results from my test, the information I was sent said in plain English that if I did not wish to apply for membership then I need do nothing, and I would not be contacted again.

For two years now your organization has caused my family a good deal of inconvenience. I have followed your instructions to the letter with respect to what I supposedly had to do to avoid being bothered by you, and still you folks have made a nuisance of yourselves time and again. Every member of my family with whom you have spoken has told you quite plainly that I do not wish to be a member, and this is entirely consistent with my actions since getting the results from my IQ test. My family has asked your group again and again to stop phoning, and you have caused us a good deal of inconvenience and aggravation.

I don’t know what kind of organization or agency I can file a complaint with about your organization, but if this harassment continues, I will find out, and I will complain as strenuously as possible."

Her reply: “So…you don’t want to join the Mensa Society?”

“Ma’am, I’m saying quite plainly I don’t want to join the Mensa Society, I have never wanted to join the Mensa Society, and I dare say I never would want to join the Mensa Society, even if someone were to hold a gun to my head.”

Her reply: “So…you don’t want to join the Mensa Society?”

Once again: being smart is different than looking smart. What’s more, the person who makes too much of an effort to look smart is liable to end up not looking very smart at all.

There is, of course, no telling if your experience would be similar to mine, but I nevertheless suggest you take care. Please consider that there are all sorts of ways to take an IQ test and to get it properly scored without approaching the Mensa Society. One can, for instance, get IQ tests one can score oneself in many bookstores.