High-IQ Men Less Violent

[thrifty++]

@GS - No, INTPs score highest on IQ tests. However, problems/subjects that we in society say requires "intelligence" to understand or solve is more geared towards the INTJ way of thinking. The name of the archetype for the INTJ is the "scientist", while the name for the INTP is the "thinker".

While INTP's come up as more intelligent I think INTJ's might get a lot more things done so might display more evidence of intelligence to others.

[7Wannabe5]

I wrote:
Of course, this doesn't mean much given the tendencies of high-IQ women. Grrrrrrr!!

enigmaT120 said: What are those tendencies? Except for not being interested in me.

Attempt at humor given well-known correlation between gender and tendency towards violent behavior. I think I read somewhere once that there is even some direct correlation with waist-to-hip ratio within the female population, and maternal waist-to-hip ratio is also well correlated with IQ of offspring, especially sons (some factors that determine IQ likely located on sex chromosomes.) I wonder whether INTX men are more or less violent than ESXJ women on average? Of course, external factors such as education, culture, affluence will have a great deal of influence on whether or not anybody behaves in a violent manner. A very high functioning ESXJ man in a low-stress environment would possibly exhibit less violence than an INTX female in a very stressful environment.

Anyways, I'm sure that there are some high-IQ women who are interested in you, because IQ is a fairly significant factor in mate selection, with only minor allowances (maybe 10 points ?) made for such factors as artistic talent, physical intelligence, emotional intelligence, street smarts or worldly experience. I believe the only other factor that is so important is the ability to convey occupation of 10% more volume/space than the female.

Treating giftedness as a proxy for IQ and using the OP paper, the most violent types would be ... ESFJ, ESTJ, ESFP, and ISFP in that order. Although, that is probably taken the correlations a bit far, it seems to confirm intuition.

Yup. The reason why I knew that is ENTP females who are 99% N and only 1% S are the most intuitive type. All I had to do was think/feel about how different people would respond to seeing a dog turd on their lawn to come up with the answer. Unfortunately, I also believe that it may be the case that although harmless as rubber balls ourselves, we sometimes provoke violent behavior in others because we do not know when to stop talking.

[JamesR]

DSKla, I would actually expect the marshmallow test is more about J vs P, so high P would do worse than high J.

[Miss Lonelyhearts]

I don't think there are any real life applications for that study -- its of poor design and limited utility. After all, how often does this shocking competition happen in our day-to-day existence

Here here! The most aggressive participants were the presumably high-IQ authors -- they were the only ones who actually delivered electric shocks to 30 strangers.

[enigmaT120]

Nobody else has admitted it, but I can't remember any altercations (answering Jacob's earlier question) despite my love of martial arts. It just never really comes up. It's almost like the world isn't as violent of a place as American movies would have us believe. It's a little depressing, but I suspect that what I enjoy about violence is the intensity of competition, rather than actually hurting another person. The tournaments I competed in were not violent.

[GandK]

I have had the misfortune during the course of my life to be acquainted with a handful of extremely violent people. Four men. One dude was an INFJ for sure... I know my kind. The other 3 were some form of S.

The only thing I can think of that every one of them had in common life-wise was extremely poor impulse control. Three are addicts, and it would shock the hell out of me if the fourth does not also have an overstrong urge to self-soothe in some way. I don't know if the addictive bent is tied to some personalities more than others, but I do firmly believe that the urge to self-soothe, when frustrated in some way, can lead to violence.

[El Duderino]

Nobody else has admitted it, but I can't remember any altercations (answering Jacob's earlier question) despite my love of martial arts.

Glad to hear it.

I've had a few fights growing up, but nothing since I was a freshman in high-school.

As an adult, training now in combat sports on a regular basis, getting into a fight just seems incredibly stupid, especially if you're untrained.

[enigmaT120]

I have had the misfortune during the course of my life to be acquainted with a handful of extremely violent people. Four men. One dude was an INFJ for sure... I know my kind. The other 3 were some form of S.

Were any of them highly intelligent?

[GandK]

I would say three of the four were of above-average intelligence, although none were geniuses. The fourth would have made a good door stop.

[jennypenny]

EDIT: I just realized that this estimate might be skewed! There are more gifted men than there are of women, men are more violent than women, and MBTI types generally don't have 50/50 splits between men and women. For example, there are 2.4 times as many ESFJ women as ESFJ men, but 1.6 times more ESTJ men than ESTJ. So if we correct for this, ESTJ might take top spot.

Here are the numbers ... https://www.capt.org/products/examples/20025HO.pdf ... however, women have now caught up to men in the IQ department. Men no longer outnumber women. Some of that is from improved opportunities for girls, but some of that probably comes from expanding the sample population.

-------------

The initial study seems bogus to me. That said, I've read in several places that high IQ men are less violent. There are so many ways to parse that out though, that it's hard to know whether it's the high IQ that is determining how violent a guy is.

*Introverted men are less likely to be violent, and also more likely to have a high IQ. They are also less spontaneous, and less likely to be around other people or in crowded places. I would think introvertedness is the biggest factor.
*'NT's are the most likely to have a high IQ (account for 70% of all high IQ people IIRC), and are less likely to be violent. I'm not sure how relevant that is though. Just a guess, but I would think that only means NTs have a longer fuse, particularly INT*s. I pity the person who is the target of an NT's patient, well-thought-out, and exquisitely executed revenge.
*I would guess a high IQ male would be better equipped to find a safer outlet for any violent/physical urges they might have. (martial arts being the obvious example on this forum)
*And not to be crass about it, but don't high IQ men make more money, live in better areas, and generally avoid doing stupid shit that would get them into situations that might necessitate violence? That, plus introvertedness, would be my guess as to why they are less violent, or at least can afford to pay someone else to be violent for them.

-----------

Anyone else find it more than a little annoying that introverts and those with high IQs are less likely to be violent, yet the stereotype for a killer is a loner or someone who is socially awkward who doesn't participate in the same activities that 'normal' people do? There are more introverts than extroverts, they are 2.5x more likely to have a "high" IQ, and are 8x less likely to be violent. And yet ... the stereotype persists.

/rant

[slsdly]

I (INTJ) have never gotten into a fight. Fantasized, certainly. But no real world acts. I deem it unlikely to occur.

I pity the person who is the target of an NT's patient, well-thought-out, and exquisitely executed revenge.

...

Anyone else find it more than a little annoying that introverts and those with high IQs are less likely to be violent, yet the stereotype for a killer is a loner or someone who is socially awkward who doesn't participate in the same activities that 'normal' people do?

Maybe high IQ introverts kill less people on average, but when we do kill people, we kill a lot of them. Or at least, people who share the relevant characteristics with us do that. Certainly a grand revenge plot would capture the imagination of the public and the media... mass shootings at schools come to mind, although I'm not sure what the MBTI statistics are for the individuals who have committed such acts.

[Riggerjack]

OK, once again, I'm the outlier.

I went to 20 schools before I graduated early. I had 15 fights by then. A combination of new kid/geek/poor social skills/ low tolerance. There's always established pecking orders in school, and challenges for the new kid.

For the record, I initiated, and lost, most of those fights. ( this kinda undercuts the high IQ aspect, doesn't it?) And I was a much less gracious winner the few times I did win. Usually, I was fighting someone bigger, because someone would say something, and I'd stew, and someone else would pile on, and I'd snap. Usually, the first challenger was the most dominant in the group, but his buddy was bigger.

Almost all my fights happened when I was below average size. That may have been another factor...

Now, I realize my experience is an outlier, but it takes 2 to tango, and that means there were 15 other kids willing to fight...

As an adult, there were a few near misses, but nothing real, and I am glad of that, kids don't do much damage. A black eye or a broken nose, fat lips, heal pretty quickly, but as we get older, strength increases far more than the flesh's ability to absorb energy.

I think the main reason for difference in violence is how likely someone is to try asserting physical dominance. We smart guys can't help but love to show how smart we are. that is our natural expression of dominant behavior. That may piss some people off, but not in a way that is likely to lead to violence, passed middle school, anyway.

In other words, smart men aren't less dominant, but less likely to try to show dominance in a way that can be countered effectively with violence. And since most violence is a dominance play, smarter guys would test out as less violent.

On the other hand, dominance is less a factor when women fight. Not that their social order is less structured or competitive, just that violence plays a smaller roll in establishing dominance.

I think studies of proclivity for violence that fail to control for poverty, are just going to show whatever the study author wants to show.

[Ego]

Smarter people are just better at getting others to do their fighting for them.

And they are better at rationalizing violence done for their benefit.

[thrifty++]

I think studies of proclivity for violence that fail to control for poverty, are just going to show whatever the study author wants to show.

But are people who are poor more likely to have low IQ as well. I remember reading quite a bit about research regarding behaviours of poor people and behaviours of rich people and lots of the poverty behaviours caused poverty to get worse and lacked any strategic thinking. Many of us on here live well beneath the poverty line and flourish while doing so, riding around on a bicycle and eating food we grew and prepared ourselves, whereas poor people will do things like buy lotto tickets, smoke cigarettes, buyjunk food and take out finance they cant afford for a low end sports car and chromes to stick on it.

[7Wannabe5]

I agree with Riggerjack. There are at least 50 different shades of dominance even within the range of high IQ. Almost every time I've experienced violent behavior in adulthood it has been in a situation where I kept verbally debating (using my words in a perhaps borderline obnoxious, but not purposefully cruel manner) an issue, then the man with whom I was debating snapped and did something like break furniture or threaten me with physical violence. Rock breaks Words.The one time I was actually physically attacked, I said something teasing that was taken as a taunt to a not very high IQ man whom I believe was quite possibly abusing steroids. Of course, breaking furniture because you are angry is more "intelligent" than breaking people because you are angry, I don't know if even more intelligent men would be more likely to not even feel the frustration or to avoid it at some earlier level. Obvious common alternative would be something like saying "I am not having this conversation now. I am going for a walk."

[Riggerjack]

.But are people who are poor more likely to have low IQ as well. I remember reading quite a bit about research regarding behaviours of poor people and behaviours of rich people and lots of the poverty behaviours caused poverty to get worse and lacked any strategic thinking. Many of us on here live well beneath the poverty line and flourish while doing so, riding around on a bicycle and eating food we grew and prepared ourselves, whereas poor people will do things like buy lotto tickets, smoke cigarettes, buyjunk food and take out finance they cant afford for a low end sports car and chromes to stick on it.

I agree with Jacob, in other threads, saying that poverty is more about insufficient skill, than insufficient income. It is hard to explain the deficit of skill to anyone who hasn't experienced it.

At the low end of the income scale, there are those who do well, and those that flounder about. I've known a few who did well, and many who flounder.

Someone with minimal training in financial matters can make much better choices than a very intelligent person who has learned self defeating financial patterns.

It's not intelligence, it is skills, you are describing. Real poverty in America is a skill problem. That's why so many lottery winners go broke.

Among those that flounder, there are axioms not accepted by middle class and above. "The Man is keeping me down" is primary among them. The knowledge that whatever you try will fail or be torn down almost eliminates long term planning. This isn't unintelligent, this is simply learning from direct experience. Those at the bottom will fight their peers rising with cunning and desperation. Failure within a community of failure is still a community. Failure becomes personal when a peer succeeds.

[enigmaT120]

That's some depressing shit, Riggerjack. No need for the dictator to lop off the heads of the taller stalks of grain, as the rest of the stalks will do it for him.

[Tyler9000]

It's not intelligence, it is skills, you are describing. Real poverty in America is a skill problem. That's why so many lottery winners go broke.

Among those that flounder, there are axioms not accepted by middle class and above. "The Man is keeping me down" is primary among them. The knowledge that whatever you try will fail or be torn down almost eliminates long term planning. This isn't unintelligent, this is simply learning from direct experience. Those at the bottom will fight their peers rising with cunning and desperation. Failure within a community of failure is still a community. Failure becomes personal when a peer succeeds.

I think you're dead on with the diagnosis, although I disagree with your claim this does not extend to the middle class and above. It just takes a different form.

True -- the middle class accepts that skill can help you climb the ladder and does not blame "the man" for keeping them down. But when it comes to seeing beyond that ladder to a life independent of a day job, their mindset is just as trapped. Thus the visceral reaction to a lot of ERE talk among the general population. It's still a skill problem, but it's a different type of skill.

[jacob]

The other issue is that the money-poor can't afford to be skill-poor. Being money-rich does substitute somewhat for skill-poverty. However, as lottery fails show, skills can be so deficient that no amount of money in the world will substitute sufficiently.

[jennypenny]

I think the money/skill dichotomy is part of the appeal of post-apoc fantasies. In every SHTF scenario I've read about, money becomes worthless so the skill-rich rise to the top. I like the genre, but it can feel a little like blue collar revenge porn.