Originally Posted by Zen Scanner
Hmm, given the heavy overlap between introversion and highly gifted, and that there is a strong correlation between being introverted and being intrinsically motivated, and that scores (SAT, income, car brand, etc.) and grades are extrinsic motivations, I see a lot of interesting questions to research.

I came across this Washington Post article a couple weeks ago. It says that extreme introverts tend to flounder in leadership positions, but extreme extroverts are also unsuccessful. Apparently, extroverts talk too much and listen too little. Who knew? wink The article goes on to say that good leaders need to be somewhere in the middle: ambiverts. It also says that most people, in general, actually are ambiverts; on a scale of 1-7, 1 being most introverted and 7 being most extroverted, most people score a 3 or 4.

I would imagine that extremely introverted HG adults would avoid high-profile leadership positions. But more moderately introverted HG adults might find the work to be challenging and intrinsically rewarding enough to tolerate the less-enjoyable social aspects of those jobs.

In my personal experience, I have seen a few HG introverts take up leadership positions simply because they were sick of being managed by less competent people. If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.

This is somewhat tangential, but I have also seen that some introverted HG adults have spending habits that look like conspicuous consumption. But really, disposable income + discriminating taste = nice things. Those nice things are purchased for personal enjoyment, not for the purposes of impressing other people. For some well-off people, it can actually be rather embarrassing to realize that other people watch what you buy / covet what you have.