Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion IQ and health

Reading an NYT essay http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/20/opinion/sunday/why-we-make-bad-decisions.html about "Why We Make Bad Decisions", in which Noreena Hertz describes her search for treatment for a mysterious ailment, I was struck by this passage:

This kind of research is g-loaded, and people who cannot do it are less likely to know people who can (with the caveat that elderly people with declining cognitive function may well have children who are sharp). I don't think there is a simple solution to this problem. Higher-IQ people are also more likely to have health insurance.

Hertz recently wrote a book "Eyes Wide Open: How to Make Smart Decisions in a Confusing World".

A paper "Intelligence Predicts Health and Longevity, but Why?"
by Gottfredson and Deary http://67.208.89.102/files/2006/02/22/20060131_GottfredsonIntelligence.pdf also finds that self-care is g-loaded.

Well, if we taught basic health and nutrition in public schools we could probably correct some of this. But we don't. And then we send them to the cafeteria to have a giant plate of carbs for lunch, and if they are lucky, a tiny iceberg salad that they can slather in ranch dressing.

A more intelligent person is more likely to discover, entirely on their own, what proper nutrition and health is. We basically have left the entire population of the US to their own devices when it comes to basic health, and look where it's gotten us...

Of course, as soon as you start to do SERIOUS research into anything medical-- and use the appropriate "jargon" (though I prefer "terminology" here because some of it is very definitely correct in a legitimate sense) then you begin to realize that you sound very much like a person who is at least possibly Munchausen.

So while I can say that somewhat tongue-in-cheek, it is NOT a good feeling to be in the 1% of patients with an unusual presentation of some unusual condition... and to get the feeling over and over and over again that you know more about current research and best practices than the physician(s) that you're dealing with.

BTDT, got the teeshirt. It's a scary thing.

Fascinating. I'll be reading this again and processing more it.

Reading that people tend to ignore or filter out information which does not agree with they want to hear brings to mind the saying "A word to the wise is sufficient".

The propensity for some to "seek more but not necessarily appropriate care when cost is no barrier" jumps out at me. The benefits of a growth mindset become apparent: I may not know about this... YET. This mindset may spark the curiosity to learn... especially for those who may be "conceptualizing health self-care as a job".

The phrase "low levels of oxidative stress and good antioxidant defenses" brings to mind another recent article which shared the effects of stress on lowering IQ.

Very interesting Bostonian. In my family of origin my mother considered the skills of researching before doctoring to be essential as well as bringing an apt advocate when you were too incapacitated to do it yourself.

Our experiences have validated the importance of this as we have often sought variations in our treatment and more quickly found answers that have improved our outcomes. Frankly, you do receive better care in hospitals and nursing homes if someone intelligent is there with you checking on things.

My eldest brother finished Med school at 23 and gave us a medical diagnostic book when I was 10. It fascinated me and I soon became the family diagnostician in the younger group. (I am one of eight children.) Because of that book and my urging, my older sister made it to the hospital before her appendix ruptured--my mother had thought she was exaggerating as she was prone to do. It did burst just before surgery but it could have been worse. I also diagnosed correctly my younger brother's Crohn's disease when he was 13 among other things.

I generally find it interesting that the demographic with concerns and making alternative choices with regards to vaccines and hospital-based childbirth is most often highly educated and likely higher g. The connection with longer breastfeeding and higher IQ interests me as well. I've found in my small group of friends with higher LOG kids that most went well beyond the average 6-9months that other around us were doing... Personally my son was 3.5yrs old when he stopped.

There could also be the reverse connection in that our IQ s are higher simply because our bodies function better (ie genetic advantage). I haven't read the article yet but I'm about to.

I stopped nursing ds11 around the same time--3.5 years.

Well, to be fair, some of that same group also embraces homeopathy and crystal healing... and persists in believing any number of things (Nitrogen in tires = better mileage, urban legends, Snopes items galore, etc.) that have fairly conclusively been demonstrated to be untrue or unsound in principle/theory.

So I'm not sure that is a valid conclusion, really. I also think that there's a particular educational attainment level for which this is true, and that as one goes beyond that level, it becomes far LESS true. I don't know anyone in our peer group (STEM advanced degrees) who has opted for non-vax (other than for medically endorsed reasons), for example. I know only two who opted to home-birth, and even so, not for a first delivery and only with quite low-risk pregnancies.


I'm willing to believe that self-care is g-loaded, all right-- but particularly so for those who HAVE particular risk factors or chronic illness, because outcomes are just so bad there without it.

But the converse probably not-so-much. I think it's a matter of "those who do well are either lucky or smart" and the category of those who DON'T do well is composed of everyone else. My DH's pithy hypothesis is that everyone gets either a brain or a guardian angel.

If you're genetically destined for Huntington's, Marfan, refractory asthma, hemophilia, an immune deficiency, or have a double BRCA1 mutation, well-- you can improve your own personal management, but you aren't going to avoid all the bad stuff just with informed decision-making and "smart choices." The best choices in the world are still going to lead to not great quality-of-life for some of those people.

I get pretty testy with victim-blaming, or anything that SEEMS to go down that road, though. Too much genetic stuff in my own family, I guess. Everything else is basically window dressing at that point.

My perspective is that the brightest of those people often have better outcomes because they can discriminate on the basis of plausibility-- and that this leads them to reject anything that is pseudo-science rather than the real thing. The merely "pretty bright" are far more vulnerable to that stuff.


Consider two people with aggressive metastatic cancers. One of them goes the intensive allopathic route and ignores all the alt-med material that friends and family are offering up.

The other spends a lot of time and energy trying "it all" rather than being focused on their oncologist's recommendations, and is ultimately taking a lot of antioxidants that wind up diminishing the effectiveness of chemo and reduce tolerance for radiation. They also don't believe in vaccination necessarily; thinking that the natural illnesses are not that serious and that better immunity is obtained via wild-type exposures, and that "just stay away if you're sick" is a fine way to minimize spread of illness-- and so do their friends. So treatment has to be stopped while the person is hospitalized for influenza, then for chicken pox.

All other things being equal, the former quite probably gets a better outcome than the latter. I think that this is probably more closely tied to risk-aversion than to LOG, however-- or that it ties to both things.

My DH and I are pathologically risk-averse. Bottom line.

But I'm also a huge believer in Murphy's Law along with Occam's Razor-- and if I wasn't, life with my DD would have made me a believer long ago. LOL.


I think that this is much like the 10,000 hours business. Necessary-- but ultimately not sufficient. In fact, I'm not even so sure that it's necessary. We all know someone who never exercised, smoked/drank and lived to be a ripe old age without serious infirmity. Lucky is real, too.

+1

When I said to a specialist, "I was wondering about this..." and got a blank look back, I began to worry.

My favorite line from the article, "The dangerous allure of the information we want to hear is something we need to be more vigilant about, in the medical consulting room and beyond."

I keep hearing this about my son, "There are some red flags but he doesn't qualify for x, y, or z." That's exactly what I want to hear, that nothing needs to be done, but something in my mommy gut says I should keep digging.