Today i learned that Intelligence is heritable and it was a gut punch knowing my parents.
Can anyone clue me in on how it’s expressed or is it a soft cap?
Are highly hifted children anomalies or is it just a good expression of genes?
In: Biology
Though genetics plays a part in how intelligent a person can be, no amount of research has shown how much of a role it plays, as there are too many variables that also affect intelligence. So to answer your first question, it’s a soft cap, and can be improved, even in adulthood.
What a lot of people don’t realize is that learning is a skill, and like any skill, it can be improved with practice.
Highly gifted children are a mix of multiple factors, some of which may be attributed to genetics, but it’s not the only factor by far.
Personal anecdote: I’m one of those “gifted” people. Everyone assumes I just automatically know things, like explain it once and I’m an expert. But what nobody sees is that I get up early to study foreign languages, I watch documentaries during my lunch breaks, and I question everything. Most of my Internet search history is “How does..” “How to..” “History of…”, “Etymology of…”, etc. I know a lot because I put the work in, not because of some super genius genes from my parents. My siblings have similar genes, and they’re not gifted. Looking at my wife’s family, same thing, not gifted, except for my sister in law, who has a crazy caffeine addiction due to constantly spending her free time studying and educating herself. Now one could argue that the drive and motivation to self educate may be a genetic factor, but at that point we’re getting pedantic and philosophical.
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