social skills

We’ve all come across people that have immediately struck us as intelligent. There are, undeniably, certain quirks or traits that immediately give off an air of knowing more than the average joe.

However, there are just as many behaviors assumed to be signs of intellect, that really aren’t. Or even if they do historically denote a higher IQ, people hijack these traits in an effort to seem smarter. In an age of blatant misinformation and fake experts…iknowinghow to spot the difference seems more vital than ever.

That's why the answers to this question, “What is NOT a sign of intelligence, but people think it is?” posed on Reddit, could be helpful. Or at the very least, it’ll give you a boost of vindication for not thinking that one guy at trivia night was the genius everyone else thought he was.

Below are the 10 most popular themes we pulled.

Having an opinion on everything

“Smart people that I know refrain from giving opinions on things they don't know. Partly because they have good awareness of what they actually know…I also think that the more intelligent you are, the more you recognize the nuance in every subject, and therefore it becomes more difficult to state a flat-out, black and white opinion.”

“The absolute inability of some people to simply say ‘I don’t know’ is astounding. They’ll speculate vague scenarios for an hour without even being able to explain where they believe they are getting their hunches.”

Challenging or contradicting everything people say

“I have a colleague that does this and I've started to disengage and let them dig their own hole because some of the contrarian positions she takes is just plain stupid.”

“I’ve noticed a lot of people who are like this tend to also have a self-righteous attitude.”

"Telling it like it is”

“In my experience people who ‘tell it like it is’ are generally on the lower side of intelligence and ‘how it is’ is a very simplified and juvenile understanding if not based on outright falsehoods.”

“When people tell me they’re brutally honest I just assume they enjoy the brutality more than the honesty.”

“It’s a sign they don’t have the intelligence to say anything with tact or differentiate between what should and shouldn’t be said.”

Talking fast with a lot of words

Many referred to this as gish galloping, which is a debate technique used to overwhelm an opponent by presenting an excessive number of arguments, without regard for their accuracy or strength, with a rapidity that makes it impossible for the opponent to address them in the time available.

“I transcribe audio for a living. I find a lot of people who talk fast don't actually say more. There's a lot of repetition, filler words and phrases, and they very rarely have well organized thoughts/conversations so they're just harder to follow. I know some people just talk like that so I'm not mad at them, and sometimes people who talk like that are still actually geniuses and it's because their brain is moving faster than their mouth is, but usually not.”

Having confidence

“I’ve seen people who are, well, not stupid, but certainly not the smartest people in the conversation, get treated like geniuses because they have the confidence and presentation side of things nailed.”

“In my life, I have met some truly intelligent people…I am not one of those people, but I was given the gift of presentation. Without question, my career has been built upon appearing, sounding and looking like I am one of those people. It is honestly scary how willingly people will give you power and responsibility for essentially being a good actor.”

“Just because people are able to speak confidently, it doesn't necessarily mean they have anything of substance to say.”

“This misconception is 90% of politics.”

Writing a book

“Any fool can spew some crap into a word document and ‘publish’ it as a book. If you see some expert on TV and their only credential is ‘author of…’ you should be very skeptical.”

“My wife is an editor, trust me, some people who write books are barely literate. I feel like she has as much a hand in writing some of these books as the author does. Especially when it needs a heavy developmental edit.”

“Following some authors on social... has been eye opening.”

Wearing glasses

Historically, glasses have been associated with brainy activities like studying and reading, hence why so many smarty pants characters in pop culture sport a pair of specs. And interestingly enough, there was a study in 2018 that indicated there was some truth to the stereotype. However, now that all of our eyes are glued onto screens for the majority of the day, which has a collective effect on our vision, I’d wonder if those stats would still hold up.

Some glasses-wearing folks in the conversation certainly had opinions on the matter.

“Can confirm, I wear glasses and I’m the dumbest person I’ve met.”

“I have glasses and I don’t mean to put myself down but I’m not as smart as people think I am. lol. It’s exhausting.”

Labelling emotions as ‘irrational’

“If people ever studied neuroscience they’d learn that our emotional processing system is literally right next to our memory system, and highly connected with our decision making and memory consolidation. Emotions are in part an evolutionary design that makes us so intelligent. When the links between these are impaired our ability to make rational, logical decisions is impaired.”

“I find the people who think they’re really logical and detached often tend to be highly emotional individuals who just struggle with other people’s emotions and their own emotional regulation. They are the kind of people who shut themselves down and then break out in a rage. Obviously not everyone, but it seems to be common in some people with autism and other conditions that affect the ability to emotionally regulate to see logic as disassociated from emotions.”

Being cynical

“Being miserable or trying to tear down every idea or opinion that comes your way doesn't equate to being intelligent or even interesting.”

“The most intelligent people I've met in life have been extremely optimistic and excited during conversations.”

“I’ve always called cynicism a low form of analysis. You do need to be somewhat smarter than average to challenge existing constructs. However, true intelligence is shown by taking the next step, which is formulating alternatives. Being cynical alone is actually buying into an existing structure without imagination—it is simply recognizing that something that someone else created is bad.”

“It’s fine to think of the potential negative outcomes to events, or possible negative motivations of people so you can be aware to watch out for them but if you’re realistic about actual probability, none of that will hold you back from being optimistic.”

“Most of the stupidest people I've met have also been the most mean spirited and pessimistic.”

Speaking with a British accent

Okay, this was a funny one, but a pertinent one nonetheless.

“Lol, Americans don't even differentiate between different British accents. They think a brummy accent - which to UK ears sounds like borderline brain damage - sounds smart.”

“It's only a sign of a very specific kind of intelligence... namely MI6”