Intelligence is defined as “the ability to apply and acquire skills and knowledge.” The average American usually believes that they are more than average when it comes to intelligence, which statistically can’t be the case. Although it is difficult to tell sometimes what is intelligence versus what is an educational lack, these are 19 signs that someone might be below average on the intelligence scale.
They are Easily Frightened
Someone who has low intelligence tends to be scared easily. Because they aren’t able to rationalize and think through scenarios to compare outcomes, they tend to become overwhelmed and make assumptions quickly about what is in front of them. Someone who thinks in black and white only has a hard time making connections and jumps to quick conclusions.
They Stay Shallow in Conversations
People who lack high intelligence tend to keep their conversations shallow. Because they aren’t deep thinkers, they only look at things on the surface. Conversing with someone takes the ability to have a back-and-forth conversation and think objectively. When you are of limited intelligence, it is a lot more forth than back.
They are Gullible
When you lack intelligence, you take things for face value and rarely question or try to verify what you are told. Being gullible means that if someone tells you something, you are quick to accept it as fact. When someone lacks intelligence, they rarely think for themselves or worry about the validity of what someone says is true.
They Lack Empathy
Being empathetic requires a certain level of understanding and compassion, which is a higher-functioning skill. When you don’t have the intelligence to put yourself in someone else’s shoes to try to understand how they feel, it can lead to being rigid and not caring very much about anyone’s feelings but your own.
They Believe in Superstition
People who want to make sense of their surroundings but lack the depth and inquisitiveness to find scientific reasons or to rationalize things often believe in superstition and the supernatural. It is much easier for them to believe in chance and things out of their control.
They are Inflexible
When you aren’t very intelligent, having a discussion or debate is something that you want to avoid at all costs. People who can’t hold their own or defend their opinions often don’t want to be questioned or made to feel or look stupid. Because they can’t think abstractly, they hold fast to their ideas even when they are proven false or wrong.
Inability to Concentrate
People with limited intelligence often have a hard time staying on-task and paying attention. Being able to listen, not just hear, takes higher-level skills that someone with low intelligence doesn’t have. It isn’t that they don’t want to sit still and hold their own. It is just that they can’t.
They are Emotionally Reactive
When someone can rationalize a situation and reason through various scenarios understands that there is more than one side. When you are low in intelligence, you can’t defend yourself with facts and figures, which means that you respond irrationally and with emotion.
They Have a Dependency on Others
Someone who has low intelligence has a very hard time navigating the world around them. They tend to find someone to cling to and follow their lead to get where they need to be. Being on their own in a world that they are not very good at adapting is a scary thing, so it is much less so to have someone that they can rely on for nearly everything.
They Lack Empathy
It takes a certain level of intelligence to be able to feel for someone else. Someone with low intelligence probably has a hard enough time figuring out their own emotions and knowing how they feel, a little less navigating the feelings and emotions of someone else. Empathy takes a level of emotional intelligence, which is highly correlated with overall intelligence.
They Have Poor Judgment
It takes intelligence to solve complex problems by taking something from the beginning to the end and understanding the consequences of your actions. When you have little forethought and can’t go through many scenarios to find out what a likely outcome is, you tend to make poor decisions. Those decisions, moreover, are based on impulse feelings rather than rational thought.
They Have a Poor Memory
Intelligence takes a particular level of memory so that you can build on learning. When someone has low intelligence, that means that they have a hard time with retention and the progression of things. It is hard to learn properly when you can’t commit even simple facts to memory and even harder to problem solve.
They Lack Common Sense Skills
The reason it is called common sense is that it is the sense that an average person would have. Someone with low intelligence doesn’t have the same sense as an average person, so their ability to reason and rationalize is lower than theirs. What is common to most is usually lost on someone of low intelligence. They simply don’t think like everyone else.
They Have a Lack of Understanding Consequence
Understanding consequences comes from experience and learning from someone’s past mistakes. Someone with low intelligence rarely learns from their mistakes and tends to repeat them. It takes a certain level of intelligence to go from start to finish in a sequence of “if I do this, then that will happen.” Therefore, they tend to make rash decisions and get into trouble a lot.
They are Impulsive
When you are of low intelligence, you lack things like impulse control. To control yourself and your decisions, you need to understand the concept of consequences. You also have to walk through abstract scenarios to see what might be the reactions to your actions. Those are all higher-level reasoning skills that someone without average intelligence is unable to do.
They Have Limited Curiosity
It takes knowing that you are ignorant about something to want to know more about it. If you don’t know what you don’t know, it is hard to be inquisitive. People with low intelligence tend to take things at face value and not try to dig any deeper to find out more or the meaning behind why something is the way that it is.
They are Quick to Stereotype
When you have limited intelligence about other cultures or things that you don’t encounter, you tend to form opinions that are usually not based on personal experience or facts. Someone who is of low intelligence is more susceptible to buying into racism, stereotyping, and sexism because they just accept the things they hear.
They Have a Limited Social Cue Understanding
There are different ways in which people communicate, verbally and non-verbally. People who lack intelligence often only understand verbal cues and what someone is actually saying. When you don’t comprehend nonverbal cues, it can be very difficult to understand things like social cues and what is unwritten as acceptable and not acceptable.
Intelligence is Formed Through Nature and Nurture
Intelligence is based on the ability to acquire knowledge and experience. Since people are not born and raised in a vacuum, it is sometimes difficult to know whether their intelligence is a lack of one over the other. Regardless of why someone has low intelligence, they often behave similarly, which is a telltale sign of their mental abilities.
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