It can be really frustrating when people think there’s something deficient about you because you’re not as glib and superficially quick-witted as they are. You’re not alone. Highly intelligent people can lack social skills more than others, and there are good reasons for it.
Intelligent people tend to care what they say in conversation. They place more importance on their words than others, and this can mean they overthink their responses. A lot of casual conversation takes place spontaneously, on automatic pilot. Once you start thinking too much, it gets more difficult to speak without seeming awkward.
A major reason why intelligent people can have poor social skills is that they can’t summon up the enthusiasm to join in everyday conversations with people. Men may understand this feeling when listening to women discussing cosmetics, and women may understand it when listening to men analyze a football game.
Some highly intelligent people feel this way about most of the conversation topics of both the sexes.
Most of the interests of a highly intelligent person will be of limited interest to those of average intelligence. This can mean that subjects that would make the highly intelligent person engaging and enthusiastic in conversation are off bounds because the other person wouldn’t be able to relate.
Two neuroscientists might be very animated when discussing neuroscience, for example, but totally unable to respond in a conversation about celebrity gossip.
One of the disadvantages of higher intelligence can be a higher degree of awareness of oneself and one’s behavior in social interactions. Highly intelligent people may be super conscious of themselves while socializing.
Imagine if you always had critical eyes watching and judging you while you speak. You’d feel like you were on stage and you’d be unable to act naturally. For many highly intelligent people, that critic is in their own heads.
Another character flaw that can afflict the highly emotionally intelligent is that they can be extremely aware of other people’s responses in conversation. A person with a high emotional quotient can spot the micro-expressions and subtle body language cues in other people, which show when they’re impatient, bored, or not really listening.
This can be crippling because people don’t really listen to others and aren’t genuinely interested in them at least half of the time! Once you’re aware of this, it can be almost impossible to continue a conversation with someone.
Many correlations have been found in research between higher levels of intelligence and increased levels of generalized as well as social anxiety. Anxiety is a major cause of poor social skills.
The reasons why this might occur are open to speculation. But it could be argued that ignorance is bliss and someone who is really conscious of what the world is realizes that it is a dangerous and unpleasant place. This naturally gives rise to feelings of fear and anxiety.
The more intelligent a person is, the less comfortable they may be with revealing too much about themselves to people then don’t know well. This is the logical thing to do in many ways, as we all know that there are people around who might use personal information against a person.
It’s reasonable to want to know a person enough to trust them with details about your life that could place you in a position of vulnerability. This has a cost in terms of social skills, though.
Following on from the previous point, intelligent people may be extremely cautious about revealing their vulnerabilities. This kind of self-protective behavior may be learnt rather than innate in intelligent people, but intelligent people are more likely to learn from mistakes and change their behavior in response to failures.
The problem with this cautious attitude is that it robs them of essential social skills. People can’t warm to people who are unwilling to reveal their humanity to others. It prevents others sharing with them too.
The problems that highly intelligent people have with social skills are not restricted only to the times when they hardly open their mouths. The real damage can occur when they do get talking.
When an intelligent person gets involved in a conversation that happens to interest them, they can become so heated and enthusiastic that people think they are aggressively opinionated, or even that what they’re expressing is anger.
This couldn’t be further from the truth. Intelligent people enjoy a heated debate and aren’t easily offended, nevertheless others mistake impassioned responses for aggressiveness and take offense easily.
A highly intelligent person often ends up in conflict with others because it’s difficult for them to let throwaway remarks about things to pass by unnoticed. Intelligent people are highly aware of the importance of ideas and how a bad idea can have terrible consequences for the human race.
For this reason, they’re not likely to let you get away with saying something you haven’t thought through properly like most people would. People tend to take personal offense to being corrected in this way, even if (or especially if) they know they were wrong.
Are you an intelligent person who lacks social skills? Do you identify with the points made?
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I have never considered myself highly intelligent, nor will I ever, I hope, but I did hit 9/10. Number 7 (uncomfortable revealing personal info) no longer applies much, if it ever has. It is my way of opening up and helping others feel comfortable to do the same. I am not afraid of being judged, as no matter what one does, one will always be judged in numerous different ways (judgments are far more about those who judge than the targets, in my opinion). So one might as well be oneself, at the risk of sounding a little self-centered. As long as I also take the time to listen, all is good.
I'm the same as you! Not afraid of being judged and speak my mind most of the time. It's most comfortable for me to behave in that way, with the side benefit of encouraging others to do the same!
Which is why its best to hire or partner with a people person as a handler or liaison
I'd never hire a people person if I'm an employer. Instead, I'd hire an intelligent person .But if I hire both, I'd favor the smart one over the social one.
I don't tend to consider myself as highly intelligent, but I'm an information sponge and tend to think deeply and intensely about things. By default this usually gives me an arsenal of more factual information than a majority of the people I come in contact with(knowledge is power is NOT a way of life in my small hometown). It's led to a fair share of heated debate and conflict to the point that I I treat with others as little as possible here.
I doubt this comment will get almost any notice, but I appreciate this article. I don't know if I would classify myself as being 'smart' but I personally deal with every issue mentioned and it can be challenging. Honestly my biggest issue is talking to people in general without sounding weird or somehow deficient, most of the time I have issues putting my thoughts into words especially when explaining things. Some people in my life have no idea how I feel most of the time and get angry because of my lack of ability to describe or explain it. I shared this article with someone in my life and they said that they think they understand me better and things have been a lot smoother between us since.
I feel like we shared the same mental womb (and I've gone weird on the first sentence). I just read this article and I thought "I'm going to share this article with her" though I wish I could scrub the "genius" bit. Not that I'm not one, just prefer not to rub it in :)
Anyway your comment did get noticed and I appreciate it; you some my mind in a clear, unmuddled fashion...and I'm going to stop taking now
Big thanks to the author of the article, I have some different opinions about some of the things but overall it's a fine article.
+D'Artagna - I wish I could share this with others, but my concern would be exploiting myself as a genius, which would cause judgement that "she thinks she's a genius!" I also can relate to each item in the article, but don't have the guts to share it. Besides, I like being the man out. I can't get into the shallow discussions out there. So, I'll remain a social outcast and continue to soak up information of interest and get involved with like minded individuals on the net, like here!
I agree, I don’t feel particularly smart, but I can relate with almost everything in article like they were describing me. Best article I ever found in being able to do that. I liked your blog by the way. I did notice.
I don't think the above points necessarily indicate signs of "very high intelligence", but rather signs of very high introversion, especially numbers 1, 6 and 7. You could argue high introversion equates to high intelligence, but this would suggest all geniuses are extremely introverted, and all extremely extroverted people are stupid, which is obviously not factual. Overall, I think you mentioned some good points about "intelligent" people tending to be more private, slow to warm up, and self-conscious, but you need more proof to demonstrate these introverts are intelligent and not just private.