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Associations between intelligence and childlessness in men (2019) [pdf]
- cpr 7y agoTitle is misleading (see conclusion below). It could also be interpreted that higher intelligence leads to delayed family formation (for a myriad of reasons), which necessarily involves less offspring. Conclusion: The present study revealed a complex association between intelligence and childlessness. The mediated association between the highest stanine intelligence score and childlessness was interpreted as an expression of delayed family formation. It is still unclear whether this delay in family formation will “catch up” if childlessness is measured at an older age, which raises the need for additional studies on the subject.
- nathanaldensr 7y agoThe actual title should include "in men" as it does in the study. > Results: No linear association between intelligence and childlessness was found. However, follow-up analyses showed that higher risk of childlessness was associated with the highest stanine intelligence score (two standard deviations above the normed average), and that this effect was mediated by whether participants had ever been in a relationship by their late twenties. No significant direct effect of the highest stanine intelligence score was found when the question of whether participants had ever been in a relationship by their late twenties was included.
- filoleg 7y ago>...and that this effect was mediated by whether participants had ever been in a relationship by their late twenties. No significant direct effect of the highest stanine intelligence score was found when the question of whether participants had ever been in a relationship by their late twenties was included. I don't know if it is just me, but I am struggling to parse the meaning of the part regarding the effect of "ever being in a relationship by their late twenties" on the premise of this study. The only way I see it now is it means "being in a relationship by their late twenties negates the whole phenomena of childlessness and intelligence score relationship that was observed in the study", but that doesn't feel right. If someone in the thread can offer a more readable/simplified version of that statement, it would be very appreciated.
- agravier 7y agoI think that more readable one may be "not having been in a relationship in late 20s is a stronger predictor of subsequent childlessness than scoring high in intelligence."
- yborg 7y agoThis seems correct to me, i.e. the current title here is clickbait. From the paper: "The results of the present study did not support my hypothesis that intelligence should be negatively associated with childlessness." In fairness, the somewhat confusing verbiage here is from I assume a Norwegian non-native English speaker.
- filoleg 7y agoTo their defense, a lot of academic papers even from native English speakers tend to have barely readable convoluted wording here and there. Either for the purpose of making it sound more complicated or to pad the length of the paper, I have no idea. But it is something I have been consciously noticing since a while ago.
- filoleg 7y agoAh, that makes perfect sense to me (both your wording and the conclusion itself), so thank you.
- didericis 7y agoI’m not a professional academic, but I’m reading that sentence the same way you are. It sounds like the conclusion here is that not ever being in a relationship by your late twenties AND having a high intelligence predicts childlessness. For that to be interesting/worth mentioning, I would assume not being in a relationship by your late twenties and having mid level intelligence does NOT predict childlessness, or at least not as strongly. I’m guilty of jumping straight to the comments after not reading the article, however, so there might be more details either supporting/refuting that conclusion that I’m missing, I’m just going off of your quote.
- gvv 7y agoToo smart to be part of the gene pool /s
- sunstone 7y agooh oh gvv, it'll be rainin' down votes pretty soon :D
- rjkennedy98 7y agoI'm curious if this is just a Western thing. I feel like in Asia the government takes steps to prevent this from happening (one/two child policy and the ability to "buy" more children).
- kick 7y agoAsia isn't just Mainland China.
- ip26 7y agoAccording to whom? The PRC might disagree with you.
- mambojumbo 7y agoIn the western world, raising children is very expensive so people just give up. Instead of solving the cost of raising children to avoid retirement issues, western governments instead import labour. Very odd, given the massive drop in population in those countries.
- oarabbus_ 7y ago"In Asia the government"... Thanks for the laugh. You don't happen to have a lot of kids, do you? ;)
- m0zg 7y agoI thought this study was done years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXSz0bA9CiE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXSz0bA9CiE
- amelius 7y agoDid they investigate if this was by choice?
- stared 7y agoIn this study men with the highest AND lowest intelligence were the least likely to have kids. It reminds me of "Smart Teens Don't Have Sex (or Kiss Much Either)" discussed in http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/04/intercourse-and-intelligence.php http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/04/intercourse-and-intelligenc.... There was an analogous relationship with having sex. My interpretation: assortative mating.
- amriksohata 7y agoIs that because wealthy people are less likely to want children? Doesn't mean you are intelligent if you don't have children
- droithomme 7y agoIt's because we are so annoying to normal people.
- ecoled_ame 7y agoand normal people are annoying to us.
- filoleg 7y agoI bet it has more to do with refusing to develop even a minimum baseline of social skills, thinking that being very smart can compensate for being intolerable around other people. The reality is, you gotta have both on at least a baseline minimum level. And no excuses like "it has to be one or the other" are really valid, because I've definitely met people who were both extremely smart by any possible metric (even if the baseline of intelligence used for comparison is an average of other engineers), as well as extremely socially intelligent.
- buboard 7y agorefusing to whom?
- filoleg 7y ago>refusing [to develop skills] to whom? Not sure what's the point of confusion here, but the way I understood the question, my answer is "to themselves". I don't get how one can develop skills "to anyone else", but themselves, unless we are talking about teaching or mentoring or something similar.
- buboard 7y agodevelop social skills towards themselves?
- filoleg 7y agoI was simply answering with the same convoluted wording that was used in your previous question. I still have no idea what you mean by your question or what's your point of confusion. In my original comment, I said that some smart people "refuse to develop social skills". How is this confusing at all? This is just a simple example of using that word in a context of "someone refusing to do something".
- oarabbus_ 7y agoWell intelligence is partially hereditary, and childless men won't be passing on their genes, so I counter that these men really aren't as intelligent as claimed.
- Zenbit_UX 7y ago> and childless men won't be passing on their genes, so I counter that these men really aren't as intelligent as claimed. Hmm, I guess we found the breeder? Not even sure where to begin with this, circular reasoning? Have you perhaps considered that these intelligent people have considered tgat passing on their genes is not as valuable to them as other things they might value? I'd posit you haven't, and further, you shouldn't consider yourself among them.
- oarabbus_ 7y agoI don't have any kids, so you failed to find "the breeder". Nor do I consider myself particularly intelligent, making you 0 for 2, and it all the more wonderfully ironic if you considered yourself amongst that group.
- Zenbit_UX 7y agoI said you shouldn't consider yourself among them, not that you do. Also your circular arguments towards childless men being stupid while also being a self-proclaimed "stupid & childless man" is poetic and somehow makes sense to me.
- PlugTunin 7y agoIt's possible to be intelligent but not have an interest in passing on the genes for such.
- oarabbus_ 7y agoI challenge that notion. It displays a shortsightedness which is uncharacteristic of intelligence.
- generalpass 7y agoRegression to the mean?
- jdmcnugent 7y agoI read the title as “association between intelligence and childishness”. Made it halfway though the abstract trying to see if my immaturity meant I was actually intelligent. Disappointed.
- qwerty456127 7y agoObviously enough intelligent people are more prone to question the popular idea everybody is to have children (let alone early) in the first place. And then only reproduce once they feel like they have enough time and money to raise children in accordance with their reasonably high standards (which may turn out negative until its too late). While stupid people don't care and just fuck.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]