My personal anecdotes: I came to know some of these "genius" kids from a forum I used to run. They really were quite bright and had unusual interests on top of

My personal anecdotes: I came to know some of these "genius" kids from a forum I used to run. They really were quite bright and had unusual interests on top of that. Of course they also came from financially comfortable families that could afford to build a home laboratory. Their financial peers had parents who would give children international vacations or horse riding lessons; their parents bought them used industrial/scientific equipment from eBay. They exited high school early and went on to R1 research universities.