Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children • Hacker News Board

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#141

Post by jawarner » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

iopq wrote: post #66

JacobJans wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I didn't expend any effort on my studies >I was reading calculus textbooks when I was 10 years old. I suggest that you, indeed, spent effort on your studies.

Those weren't my studies. Those were my hobbies. Give me homework and I'll run away screaming. I used to HATE the language subjects. Now that I'm not being forced to do it, I enjoy linguistics.

> Those weren't my studies. Those were my hobbies.

Then your case does not contradict the OC's view that "Gifted children are "gifted" with a laser focus on the unusual things that they find fun - math, music, what-have-you."

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#142

Post by sliverstorm » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

ralusek wrote: post #60

Isamu wrote: post #14

> Such results contradict long-established ideas suggesting that expert performance is built mainly through practice—that anyone can get to the top with enough focused effort of the right kind. Actually the claim is the other way around - that the people at the top got there through focused effort of the right kind. Finding "gifted" children does not contradict this. Nobody pops out of the womb a math genius. Gifted…

Why is everybody so binary about this? Are we really suggesting that some individuals are not capable of intellectual tasks at a greater capacity, or a greater speed than others? If you understand that a human being has a higher cognitive function than a sea slug, a wasp, a mouse, a dog, a dolphin, an ape, by our genetics alone, then you have to accept that there is a degree of genetic variance between individual hum…

We don't know how to measure the potential of an individual.

We are pretty sure that learning & hard work is important for everyone, no matter how genius.

We suspect that focusing on innate aptitude encourages laziness and/or learned helplessness.

And of course, lastly, you can't change it.

It just doesn't seem that productive to worry about how genetically gifted you are, one way or the other. Potentially even detrimental.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#143

Post by squigs25 » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

Interesting read, but I have one major qualm about this.

There seems to be a confirmatory bias among the academic community that a measure of intellectual success can be found in the percentage of individuals who earn a PhD. Sure, it's true that you need to be reasonably smart to earn a PhD, but I think that someone can have a lot of intellectual success (potentially just as much or maybe more) if they don't earn a PhD.

I think you could even argue that, depending on the field of study, a PhD is the "easy" route for someone who is intellectually gifted - it's a simply a continuation of what you have been doing. I would be more impressed by the intellectual who not only realizes that they can conduct their own independent research, but also has the creativity to come up with a use case that can improve and contribute to the world (and presumably, make a living doing so).

My point here is that, given two gifted cohorts, one which has a 45% PhD graduation rate and one which has a 50% PhD graduation rate, I don't know that you can conclusively say that one is more gifted than the other without looking at other metrics associated with intellectual accomplishment.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#144

Post by jupiter90000 » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:31 PM UTC

Interesting piece from one of the studies referred to by article: "...many individuals who completed their degrees in non-math-science areas ultimately chose math-science occupations, and vice versa. Among mathematically talented populations,the leaking pipeline is not an appropriate metaphor. Upon reflection, this fluidity is not surprising for mathematically precocious females. In samples of males and females selected for mathematical talent, females display higher levels of verbal ability than males, and also more uniform levels of mathematical and verbal ability. Thus, mathematically precocious females more often than mathematically talented males are endowed with talents that enable them to excel with distinction in domains that require highly developed verbal-linguistic skills (these skills and the flexibility they lend could perhaps propel these individuals in varied directions, in part because verbal-linguistic skills tend to co-occur with social, or organic, interests and values)."

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#145

Post by matthewvincent » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:32 PM UTC

0xdeadbeefbabe wrote: post #108

iopq wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't feel like that's true. I didn't expend any effort on my studies and it just came easily to me. Now, I'm not a genius, but there's a huge difference between my aptitude towards anything and the average person. I scored in the 99th percentile in math on the California high school exit exam. I went to community college at 15 (while still taking some high school courses at first, but upon taking the proficiency e…

> Maybe successful people have lazer focus. It's probably more fun or compulsive than laser focus. One savant was described as a calendar addict. He'd ask when you were born first thing when he met you. He developed an ability to calculate the day of the week for any given date in seconds.

I met someone like this once, he could also tell you the phase of the moon on the day you were born as well as all the celebrities born that day. It was pretty striking.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#146

Post by findK » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:33 PM UTC

iopq wrote: post #46

Isamu wrote: post #14

> Such results contradict long-established ideas suggesting that expert performance is built mainly through practice—that anyone can get to the top with enough focused effort of the right kind. Actually the claim is the other way around - that the people at the top got there through focused effort of the right kind. Finding "gifted" children does not contradict this. Nobody pops out of the womb a math genius. Gifted…

I don't feel like that's true. I didn't expend any effort on my studies and it just came easily to me. Now, I'm not a genius, but there's a huge difference between my aptitude towards anything and the average person. I scored in the 99th percentile in math on the California high school exit exam. I went to community college at 15 (while still taking some high school courses at first, but upon taking the proficiency e…

"Now I am not a genius, but.."

You know, I think you might be a genius dude.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#147

Post by colordrops » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:33 PM UTC

My martial arts teacher told me a relevant proverb: people are like vessels, some larger than others, and the vessel with less capacity can still hold more water.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#148

Post by blubb-fish » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:34 PM UTC

iopq wrote: post #46

Isamu wrote: post #14

> Such results contradict long-established ideas suggesting that expert performance is built mainly through practice—that anyone can get to the top with enough focused effort of the right kind. Actually the claim is the other way around - that the people at the top got there through focused effort of the right kind. Finding "gifted" children does not contradict this. Nobody pops out of the womb a math genius. Gifted…

I don't feel like that's true. I didn't expend any effort on my studies and it just came easily to me. Now, I'm not a genius, but there's a huge difference between my aptitude towards anything and the average person. I scored in the 99th percentile in math on the California high school exit exam. I went to community college at 15 (while still taking some high school courses at first, but upon taking the proficiency e…

> Now, I'm not a genius, but there's a huge difference between my aptitude towards anything and the average person.

anything - I bet you just don't know how little aptitude you have at things you didn't happen to spend time with.

> It took me longer to graduate at that point, but it was mostly because I was expected to do work and I never did before.

Or - you're not that smart and good with excuses :)

> I was reading calculus textbooks when I was 10 years old. I struggled with it, but it was fun.

Reading is not understanding - maybe you just enjoyed the attention that you got from it.

> Then I'd read some physics instead because I felt like it.

Alright - very impressive!

> But not all talented people are focused.

This contextually implies you consider yourself talented - well, quite possible you are just pretty untalented at self reflection.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#149

Post by ausjke » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:34 PM UTC

I probably had a gifted kid but never had enough bandwidth to lead him, comparing to his siblings he just memorizes so well(e.g, mechanically memorized PI to 600+ digits in two days until I asked him to stop), doing high-school-level math at 4th grade, learn many things by himself and so on. Meanwhile he is bored, hard to make peer friends due to lack of shared interests, etc.

Everyday I have to work and care for other kids, I tried to home-school him but then you get the financial pressure quickly.

I wish there are some programs that can help kids like him, i.e. group them somewhere to study and learn from each other. We have quite some program taking care of the disadvantaged kids, what about the gifted ones? After all, they can potentially contribute to the society in some way that helps many others. We probably need a state-level or federal-level or even college-sponsored program for those really gifted kids.

No I'm not talking about the gifted class in the school district, those helps, but far from enough for those really gifted, you probably only have about 5 who are really gifted in each school district.

Re: Lessons from a 45-year Study of Super-Smart Children

#150

Post by ck425 » Wed, Sep 07, 2016, 4:34 PM UTC

I've not went and read any of the actual studies, only the article, but it seems that they start measuring kids around the age of 10 onwards, is this not too late?

One of the themes seems to be that certain measurements of ability at this age were accurate indicators of future success if the kids were not discouraged (ie allowed to push themselves and learn more advanced stuff). But by age 10 surely most kids have already been discouraged? I was reading another article earlier today that I can't find talking about pre-school being more important for life chances than high school. Could it be far more kids than we think are capable of being 'geniuses' and that the majority are discouraged at an early age? I'm not read up on this so if anyone is please share!