Superior IQs associated with mental and physical disorders, research suggests

I went through a battery of IQ tests as a kid and got a _high_ score (139). But that was when I was seven years old. I'm 30 now, have a master's degree (which was pretty pointless) and make 25 bucks an hour as a temp (more money than I've ever made in my life). I think my life and prospects have dimmed because I haven't been able to get over the anxiety and the depression that impact me every…

I've met plenty of incredibly intelligent people in my life, and very few mentioned Mensa. Those who did had a yearning for being recognized as smart or exceptional. Perhaps using Mensa membership to draw inferences about smart people in general isn't statistically applicable. It could be that people who want to be recognized as smart have those mental issues, which other smart people don't.

> It’s also possible that people who join Mensa differ from other people in ways other than just IQ. For example, people preoccupied with intellectual pursuits may spend less time than the average person on physical exercise and social interaction, both of which have been shown to have broad benefits for psychological and physical health. Is Mensa really an "intellectual pursuit"? I'm not sure exactly what Mensa does, but maybe people insecure enough to join an IQ-restricted club are more…

The researchers, and the reporters, missed a glaring problem with the inference: Perhaps the increased prevalence of the examined disorders is due to Mensa membership, not high intelligence. Maybe people with high intelligence are just fine. Maybe the need to have some certification of this attribute, or to let others know about it is correlated with the disorders being attributed to high intelligence.