I am sure you’ve heard of an IQ test by now. In a lot of printed publications, focused on women in particular, you may find them. You can find them online too, just by Googling ‘IQ test’. A number of more or less difficult questions will pop up and you have to figure out the appropriate answer. Press ‘Submit’ and seconds later you will have the judgement of your mental capacity. Neat and simple.

But to start from the beginning, what is an IQ test really? And what does the score mean? IQ stands for ‘Intelligence Quotient’, meaning how smart you are. There is some connection between your IQ score and what professions may suit you or how well you may do in college.

The IQ test measures your intelligence to solve problems written on paper. Written problem solving is the core idea of IQ tests. The raw test scores are then compared to other persons. It’s one method commonly used to measure human intelligence.

IQ 100 is defined as the average of the whole population. Any score over 100 means you are more intelligent than average. A score below 100 tells that you are less intelligent than average.

Advantages of the IQ Test

• Employment Let’s say you’re hiring someone for a new job. One way to get a better understanding of the candidate’s capabilities would be to let them take an IQ test. You could select the type of test to use. This should be guided by the requirements for the type of work offered. The results should give a clue on the suitability of the candidate for the position. You could weed out those who don’t make the cut.
• Academic admission IQ tests could complement the SAT in the judgement of a student’s intellectual potential. As there are often fewer places than applicants, this could be an additional screening tool. You could pick the cream of the crop from the high IQ scorers and send rejection slips to those who didn’t make the grade.

Negative sides of the IQ test

• IQ tests are far from infallible though Plenty of folks who have taken an IQ test as part of the interview process didn’t do so well at work. Quite a large share of high IQ persons are simply not as successful as you would expect from their IQ score.
• Not the most important success factor Many students with high IQ are a dissapointment when they hand in their term papers. Studies have found out that a student’s self-discipline is a better gauge of how well they’ll do at college or high school. Relying only on smartness is not enough you must put whatever IQ you have to work to do really well. Many high IQ scorers have been overtaken by so-called ‘weaker’ minds with much lower IQ.

• IQ does not measure everythingLeadership is one area which is not measured by IQ tests It doesn’t measure your emotional quotient or EQ – how you’ll get along with other people, including co-workers, superiors and peers. There is also the theory of multiple intelligences, that defines 8 different aspects of intelligence that you may have to varying degrees. Intelligence is so much more than a single score.

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