Giftedness Linked to Prenatal Exposure of Higher Levels of Testosterone
A longstanding debate as to whether genius is a byproduct of good genes or good environment has an upstart challenger that may take the discussion in an entirely new direction. University of Alberta researcher Marty Mrazik says being bright may be due to an excess level of a natural hormone.
Mrazik, a professor in the Faculty of Education's educational psychology department, and a colleague from Rider University in the U.S., have published a paper in Roeper Review linking giftedness (having an IQ score of 130 or higher) to prenatal exposure of higher levels of testosterone. Mrazik hypothesizes that, in the same way that physical and cognitive deficiencies can be developed in utero, so, too, could similar exposure to this naturally occurring chemical result in giftedness.
"There seems to be some evidence that excessive prenatal exposure to testosterone facilitates increased connections in the brain, especially in the right prefrontal cortex," said Mrazik. "That's why we see some intellectually gifted people with distinct personality characteristics that you don't see in the normal population."
Read the rest on Science Daily.
Tags: brain, fetus, prefrontal cortex, prenatel, prodigy, talent, testosterone
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by T A A on -
What a strange choice of wording that researcher makes... giftedness????????????
If they wanted to evidence a hormonal link between IQs >130 and testosterone levels, why not just say it?
There are plenty of extremely gifted people with low to average IQ. This article really causes me a counter-intuitive moment, if testosterone levels during development are linked to high IQs... why the prevalence of dumb jocks in the world????????
IQ is such a subjective assessment, I'm constantly surprised to still find such terminology in a scientific paper.
Smells fishy. Before I'd consider such a statement I'd want to see an across the board assessment of thousands of cases in different fields of achievement.
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Permalink Reply by Dallas the Phallus on -
Yes, giftedness is an odd word, but I don't think technically wrong.
I didn't get the impression that they were talking only about plain ol' intelligence, but rather child prodigy type stuff, like kids who can master the piano lickety-split.
Agreed, IQ is highly subjective, and as we know now, there are many forms of intelligence.
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Permalink Reply by T A A on
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I really wish some of our members had scientific journal memberships so we could see actual article and read the methodologies and sample sizes. I've never been a big fan of secondary sources.
Could this be a project within Think Atheist you think, to get a membership? Personally, both libraries (college and municipal) in the small city in Northern Canada I live in do not have memberships.
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