<p>I know that this is a particularly driven crowd here at CC, so what are your thoughts?</p>
<p>The article kind of reminds me of the false paradigm of the “nature vs. Nurture” debate.</p>
<p>It’s not really an either/or type proposition, though these researchers continually want to act as if it is a binary issue. The talent and ability drive the desire to practice, imho. But, without the practice? Forget it. Anyone who has ever been to Mensa knows that there are plenty of washouts in mensa.</p>
<p>Anyway, I think it’s a type of question academics love. Is it the innate genetics of the child which leads him to be a genius, or is the way he is raised? Given what any parent knows, each child comes out with their own “self” a heck of a lot more concrete than anyone waiting for the birth of their first child would ever expect, we have less influence over who they become than we think.</p>
<p>My theory, which is supported by the success in various areas of both of my kids, is just to let them take the lead in what they love and then throw your own parental resources behind that desire at or around 110%.</p>
<p>Every kid has tremendous strengths, though not necessarily the ones we might have expected. The key to parenting kids who become successful, imho, is to support interests they have already expressed. YMMV</p>
<p>Endlessly fascinating discussion, of course.</p>
<p>Ok, I’ll start. While I think more intelligence generally helps in all endeavors, let me say I don’t think it is a prerequisite for musical talent. My husband and I have known a lot of musicians, some very talented. Some of the most talented ones are not really very smart. But the talented ones do play a lot.</p>
<p>On the other hand, we can’t think of any really gifted mathematicians who are not intelligent. So maybe it is true that intelligence trumps practice in some areas, not in others.</p>
<p>This is just my experience. I have no links, no proof, no data.</p>
<p>For any particular goal or achievement, there is a minimum level and type of talent and effort (and sometimes luck) needed (and that varies depending on the goal or achievement). If one is lacking in either the talent of effort (or luck, if applicable), one is unlikely to achieve that goal or achievement.</p>
<p>I agree, UCB.</p>
<p>I think the one factor parents can assist with is “luck.” Luck being defined, in this case, as all the opportunities to learn, practice and affiliate with those who are already successful in whatever chosen field. Luck is frequently about being in the right place. As parents, we have enough experience to know, perhaps, how to get our kids in the “right place.” </p>
<p>The rest, obviously, is up to them.</p>
<p>Seems to me this is an example of an article trying to make itself newsworthy by being provocative. It starts out by saying recent research says a big part of high skill levels is practice. Their conclusion based on the piano players example is that 7% is intelligence. That says to me that a big part is still practice. Is it “right” amount contributed by intelligence 7% or 2% or 20% ? Academic exercise at best.</p>
<p>It also seems to me that measuring skill at a particular task doesn’t necessarily say anything about overall skill. Does the fact that the “smarter” piano player is a better sight reader mean anything to the overall career success of the two? I’d bet who is “successful” depends a lot more on how you define success than how smart you actually are. if you want to be a piano teacher or concert pianist does it even matter at all how well you sight read?</p>
<p>Similarly there are tons of people who don’t have doctorates, patents or published works who are highly successful–just doing other things. Were you to define success as, say, running a Fortune 500 company, or being elected to office, I wonder how the profoundly gifted would do relative to the rest of us.</p>
<p>And I think the point Howard Gardner was making is that there are many different kinds of intelligence. People can be profoundly gifted in many very specific ways that may not show up via IQ test or SATs.</p>
<p>I am going to throw this out there:
It would seem to be common sense that talent alone is less important than effort, that talent NEEDS effort (at least) for it to be expressed.</p>
<p>Effort without talent: how far can one go without talent? Probably not far if there is NO talent, but is that a realistic scenario? I say no.</p>
<p>I surmise that in the real world, where talent is present in degrees and with other talents in a given individual, effort trumps talent, in the sense that a little bit of talent can be made to go VERY far with A LOT of effort, and that this effort may ignite other talents as well…</p>
<p>For every generalization there is an exception or two or three or four…I also think the Peter Principle applies. Some highly intelligent people lack in social skills, political skills and all those intangibles that are necessary to achieve success. Some highly intelligent people also posses those innate skills. But there will always be that tongue in cheek saying of “my B son is your A son’s boss.” You need the entire package to be successful whether it’s arts, sciences, athletics or really any field.</p>
<p>I see this article in part as a justification of the value of standardized testing. GPAs are largely a measure of work ethic while the SAT and ACT to some degree get to the concept of academic ability. High SAT scores do not necessarily predict college success since they don’t directly assess work ethic or motivation. But like the 40-yard-dash times and bench press repetitions that are measured at the NFL combine, the data from the testing can give some indication of the raw material that the prospect has to tap. Hard-working, motivated NFL prospects can only overcome deficits in strength and speed up to a point; at that point, they’ll likely hit a barrier that they can’t surmount. I’d say that the same will likely be true with the academic pursuits of students who have good GPAs and substandard SATs.</p>
<p>In my experience, effort without the talent can only take someone so far. It may be very far, but not to that upper echelon. I remember watching kids in dance classes, kiddie soccer and intellectual contests like DI etc. You could tell at a very early age who had the talent - not just IQ-wise, but musically, athletically and socially. And as they grew you could see the ones who put in the effort. But those without the talent, never reached that highest rung in the ladder. They were very successful, but not stars, no matter how much effort they put in. And those who had talent, were able to shine, sometimes with minimal effort. Some of these kids are almost 20 years post-college and, for the most part, apart from extenuating circumstances, this phenomenon still holds.</p>
<p>The only problem I have with the article is the use of IQ as the sole indicator to make their argument. I think that the argument goes for things like music, dance, athletic and social, etc, etc, etc talent as well. Unfortunately, there really aren’t ways to measure these areas of talent.</p>
<p>I knew a woman who wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but was one of the best teachers I ever met. She didn’t have a college degree, so was a teacher’s assistant in elementary school, and didn’t have knowledge of the subject areas beyond what she was assisting with, but she certainly could teach what she knew. She had a talent for teaching, which other teachers that I knew, who put in a great amount of effort (getting advanced degrees, etc.), could never achieve. Here talent certainly trumped effort.</p>
<p>The article doesn’t tell us what percentage of those who to go on to earn a doctorate, secure a patent, publish an article in a scientific journal or publish a literary work, are in the top 1% (probably because it is unknown). If the vast majority of people doing those things are not in the top 1%, then does it matter whether the 1%ers are more likely to do those things?</p>
<p>^^I agree, it doesn’t matter. I am certain there is some percentage of the 1%ers who are unemployed or earning subsistence wages and not contributing greatly to society for one reason or another. High IQ is like a tool, if you don’t know how to use it or you can’t use it for some reason it doesn’t matter. I think talent and effort can be used synonymous for the purposes of discussing success in the face of IQ.</p>
<p>Anyone read Malcolm Gladwell’s thoroughly researched book, Outliers? He says work is far more important than innate talent. What separates the merely good from the truly great is generally about 10,000 hours of work/practice. He combines quite a bit of research to determine that the two common denominators of the truly successful are:
- They work much, much harder than everyone else, and
- They happen to be in the right place at the right time (born at the right time, etc).</p>
<p>Carol Dweck’s (Stanford University) recent research indicates that our abilities are not fixed - they can be improved with study and work. Those who believe their abilities are fixed - “I’m not good at math, but I’m great at writing” are short-changing themselves.</p>
<p>Also a few weeks ago the NYTimes Magazine ran a terrific article called, “What if the Secret to Success is Failure?” (google it). In that article, Martin Seligman (UPenn) and his team found that “grit” - a combination of perserverance, self-control and determination - was a better predictor of GPA at UPenn than was IQ. </p>
<p>So I’d say there’s plenty of evidence that IQ is not more important than work ethic. Sure, a basic amount of intelligence or ability is helpful, but as Maya Angelou says, “Nothing works unless you do.”</p>
<p>Lafalum -</p>
<p>I don’t believe it. Let me restate that - when you use IQ as the predictor I believe that might be the case. However, I do believe that there are people who have talent (or gifts, or innate ability - however you want to state it) in areas not measurable by SATs or IQ tests. Those who are the truly great (compared to the very good, even exceptional - not the merely good) would not achieve that status, no matter how hard they tried, if they didn’t have the talent. That is not to say that all who have the talent achieve the greatness - it also takes an interest in using the talent. Note, I didn’t say desire, drive, etc - the interest is really all it takes for a talented person to successfully use that talent. Many who have it have no interest in using it.</p>
<p>In my view, genetics trumps all.</p>
<p>I could study for a million years, and I would never be able to earn a PHD in Physics.</p>
<p>I have many clients who have natural kids and adopted kids. The adopted kids always seem to have academic problems when compared to the natural kid.</p>
<p>Same parents. Same environment. But different genetics.</p>
<p>My ex wife is brilliant, and so is our son. Genetics.</p>
<p>Twelve year olds scoring 2300+ on the SAT? How many of those are out there? Probably 100% of them have professors for parents. So they go on to earn a PhD, patent etc. and this is surprising new evidence for the importance of intelligence? In the second study cited, pianists with good memories are 7% better at sight reading and this is compelling evidence that intelligence trumps practice? The only thing these studies tell me is that social science is an oxymoron.</p>
<p>Having talent is wonderful, of course, and adding disciplined practice to that talent is the ideal. Since this topic was discussed at length on the legacy thread last week, I don’t want to completely repeat myself here. But I will say that most of us on CC have experience with above-average to exceptional children who when they were younger probably showed themselves to have some talents. My older two were in this category, and so I believed in a mixture of nature and nurture. However, my views on this subject have changed quite a bit after the birth of my third child. She was born with some disabilities which produced moderate developmental delay. Trust me, she had no visible talent nor apparent genetic predisposition to excellence. None. She had poor fine and gross motor skills, was delayed in language acquisition, did not make eye contact or converse with others, and all the evaluations including IQ testing showed below average capability in every category. What hard work has done for her is nothing short of a miracle. I guess you could say that she does have one talent, which is her willingness to strive, but beyond that it was a heck of a lot of elbow grease.</p>
<p>So if you’re an employer, who would you hire? The moderately intelligent person who works her tail off or the genius who habitually slacks off?</p>
<p>^^^The genius who works her tale off - plenty of them exist - AND - the person who is pleasant to have around - I think that part of the equation is often overlooked, and can be a topic in itself.</p>
<p>Obviously. But that wasn’t the choice I posed in my hypothetical question.</p>