Data from Sexual Experiences of Adolescents with Low Cognitive Abilities in the U.S.
What's the reason for these results? I think one of the simple ones (though not the only one) might be a form of positive assortative mating: like with like. If you assume that affinity is proportional to cognitive similarity than the sample of individuals for someone who has an IQ of 100 vs. 130 or 70 is far higher for any given range. For example, nearly 2/3 of individuals on the frequency distribution lay within 1 standar deviation of someone with an IQ of 100. In contrast, only around 1/7 of the population is within 1 standard deviation of someone at 130 or 70.
Email this entry to a friend
View the Technorati Link Cosmos for this entry
Comments
I think it might be intersting to cross-check the virginity ratings for video-game playing and thickness of glasses too.
Posted by: J-Dog | December 8, 2006 12:14 PM
"Among non-virgins, mentally disadvantaged adolescents were less likely to use contraceptives and had higher risks of STDs and pregnancy."
I'm a bad bad person for finding this funny, aren't I?
Posted by: Kimbits | December 8, 2006 12:51 PM
The test that Add Health used to measure IQ was a picture vocabulary test: the tester gives the kid a word, and the kid picks out which picture demonstrates the meaning of the word. In the middle school - high school age range, my guess is that this is a measure of IQ plus certain personality or leisure interests too -- basically, a nerd test. Who else has an impressive vocab at this age? Those who spend their free time reading Great Books or studying vocab flashcards for fun.
Unlike the more fluid reasoning skills tested by Ravens, vocab scores continue to increase as one ages (monotonically, plateau-ing). Those who score higher earlier might thus be early-blooming nerds. I'd guess this is the reason they're not wanted. Female desirability at that age is purely a function of good looks, and male desirability a function of status -- "popularity," as it's called at that age -- which has little to do w/ IQ at that age.
So, assortative mating may not be necessary to invoke. My best friend in middle / high school was pretty smart, even had a big vocab, but the reason he had luck w/ the ladies was b/c he was tall & stout, extraverted, and played varsity football & wrestling beginning his freshman year. It's more likely the bookish, nerdish tendencies that are keeping those w/ big vocabs from attracting sexual attention at that age.
Posted by: Agnostic | December 8, 2006 12:54 PM
I'm a high IQ male virgin ... in grad school! I bet it skews more toward the high IQ side as people get older. For every dim-witted female who is still a virgin in her late twenties, there are probably a dozen virginal male nerds of the same age!
(PS I wonder how many of those low IQ virgins are abstaining Christians)
Posted by: Anonymou | December 8, 2006 03:12 PM
I'm a high IQ male virgin ... in grad school!
i'll pray for you my brother.
Posted by: chet snicker | December 8, 2006 03:15 PM
Re: the anon grad school virgin -- is this due to your high IQ alone, though? What about the high-IQ guys who instead go to get their MBAs, JDs, or MDs? They're as smart as PhD students (biz students maybe a little less), and I bet they get laid much more than PhD students while in school, and especially afterward once they assume their dominant position in society. Not to say that all lawyers will work for BigLaw, but then neither will all PhDs chair a dept at Harvard. Control for position w/in their sector, and I'd bet dollars to donuts that professionals (e.g., lawyers & doctors) get more pussy than nerds (e.g., professors & engineers/programmers).
Posted by: Agnostic | December 8, 2006 03:21 PM
So, Razib, are you trying to tell us something about yourself here? ;)
Posted by: Will Baird | December 8, 2006 03:36 PM
I find it interesting that male-female differences disappeared at high IQ.
Posted by: Koray | December 8, 2006 03:52 PM
"i'll pray for you my brother."
Don't worry! It's by choice.
Posted by: anonymou | December 8, 2006 06:12 PM
"Don't worry! It's by choice."
You must have an uncommon system of drives and motivation to find anything positive about that.
Posted by: keil | December 8, 2006 07:30 PM
"You must have an uncommon system of drives and motivation to find anything positive about that."
Try living as an ascetic for a while! It will change your view of things, in a beneficial way. You might find out that some of what you think of as your "system of drives and motivation" is actually arbitrary, or imaginary, or so malleable that it might as well be imaginary.
Posted by: anonymou | December 8, 2006 08:27 PM
Love and marriage, love and marriage,
Go together like a horse and carriage.
Dad was told by mother you can't have one
You can't have none.
You can't have one without the other.
I think, this has been the way of our society for rising average IQ for centuries, isn't it? May be we should remember this more than we had since 1968 (or so).
Hey!!!: WHAT do you THINK ABOUT THAT???? :-))
Look at the Amish people!!! They do not loose their joy and fun with such morals. Stability of marriage and a lot of children may be associated with that.
Posted by: Erich Meinecke | December 9, 2006 05:58 AM
Dull-normal males are the sexiest.
I agree with anonymou. People don't realize how much their lives, self-esteem, and self-understanding are distorted by the needs of dating and relationships. When things go right it's wonderful, but people put up with (and do) a lot of lame shit if they feel they need to get laid.
Posted by: John Emerson | December 9, 2006 10:48 AM
"Try living as an ascetic for a while! It will change your view of things, in a beneficial way. You might find out that some of what you think of as your "system of drives and motivation" is actually arbitrary, or imaginary, or so malleable that it might as well be imaginary."
That's the place I'm coming from! It's a far better life to live as a mind and a body rather than only a mind, I know this from hard experience.
Posted by: keil | December 9, 2006 06:50 PM
"mind and a body" rather than "only a mind" ... I don't know what that means, exactly. Smells like implicit cartesianism to me ... but I'll momentarily accept that way of talking about things... let me put it this way: for me, the important part of sex has to do with the "mind" rather than the "body". And in this culture, it's hard for someone like me to find anyone to sleep with. This is because everyone has dumbed sex down, so to speak: everyone thinks sex is all about the body... case in point: you!
PS I bet some of those high IQ virgins are similarly culturally maladjusted
Posted by: anonymou | December 9, 2006 10:36 PM
"I think one of the simple ones (though not the only one) might be a form of positive assortative mating"
This, in addition to the fact that women tend to marry up in age, would account for the man shortage found among "highly educated" women.
Posted by: Tex | December 9, 2006 11:25 PM
Yes, we're "culturally maladjusted" for the survival of our (IQ- and a lot of other) genes.
Where does this come from? May be from a lot of "God Delusions" teached by priests and their morals about sinful bodies, sinful nature, "selfish" genes and a lot of more of that. So, may be, we need new morals, a new religion, new metaphysics? What sort of? May be something like Edward O. Wilson's "tribal" pantheism? May be something like the metaphysics of Diotima, Socrates and Hoelderlin?
We do not need any more any mind/body-split. We need more soul concerning love. We have to get rid of all the (atheistic?) mass media-"cover-girl"-culture, that moulds our social relationships. That makes the divorce between soul and body come into being and that destroys confidence and understanding between man, women and children, that destroys families and childhood.
Posted by: Erich Meinecke | December 10, 2006 06:31 AM
Somebody, hire this guy a hooker! Seriously, sex *is* all in the mind (ego/emotional) for humans. The physical component is easy enough (for a man) to handle. But nothing beats experience for fantasy material.
From a Darwinian perspective, all the sex in the world doesn't mean a thing without viable offspring. Socially, you'd probably want successful offspring, which are more difficult still.
Any type of asceticism can be beneficial, though - because it allows one to observe how controlled most people are by arbitrary impulses and drives. (You know, what all that religion stuff talks about).
Posted by: NuSapiens | December 10, 2006 01:06 PM
"Somebody, hire this guy a hooker!"
I don't think you understand: I actually choose to live this way, for now. I've had ample opportunity to have sex. It says a lot about our culture that people can't understand why someone would choose celibacy, even temporarily. They assume it's a case of sour grapes: the "choice" must actually be against his/her will. Very interesting... what's at the root of that assumption??
Posted by: anonymou | December 10, 2006 01:27 PM
I suspect the inability of most people to control their cravings over extended periods of time is at least partially responsible.
My society (USA) is fairly obsessed with sexuality. That probably contributes as well.
Posted by: Caledonian | December 10, 2006 01:32 PM
My 2 cents:
Sex is clearly most of all about reproduction. And secondarily about courtship, insofar as courtship is about reproduction. I think if a high-IQ person hasn't yet found a suitable partner for children, then they shouldn't worry too much about the opinions of lower-IQ people who are confused about this.
It also seems to me that more often then not, if you're already in graduate school and you haven't found someone yet, time is running out. Once you're out of school opportunities get pretty scarce.
Posted by: mjb | December 10, 2006 06:53 PM
"Sex is clearly most of all about reproduction. And secondarily about courtship, insofar as courtship is about reproduction."
What about gay sex?
Posted by: anonymous | December 10, 2006 07:28 PM
virgins!!!!
Posted by: chet snicker | December 11, 2006 01:48 AM
razib's got a large virgin readership! hell yeah!!!!
Posted by: chet snicker | December 11, 2006 01:50 AM
cool it chet.
Posted by: razib | December 11, 2006 02:15 AM
>What about gay sex?
Gay people can do whatever seems to make them happy. And I have no doubt that gay sex is a good thing for many people.
But some naturally straight and non-promiscuous people might be happier if they could trust their own instincts more, rather than letting themselves being shamed into sexually bulimic behavior by other more promiscusous people.
I'm not a virgin by the way, but would have stayed one longer if I could do it over (or not do it, as the case may be.)
Posted by: mjb | December 11, 2006 10:26 AM
I wonder what IQ and nerdiness have to do with each other. Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought one of them is a trait and the other is a state of mind/clothes.
That done, thank you Agnostic for calling me a nerd. Just because I happen to be an engineering student. Dumbass. I just happen to want to become an electric engineer and I don't think you want to have EEs to be not 'nerds' ie. having to learn something about their fields. MBA's make a mistake, big deal. Money loss. Doctors make mistake, well, someone or a couple of people die. ENGINEERs make mistakes, the number of casualties is going to be pretty high. Or half of the country will be in the dark, which means that after the generators run out, people are going to die. A lot of them. Or is it that you agree with Stalin? One death is a tragedy and a million death is statistics? Hmm, I might be a nerd, I'm quoting Stalin. Or maybe I'm just smart enough to have actually studied something in high school.
Yes, in case you didn't get it, I did take that as a personal insult. For all of the engineers/engineers wannabees out there. I find great pride in being one.
Oh by the way, I don't wear any kind of glasses, have a nice figure even if I'm not cut out to be a model. So, I'm not a nerd. At least I think so. My last relationship ended by my choice, and I find "celibacy" not so much of a disturbing state to be in.
Posted by: T.A. | December 11, 2006 10:53 AM
>I wonder what IQ and nerdiness have to do with each other.
I think a strongly scientific, problem solving mindset probably correlates strongly with some kind of nerdiness.
When you focus your mind on a problem, at that moment you're not paying as much attention to other sensory information. A lot of people who can focus in the way needed to solve difficult problems can be somewhat oblivious to other things such as social cues. Also, if you're generally intelligent and interested in things, you tend to develop a model of the world that is more sophisticated than those used by less thoughtful people. This puts you socially at odds with other people who think and do things that to your understanding really don't make any sense.
That said, when I took that nerd/geek/dork test that razib posted a while back, I came out as 'Joe Normal', even though I am clearly some kind of freak. It appears to me that these categories are made by average people to describe people who are only barely less average than themselves. Nerds apparently have an obsession with formal academic training, performance and associated status. Geeks are obsessed with technology, sort of like people who are obsessed with muscle cars, but with electronics. Dorks are apparently socially clueless beyond what would necessarily be caused by the introversion described.
By the way, given a suitable environment like a university, I think that its often easier for male nerds (or whatever) to successfully find love once they're about 30, because the qualities women look for at that age tend to change some.
Posted by: mjb | December 11, 2006 11:41 AM
My first reaction to this post was to think it was as silly topic. But then I read the ensuing discussion and realized that I'm really glad it was brought up.
I consider myself a nerd. I am constantly asking questions on every possible topic and searching for objective answers to them. I spend a lot of time reading and programming websites. I'm in a choir and a jazz big band. NERD! :P
However, I'm not a virgin. In fact, and I'm only disclaiming this for the purpose of this discussion, I am quite confident in my ability to attract beautiful women from many walks of life (and men for that matter, but I don't actively pursue them). I am confident primarily thanks to experience.
However, while I do love being around women I find attractive and think about them sexually a lot, I don't feel strongly motivated to have sex. And sometimes this bothers me! I sometimes feel like there is something wrong with me because I'm not trying to have sex with someone at this time.
This post's ensuing discussion has enforced my predominant feeling that I actually *am* looking for the right person to come along, and that I'm not actually bothered that I'm not having sex - I'm bothered that society seems to be pushing me to want sex.
I have no problem with people who are strongly driven to seek sexual satisfaction - it is very normal and very fun! My only problem is with the idea that virginity is a social taboo.
Posted by: Dave | December 11, 2006 10:48 PM
Am I the only one who finds it highly amusing how 'cool' it is to be a nerd or a geek these days? 15 - 20 years ago one wouldn't be caught dead admitting to it, but thanx to the internets & www technologeez it's cool to be a n3rd. I am one too - no really I am. I read dilbert, I buy lots of cool gadgets, an online test said I was 79% nerd and I errrr read hitchhikers when I was 5 months old. So there.
Posted by: bengali | December 12, 2006 12:13 AM
There's probably more than a little "Sour Grapes" reasoning, too. Consider for a moment how much time, money, and effort most people invest in pursuing sex. Either they value sex that much, or they believe that they ought to - and we usually view others as being the same as ourselves, so clearly people who claim not to pursue sex value it as highly as most people do, but can't obtain it.
You can get what I suspect is a similar reaction in certain places by telling people you don't own a cellphone.
Posted by: Caledonian | December 12, 2006 09:26 AM
"You can get what I suspect is a similar reaction in certain places by telling people you don't own a cellphone."
OK. I don't own a cellphone either.
Reminds me a little of governor arnold's statement that if some men wouldn't happily participate in a gang bang, its only because they're ashamed of their small peckers. No doubt this is the only reason he could think of.
Posted by: mjb | December 12, 2006 10:19 AM
"My only problem is with the idea that virginity is a social taboo."
I enjoyed reading your comment. I agree with you about this. There shouldn't be any mockery or social stigma associated with virginity. When it comes to this issue, most people seem to think like steretypical jocks (see Chet's comments above... mature, no? If this was a locker room conversation, that would have been the part where he ran over and gave me a wedgie)
Posted by: anonymou | December 12, 2006 04:16 PM
Well I guess all the cool people are fessing up to their virginity, so I'll do it too! I suppose I've got issues beyond simple nerdity though. Looking back I've made for a rather shitty regular friend, so I'd make for about as bad a boyfriend as possible barring any sort of criminal type of activity (and I wouldn't even have the type of battered woman deluding herself into thinking "He does it 'cuz loves me!"). I'd have to really dislike a girl to subject her to me. Coincidentally, I'm somewhat misanthropic, especially when it comes to my peers (I'm a second year university student). So those two factors might cancel out to an extent, but then there's my extensive apathy, puritanical religious prudishness (despite my lax church attendance), and libido deficiency.
Like some of the virgin dudes above I believe I could have popped my cherry, but it's really always just a matter of how much you are willing to lower your standards and/or put in the effort. I'm in better shape than I have any right to be in considering I never exercise and have a horrible diet. I suppose it's good genes as many of my older relatives stayed in great shape with minimal work while they were young before crashing headlong into diabetes and serious weight problems after middle age. I don't put any effort into appearing presentable either as I'm not looking for a job right now and have no one I need to please.
Nevertheless I occasionally hear from old classmates that this or that girl dug me, which I've found very odd because in each case the girl in question could certainly do better The only explanation I can come up with is they found me funny, and since girls tell themselves a sense of humor in a guy is important to avoid thinking of themselves as shallow they ended up saying as much to their friends and the grapevine brought that to me, because I was never drunk with any of them and that's the only time I'm sociable enough to be likable. Aside from just not being a "party guy" (I'm a nerd, remember) I can't really hold my liquor and broke my elbow very badly doing something stupid on something like the fifth occasion I've been drunk, so I've limited myself to just a few nights of drinking since then.
Some who are reading this might get the impression that I'm some sort of miserable, depressed whiner. On the contrary, I feel my life is a pretty much non-stop (the aforementioned elbow breaking is an exception) series of highs with no lows that less fortunate (read: normal) folks seem to frequently experience. My only concern is how unprepared I'll be to deal with the inevitable disappointments that will accompany my graduation and entry into the real world, when I'll have to be concerned with people other than myself and face the consequences of not meeting certain responsibilities. However, I feel the period of time in which I don't have to worry about that is a precious thing I should savor. It might seem odd that savoring life to me means doing things like reading gnxp but I can barely comprehend how happy the Amish can be without everything I'd consider essential to "the good life".
Bengali, it isn't cool now, it never has been cool and never will be cool to be a nerd. I can't stand the self-indulgent geeksturbation of "nerd culture" in its various forms, and I am a nerd. It's just nerds enviously imitating cooler types by declaring their subculture to be hip in a manner transparently lame to all but the most deluded.
Chet, don't let wusses dissuade you from a having a laugh. Dorks could use a good kick in the pants to get their act together and anyone sensitive enough to feel hurt by such mild mockery deserves more where it came from just for being such a baby.
Posted by: TGGP | December 13, 2006 12:26 AM
I find it interesting how the relation is U-shaped (i.e. both high and low IQ people are more likely to be virgins than people around the average. Particularly, the fact that 85% of women with IQ
I guess I'll join the other "cool people" on here and say that I hope I won't become like anonymou (even though it may well happen), because in my case it definitely wouldn't be by choice.
I don't know how much IQ itself has to do with it. I somehow think that a lot of women do prefer a guy with above average intelligence, just in certain cases other things may be more important. My IQ, while certainly being high for the population average (and for the chart above) is actually not uniquely high among the people I have gone to school with. I'm sure a lot of people I've known with an IQ in the same range are very satisfied with their sex lives, and not all of them are in the math/science area. I am a rather unique person in how I think, but mostly because of the specific areas of ability that I really excel at, not because my overall intelligence (as measured by IQ tests) is ridiculously high.
mjb-"It also seems to me that more often then not, if you're already in graduate school and you haven't found someone yet, time is running out. Once you're out of school opportunities get pretty scarce."
I don't know how true this is. However, some of my friends criticize me when I think about grad schools in terms of the women there, particularly when I express reservations about going to a technical school (since as you know math/science females are not my type). They say that there are many other ways to meet people aside from at school, and point out that many people in this country don't even go to college to prove their point.
I am totally with TGGP in wondering how I do when I'm out in the real world and have more responsibilities. Of course, I may well end up in academia in which case the change won't be that huge. However, I don't at all see this as a reason not to have sex. I sometimes find it remarkable how many people my age I've talked to who are already sure they want kids. While I'm not dead-set against the idea, the idea of having them sometime down the line holds no attraction to me at this age. I am more interested in playing around sexually than finding "the person" (whatever that means)--considering my level of experience in the area I think it's too early to be that committed.
Posted by: arosko | December 13, 2006 01:56 AM
i think that the reason "nerdy" or high IQ men cannot get laid is because they're far lower on the scale of Agreeability than the retards.
part of wooing a woman is making her feel special. i think that the high IQ folks recognize that very very few of us are all that special. the high IQ guys always call it like it is, and this is so antithetical to the fantasy-side of sex.
Posted by: the0ther | December 13, 2006 01:42 PM
These were adolescents, right? Since your IQ is correlated with that of your parents, and thus with SES, race, and all kinds of other goodies, it seems pretty likely that some of the effect here is different environments and values and such.
Does anyone know if early onset of puberty has a correlation with IQ?
Posted by: albatross | December 13, 2006 04:02 PM
Does anyone know if early onset of puberty has a correlation with IQ?
some evidence that the higher IQ develop more slowly.
Posted by: razib | December 13, 2006 04:10 PM
Well, this is another finding consistent with Rushton theory again. Maybe hundred years later, Rushton will be hailed as another Darlwin.
Posted by: AG | December 13, 2006 04:21 PM