Study: Americans Think They’re Smarter Than They Are (Duh!)

A recent poll from YouGov reveals that a piddling 4% of Americans think they are less intelligent than average, while 55% believe they are smarter than your normal everyday American moron. In all, 89% of Americans considered themselves at least average or above. If you know anything about math, you’d realize that this poll proves how dumb Americans are.

Seven percent—likely a loose aggregation of idiots and savants—said they “didn’t know.” At the very least, I admire their honesty.

Regarding who considers themselves “much more intelligent” than others, some of the results shattered a few of my preconceptions:

• Males edge out females by 9%. I figured most females think all men are idiots.

• Independents think they’re smarter than Republicans, who think they’re smarter than Democrats. I was under the impression that most Democrats deem themselves a bunch of Einsteins.

• Only 14% of those chauvinistic Northeasterners claim cognitive bragging rights, while 19% of Southerners and a bulldozing 26% of West Coasters considered themselves to be super-brainiacs. This is quelle surprise because at least judging by educational level, six of America’s 10 “Smartest States” are in the Northeast—or five if you don’t consider Maryland to be part of the Northeast, which I do, if merely because of the accent.

Otherwise, the rich, the educated, and white people were more likely to claim they were smarter than others. No surprises there.

According to this map of national mean IQs across the globe, Americans are only slightly dumber than average, but those tests are obviously biased in favor of the Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans.